Video Diary: Ben on the future of ‘The Really Mobile Project’

Comment from Sebastian (almost 10):

"What happened to Whatleydude coming down to the country to test waterproof phones in my boat?"

Dear Sebastian,

Whatleydude would love to test a waterproof phone in your boat and is really looking forward to it - he's also asking a man with a plane to squish it and another man with anger issues, and the tools to express himself clearly, to test them too... When the other two men have told him when he can visit them, Whatleydude will visit you all (but he'll come to see you first).

Yours sincerely,

Ben
Whatleydude's UK handler and diary assistant

Welcome back guys.

Btw on the Sonim, "Dan Lane really took it apart .." - No he didn't. That's kind of the idea. But I think I know what you mean.

Now, where did I see a video of him throwing it down some stairs ... no, can't remember!

Fair point - the script editor will be shot.

Ben, a mild beating will suffice

2009/5/7 Disqus <>

Ben, a mild beating will suffice

2009/5/7 Disqus <>

Really loving the idea as well as the simplicity of the site. If you continue to provide the great content you guys have a win on your hands. Look forward to helping you grow.

Great. Will think of something constructive to shoot and contribute.

Looks good. Without Ewan's cynicism what's to stop this turning into a fan site where every new service or gadget is amazing?

E75 is a case in point. Come on. That phone is just wrong.

What's to stop it turning into a fan site? A fair question...

Well:

(1) The readers. You lot e-mail me to tell me when a graphic is 3 pixels to the left on a certain browser (and don't stop - we appreciate the help!). If we produce crap then we'll see the stats drop and the comments will be full of complaints. Seriously - you don't like it? Tell us. We listen, we cry a little inside and then we act.

(2) Our interest. Even to get to this stage we've invested a lot of time and money (not all of it publicly apparent yet). I've no more interest in producing a fan site than you have in reading one.

On the E75 - I disagree. I was one of the first group of independent people to receive a pre-production unit for test and review in the UK. It's not a handset I'd buy, but I'm a mobile geek.... What I will do though is recommend it to my boss who dislikes his Palm Treo for corporate access to e-mail, but won't appreciate the smaller keys of the E71 / E63. This device is well specced, well built and does a great hob of filling a slot in the whole E-series range.

You'd probably be amazed at how popular the HTC S610 &S710 is with people who have to use Windows Mobile at work.

Re: Cynicism, two words: Dan. Lane.

Also, I'm yet to see an E75 review on this site - but when one appears we'll happily take your criticism/opinions/comments. After all, that's what we're here for right - the conversation?

Cheers 'Anon', hope to see you back here soon.

J.

I'm really liking the site, especially the mobile version of it - the design works well with the content and I don't think there is any other mobile site that beats it.

Can't wait for the more content to start coming through!

It's getting exciting now guys. Good luck with it all. I agree with Chris. I missed you while you were gone. Even though it was a little while.

Really great to have you guys back "on air"!

The internet has not been the same without you all!

Chris - Solihull

An interesting concept. The one thing I would note is that I followed a URL that had been tweeted by @bookmeister on my iphone and....I couldn't view the video because it wasn't in an appropriate format. Also, I would have hoped for a mobile formatted version of the site - not really nescessary for the iphone as it features a fully funcitonal browser however it would have been a nice touch to have a more appropriate layout for my handset. But nice site and a good 2nd video.

Wayne - there is a mobile version of the site... see the top right corner of the main page. It *should* also auto-detect if you're mobile and display the correct version (unless you've previously chosen to switch back to the full version) - there's a 'touch' and a 'simple' variant of the mobile interface.

On the mobile version of the site all the videos are provided via YouTube instead of Vimeo and are playable on the iPhone just by clicking them.

I can't test with an iPhone right now, but it works OK from the G1 and a Windows Mobile handset (yuk) for me.

Anyone else see this?

Genius award for mobile optimised video distribution :)

Why thankyou, sir :-)

We will have podcast / iTunes links too when the main show kicks off.

the homepage isn't really friendly for people who freshly type in the url. i get what you're trying to do with the windows as previews idea, but even then it isn't very intuitive.

the above commenter said "top gear of mobile," well why not check out their site: http://www.topgear.com/uk/

What is it you feel is confusing Stefan?

guess i'm just not used to the grid approach, i'm so used to seeing the blog format aka reverse timeline of posts.

Well we _are_ listening so we'll try to address that concern into the on-going improvements.

great new site, this is TOP GEAR of mobile and we must all do our part to make sure this project really works thanks guys