Blocking Cell Phones In Prison

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Cellular Agent

There is an article in the Baltimore Edition of CBS Local about keeping cell phones out of prisons. According to the story, the Maryland Department of Public Safety will attempt to:

block covert inmate calls by creating a radio frequency umbrella around prisons.

Supposedly, this will allow legitimate calls in and out, but block calls from unauthorized cell phones. It sounds pretty good in theory, and will be nice if it works, but the second it does, the bad guys are just going to hire some geek from Harvard, or Cal Tech, to break the system.

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Mobile VoIP To Replace Cell Minute Usage

Posted on March 30, 2012 by Cellular Agent

As your cell phone’s data pipe gets fatter, there will be less and less reason to use your cell phone minutes, when you could be using a VoIP app to make your calls instead. As 4G broadband becomes more widespread, there will no longer be any reason not to kill your cell phone’s per minute plan, and just go with unlimited data. As a matter of fact, if you’re not much of a data user, you could opt for the cheapest data plan, and use it for VoIP calls, because VoIP calls need only low data streams to work.

If you’ve got an Android phone, and you’d like to try out some free VoIP apps, head over to the android store, and try some out. according to current download stats, Skype has the most downloads for their VoIP and video chat app, with 377,390. Viber is second, with 82,042 downloads of their app, but they claim over 40 million users. Which reminds me, these VoIP apps only work for free in network… That means if you’re using the Skype app, you can only talk to other Skype users, unless you want to pay for it.

If you’re looking for an app that you can use to call regular phone numbers for free in the US and Canada, then you need to sign up with MagicJack, and download their VoIP cell phone app. Right now, the app only works on Apple products, but hopefully they’ll have one for Android soon. You can get it for free as a trial, but you can only call in network if you do that.

Of course, after I wrote this, I wandered out to Sprint.com to see what they had in the way of data only plans, and they didn’t. I then went to Verizon, and they do offer some data only plans, but they are for “Tablets Only”. Those plans started at $20.00 for 1GB of data, which would be enough for between 300 and 600 minutes of calling, depending on your kbps data rate. (Most VoIP calls are in the 30-40kbps range, but they can go as high as 80 kbps.) Of course, if you’re going to do that, just grab a plan from StraightTalk, and get 1000 minutes of calling, 34GB of data and 1000 texts for $35 per month.

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Ping4 Pusher App

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Cellular Agent

Ping4 is releasing an app that pushes emergency alerts to your phone once you cross into the the alert’s geographical boundary area. Agencies that have purchased the ability to push data, can enter their information, and a geographical boundary into the system, and when someone with the Ping4 app crosses into that geographical area, the message gets pushed to their phone.

This can be used in many ways, from alerting a whole town that their electricity will be out for 4 hours, or that the river is flooding, to letting people at the local football game know that little Johny is lost. There are a ton of “GOOD” uses for this product, but it can also be used for “EVIL”. LOL

Companies can buy the services of Ping4 to deliver messages to their customers when they cross the store’s boundaries. While little messages about turning off your headlights and locking your car door might be OK, I think it will desensitize people to the app, if it goes off every time they get near a commercial establishment. If it’s going off all the time, people will start ignoring it, and it will then lose it’s value as an early warning system for real emergencies.

How much do you want to bet, that once the system is up and running nationwide, Billybob, and his cousins, the evil hacker twins, will figure out some way to send ads to everyone in the world who has the app? I mean, how cool would it be to stick your affiliate code in an email/text/video message, and send it to 22 million people? I’m pretty sure it would generate some health commissions…

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Channel Partners Expo Mobile App

Posted on March 12, 2012 by Cellular Agent

If you’re going to the Channel Partner’s Expo in Vegas the week of the 26th, you might want to download the Channel Partners Expo Mobile App. android phones and pads can download it from the Android App Store, while iPhone and iPad people can do the same from the Apple Store.

The new app will let users find exhibitors, navigate the show floor, review their daily agenda, manage their schedule and more.

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Comparing T-Mobile and Verizon Family Cell Phone Plans

Posted on December 26, 2011 by Cellular Agent

Cell phone service is practically a necessity when you have a growing family. Teenagers need a way to contact mom or dad or call 911 in an emergency. Having a cell phone is not a luxury anymore. When you have made the decision to get a family cell phone plan, the task then is deciding which service provider to choose. Selecting a plan that meets the needs of your family and fits your price range is key.

The approach to determining the ideal provider is to conduct a comparison of their family cell phone plans. The one that delivers the best value for the money will be the best one to pick. These examples below show the features and prices of T-Mobile and Verizon family plans.  Both are reputable service providers but one may have more to offer. It is always a good idea to research any company you plan to put money in.

T-Mobile Classic Family Unlimited Plus (2-line, shared)

  • Features:
  • Unlimited T-Mobile-to-T-Mobile Calling
  • Unlimited Nights and Weekends
  • Nationwide Long Distance
  • Caller ID
  • Voice Mail
  • Call Waiting, Call Hold, 3-Way Calling

Monthly Charges: $139.98

Fees: $36 activation fee, $200 early termination fee

Unique Benefits: No Roaming Charges

Verizon Nationwide Voice and Messaging Unlimited (2-line, shared)

Features:

  • Unlimited Messaging (text, picture, video) to Any Network
  • Unlimited Mobile-to-mobile
  • Unlimited Nights and Weekends
  • Nationwide Long Distance
  • Mobile Web Pay-Per-Use @1.99 per MB
  • Caller ID
  • Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3-Way Calling

Monthly Charges: $149.98

Fees: $35 activation, $350 early termination fee

Unique Benefits: No Roaming Charges on the Verizon Wireless Network

 Conclusions:

Based on the information above, it would seem like T-Mobile offers a good service and at a lower monthly charge. However, even though it is $10 more, Verizon has included text, picture and video messaging in the plan and T-Mobile has not. Text and picture messaging are optional and added onto the plan for an extra charge. T-Mobile does include unlimited web browsing while Verizon charges for data service. In determining the right plan for you, you will need to decide what feature you need and which ones you do not mind paying extra for.

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Sports Tracker App

Posted on December 19, 2011 by Cellular Agent

Sports Tracker is an award winning App that uses GPS to keep record of a variety of your daily routine workouts. Whether you are jogging on your favorite track, running or cycling, Sports Tracker will keep track of the distance, duration and energy spent in your Training Diary. This information puts you in better control and gives you another way to share your daily, weekly or monthly data outputs, including route, speed and photos, with your followers on your favorite social networks like Twitter and Facebook.

Your phone is also synchronized with all of your exercise information and tracked online at sports-tracker.com. Application are available for “Windows Mobile 7”, iPhone and Android phone users. Your free Sports Tracker app may be downloaded and installed from the Sports Tracker website.

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Who Has The Cheapest Shared Minute Plan?

Posted on December 17, 2011 by Cellular Agent

Who has the cheapest family cell phone plans between T-Mobile, Sprint and Verizon? Unlimited family plans offer the best benefits for the money, but which plan is actually the cheapest? Well, we did a little research, and the cheapest unlimited 2 line plan comes from T-Mobile for $139.98 per month. This T-Mobile plan comes with unlimited texting, pictures, video messaging and more.

Shared plans are for two or more phones and users can opt for additional lines for a low monthly fee. Parents can get a phone for each member of the family on the same account. This is a cheaper option than paying for individual plans. Most unlimited plans come with the most frequently used features, like caller ID and call waiting.

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Sony Ericsson To Release Nyphone

Posted on December 14, 2011 by Cellular Agent

Sony Ericsson is planning to re-brand to Sony in the Middle of 2012. Rumors are that with this re-branding, it will come up with a new phone with just a Sony logo on top. The phone will succeed the current Sony Ericsson Nozomi which has almost disappeared. Glancing at the specs of the new entry, Nyphone will come with a 1GHz dual-core U8500 chip-set developed by one of their subsidiaries. A 4 inch HD display, 8 megapixel camera having back-lit sensors, 1GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage capacity should make this phone worth to your money.

The Android operating system from Google will add let users add apps to enhance the phone’s features. Initially it will be loaded with Android Ginger-bread, and later on Android 4.0 Ice cream Sandwich is expected to replace Ginger-bread.

You must be thinking “do I really want this smart phone?” or “Will the Nyphone be any  better that the  Nozomi?” Confused? You are not alone. This phone may end up hitting the cell phone market with a pretty low price tag.

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Droid X Android Smartphone

Posted on December 8, 2011 by Cellular Agent

The Droid X is for users who need all of the normal web browsing and messaging features expected from a smartphone but who also need amazing high definition video playback and capture features. This phone is awesome!

The Droid X has a high resolution touchscreen with an incredible  4.3 inch edge to edge display. It runs on Android 2.1 and has a 1GHz processor so it is a really fast phone. It comes with 8GB of internal memory and a preinstalled 16GB micro-SD card. It can also double as a 3G mobile hotspot with a subscription so you can use it to provide WiFi for up to 5 devices.

The Droid X smartphone was built for video. It delivers video viewing and video capturing experiences. It has a high definition, high resolution widescreen for watching video. Its camcorder shoots 720p video and utilizes 3 microphones, a front mic, a back mic and a mic on top to take visually stunning video and get great audio quality.

You can use three video scenario modes to adjust the mic configuration to match the environment that you’re shooting in.

Narrative mode turns the volume from the back mic down so that most of the audio captured is focused on your voice.

Outdoors mode uses both the front and the back mics to get all of the sound.

And subject mode focuses volume recording on the back mic so that the majority of the audio capture is on the person or thing you are shooting.

Bottomline, the X takes great looking and great sounding video plus the HDMI output lets you run the hi-def video from your phone to a TV.

THe X also takes great pictures. It has an 8.0 mega-pixel camera with a fast mechanical shutter, there’s a dual LED flash, autofocus, panoramic view and more.

The dedicated camera key let’s you start shooting quickly so you’re not  the person fumbling to get your camera going while everyone else is getting great shots. The X makes sharing all those great photos easy with integrated photo sharing for Facebook, Picasa and Photobucket. Because the X is a Droid, you can customize it to be the phone that you need it to be.

It comes preloaded with several resizeable widgets and of course you can choose from thousands of downloadable Android apps and games.

One that is specially cool is, for a fee, the Blockbuster application will let you download and watch movies the same day they are available on DVD right on the phone. For music, it has the Android music player and has a built-in FM radio. As far as web browsing, messaging and contact and calendar management, the Droid X does it all. It has an HTML file based browser for surfing the web, it has push email support for Gmail, Exchange and Yahoo and it has IMAP or POP support for Hotmail and AOL mail. The integrated Google, Exchange, Facebook, Myspace and Twitter contacts put all of your personal and professional contacts into one single place which makes it easier to stay in touch with everyone in your life. The X has unified corporate and Google calendars then you won’t have to check between two different calendars to know what’s going on. So the busier you are, the more help you get from the X.

The advance speech to text functionality makes composing emails and status updates easier than ever. Just speak your message and X will type it for you. That will speed things up but swipe is going to help you move even faster.

Swipe is a new way to enter text in a touch screen. It uses error correcting algorithms and predictive technology so that you type a word by sliding a finger from letter to letter and you only have to lift of the screen between words which really increases typing speed.

The X is a power house for video, messaging and more. If you’re looking for a smartphone that handles all your messaging and web browsing needs with ease, and delivers an amazing mobile video experience then the Droid X from Motorola is a must have.

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Overview of the Blackberry Curve 8530

Posted on November 3, 2011 by Cellular Agent

The BlackBerry Curve 8530 is a powerful multimedia device designed to keep your business and personal lives with you when you’re on the go.

On the front of the phone, you’ll find the earpiece, display screen, optical trackpad and full QWERTY keyboard. The headset jack, charger and accessories jack and left convenience key which accesses voice dialing are located on the left side of the phone. The volume buttons and right convenience key which launches the camera are located on the right side of the phone. The left and right convenience keys can be reassigned to open your choice of applications. Dedicated music keys located on the top of the phone keep you connected to your music library when you’re on the go. The microphone is located on the bottom of the phone. The 2 mega-pixel camera and camcorder lens is located on the back of the phone.

The curve is designed to quickly access essential business solutions on the go.

Stay connected with 3G technology that provides fast web browsing on the nationwide Sprint Network
Use the Curve’s WiFi feature to easily connect to WiFi hotspots or your home and office WiFi network
Capture high resolution pictures and videos with the built-in 2 mega-pixel camera
Stay connected with instant access to social networking applications such as Pandora, Facebook, Flickr and Myspace
Download and play music from the Sprint Music Store
Watch live Sprint TV and Video on Demand and keep track of the latest scores and standings with NASCAR Sprint Cup Mobile and NFL Mobile Live
Get where you need to go with GPS Navigation for turn by turn driving directions
And enjoy the convenience of hands free communication by using stereo bluetooth compatible devices

At home, in the office or on the go the BlackBerry Curve 8530 Smartphone brings your whole life together.

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