Everybody chuckled when Tellme, a mobile voice company snapped up by Microsoft almost two years ago, released its smartphone voice search application for BlackBerry, instead of for Windows Mobile. Thanks to a new native application that will be released on Windows Mobile 6.5 phones this coming fall, the ribbing may entirely subside.
On Wednesday, Tellme announced the application's features and its shipping plan. Like rival voice services for smartphones, you click a hardware hotkey to initiate the program's digital ears, and from there you can begin a search, call a number, or dictate a text message. This last feature will be new to Tellme's Windows Mobile app.
(Credit:
Tellme)
Tellme's application will offer more voice services than the straight voice search that Yahoo Mobile, Windows Live Mobile, and Google Mobile App are currently capable of, but after watching Tellme's demo here at CNET, it appears that it won't be as fully stocked as Vlingo when it's released. Vlingo--a free voice service for BlackBerry and iPhone, but not yet Windows Mobile--adds greater dictation powers, including launching native applications, updating your status on Facebook and Twitter, and reading back e-mail messages.
Another notable difference between the two is the fact that Tellme is integrated into Windows Mobile at the network level--which one would expect from an acquired company--and that at launch, it will only search using Microsoft Live Search. We understand the prerogative, but the app is much likelier to succeed in offering choice.
Like many contemporary mobile apps, Tellme for Windows Mobile will also use GPS or cell phone tower triangulation to localize searches, making a search for "weather" or "movie theaters" serve up businesses in your neighborhood. It's hard to say exactly how Tellme will stack up to its competitors, but when it comes out alongside Windows Mobile 6.5 we'll let you know.
Tellme for Windows Mobile phones will be available beginning Wednesday to manufacturers that want to load it onto Windows Mobile 6.5 phones. Come autumn, the general public will be able to find it (in English) on the phones, in the Windows Marketplace for Mobile, and directly from Tellme's mobile-optimized site.
OK, Mike McCue, CEO of recently-acquired-by-Microsoft Tellme: Tell me again why your brand new mobile phone app--the cool one that lets you speak a business name or category into the phone and then gives you nearest matches on your screen--is out first for the BlackBerry, and not Windows Mobile?
As McCue explained it to me, Tellme had the BlackBerry app well into development when Microsoft acquired his company. But why BlackBerry at all? Because it's a better platform for Java, which the app is built on, than is Windows Mobile.
Push to talk.
Of course, Tellme will build a Windows Mobile version of the new app eventually. And in fact, McCue hopes that Tellme's functionality is embedded deeply into the next major release of Windows Mobile (version 7). But that's not coming too soon since Microsoft only just shipped Windows Mobile 6.
As to this new BlackBerry app: It is very strong. You can assign a button on your smartphone to it, and then just it hold it down, speak a directory lookup, like "coffee" or "Nordstrom," and the phone's screen displays the closest matches to you, based on your GPS location. Then you can select an option to call the location, map it, get directions, or share the link with someone else.
You can also speak a movie title or ask for a weather forecast. Sports scores are coming soon. So is the capability to look up names and numbers from your phone's directory, or your Outlook contacts list.
All the processing and rendering, including the voice recognition itself, happens on Tellme's servers, not on your phone. So you get fast and accurate responses--assuming you have a fast connection.
The interface is miles ahead of Microsoft's current smartphone app, Live Search Mobile. Tellme technology also powers the voice recognition in that app, but the interface is confusing and involved. Tellme, meanwhile, is moving towards simplifying its UI even further, aiming for what McCue calls the "60 mile-per-hour interface," the mobile phone lookup user experience that's safe to use while driving. For all our sakes, I hope Tellme gets that right.
Mobile users away from their computers have had a handful of options for directory services in the past couple of years. There's TellMe (555-TELL), FREE-411, CALL-411, and GOOG-411 to name some of the free ones. There are also the official ones from each of the carriers that are billed a la carte--and usually at a high price.
This morning FREE-411 (one of the older services of the crowd) has announced a partnership with a useful driving directions service Dial DIR-ECT-IONS to help people find phone numbers and addresses for businesses or residential listings along with step-by-step directions for how to get there. The service starts next month in three major cities (Los Angeles, the SF Bay Area, and Chicago) and then nationwide in April.
This is immensely helpful if your handset isn't on a data plan, or you're away from a phonebook or map. Competitor TellMe, which is owned by Microsoft, has had such a mixed feature using its downloadable phone app, but no such service for its text, or 800-based phone services.
Get Google maps on your phone now, using 1-800-GOOG-411
(Credit: CNET Networks)Users of Google's free 411 service (1-800-GOOG-411), can now get maps sent straight to their phone. Once you've found your listing, just say "map it" to get a text message containing the address and a link to its location on Google Maps mobile. Users also get a link to turn-by-turn driving directions.
Since writing about the service in early April, I've become a regular user. Nine times out of 10, it works like a charm, while occasionally the voice recognition can and will fail--and when it does, it's often quite amusing.
If you're looking for a more flashy mobile mapping tool, TellMe's downloadable Java app gives you 411, maps, and directions in one slick interface. Assuming you have a data plan, it's free to use. Google's mobile offerings also link up to one another, including their mobile search, and mapping. For nondata plan types like me though, this new service is good way to cut data usage to a minimum.
[via Official Google blog]
- Brightcove and CBS News parner up. CBS' News division has teamed up with Brightcove to play popular news content like CBS Evening News on Brightcove.com. This is one of the many sites and services CBS is partnering with as part of their "Interactive Audience Network," which is marketing speak for taking their shows off the television and putting them online. They've also been working with YouTube and AOL to expand online offerings of CBS programming. (CNET News.com)
- MySpace sexual preference bug causes stir. A small bug on MySpace that removed the option for users to select "Gay" as their sexual preference led to a small uproar last night. MySpace figurehead and founder Tom Anderson posted a bulletin acknowledging the bug, and noted that not only would it be fixed, but that "MySpace does not hate gay people..duh."
- Microsoft closes Tellme Deal. Tellme is now officially owned by Microsoft after the initial announcement of the purchase back in May. Tellme is working on a variety of voice and telephone related projects, including their slick mobile phone app which we chose as one of our Top 5 offerings at the Web 2.0 Expo last month. (CNET News.com Blog)
- AOL slips to No. 3 on Internet. AOL is now the third most popular Internet Service Provider (ISP) behind AT&T and Comcast. The company's focus on providing a portal service (one that looks quite familiar) as of last year has moved them away from offering a connection to the internet and towards content like music and news. (CNET News.com)
The first Web 2.0 Expo is behind us, and it was a good show. In addition to dozens of interesting panels (including, if I do say so, mine), there were about 115 companies presenting on a crowded expo show floor, and six interesting company presentations during the "Launchpad" sessions that ran on Monday and Tuesday.
With Webware.com's Josh Lowensohn and News.com's Erica Ogg, we picked our Top 5 Web 2.0 services from the conference. They are:
- Tellme, which has a new downloadable app for getting useful 411-like info on your mobile phone. (news)
- Octopz, a very slick collaboration service we covered a few days ago. (hands-on)
- Dapper, which can make any Web site into an RSS feed or widget. (field report)
- Coghead, a Web-based database that just came out of beta. (hands-on)
- Spock, the upcoming people search engine. (preview)
Play the video for the full rundown.
Three new products were demo'd today at the Web 2.0 Expo, rounding out the big product launches at this conference. (Yesterday's news came from Spock [review], InPowr, and Webex.) Today the pitches came from the following companies.
Swivel makes a great data exploration service. See previous coverage on Webware and ZDNet.
No new product news from Swivel, but the company is announcing that the OECD is an official partner to the company now. Swivel is a killer demo. If you like playing with data, this is definitely worth trying out.
Vidoop has a new system that replaces passwords with picture categories. See this morning's coverage.
One thing I didn't mention in this morning's post: Each computer that you use Vidoop on must be authorized, and that happens via a confirmation message sent to your mobile phone.
TellMe launched a free directory listing service to compete with Google's new 411 system. TellMe is adding a visual component to their old-school voice-recognition-based information retrieval service (1-800-555-TELL). The system sends you text messages for your results, and will map them too (it fires up your phone's browser to display it). Also new from TellMe: A downloadable client app to make accessing the TellMe data even easier... although it seems a little weird for a company based on voice response to release a standard phone app.
Tellme Networks, which Microsoft is acquiring, today is scheduled to launch a free service that allows people to get directory listings on their phone by voice or text message. The service is designed to enable Tellme users to call 1-800-555-TELL (8355) and say "business search" to get a business listing or to search for a category like "cafes."
People can also send a text message to TELLM (83556) with a request such as "Starbucks San Francisco" and get a text message back with listings and map links. Tellme also offers a software download for mobile phones that lets people speak their request and see results displayed on the phone screen. Google also recently launched free voice-activated local search.
- Viacom drops $1 billion lawsuit on YouTube. The news came this morning that Viacom is suing Google-owned YouTube for "massive intentional copyright infringement." The suit is due to the repeated viewing of almost 160,000 clips of Viacom-owned content that were hosted on the service. It was only a matter of time before the big lawsuits came from content providers after Google's acquisition of YouTube late last year. It's worth noting that the lawsuit amount is more than half of what Google paid for YouTube in stock in November. (CNET News.com)
- Shots of MySpace News surface. Screens of the upcoming MySpace News service have been posted on Wired.com. They come from a leaked PowerPoint presentation, the same one that led to a source for our report on it last week--this time with pictures of the design and user interface. As we predicted, there are some serious ads going on. (Wired.com)
- Sources say Microsoft near deal to buy Tellme. Normally we don't report on rumored buy-outs and acquisitions, but this one is interesting. Tellme has some neat voice-recognition tools for mobile phones, including a nifty 411 service that works with voice or text and integrates maps. We can only assume there would be some future integration with Windows Live Maps, or perhaps incorporating voice recognition into the next version of Windows Mobile. Bill Gates likes ridiculously futuristic stuff like that. (CNET News.com)
(Credit:
CNET Networks)
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