Highlights of the Week
The Google I/O event just passed us by and there have plenty of other major things happenings in the mobile phone industry. If you have not been in touch with the largest headlines, here is the quick recap of things.
First off, Apple is still undecided about the worldwide launch of the iPad. The touch screen tablet is still slated for a May 28 launch, though the official UK Apple online website now states that the device will be in shelves by June 7 –just in time for Apple’s big announcement. Many are expecting the folks at Cupertino to finally show off their new iPhone HD/4G handset. In other Apple news, they are now facing about four different patent infringement lawsuits; one each from Nokia, HTC, Elan Microelectronics and some company named Monkey (no, we are not kidding).
Google has finally come out with Android 2.2 Froyo as well as the announcement of their next Android version, 3.0 Gingerbread which is expected to appear later this year. The company is now focusing on development of HTML5 along with Adobe who has promised to deliver their own HTML5 development tools –something that would certainly make a lot of developers happy.
A new Dreamweaver has been shown at the Google I/O where Adobe showed off the software’s ability to handle different HTML5 and CSS for phone, tablet and desktop variations of a single website.
Speaking of Google, the company is now under investigation from Germany and Spain regarding the WiFi data that was collected by the Google Street Car. UK’s ICO has decided to respect and honor Google’s decision to delete the data.
In the world of social networking, Facebook has launched the new 0.facebook.com and m.facebook.com –two super mobile optimized versions of the website (0 for standard phones, m for touch screen devices). The social network has also partnered with 50 operators across 45 countries to make access to the mobile versions of the site free of charge. Sadly, the UK is not in that list.