mobile messaging

Many of the worlds network service providers offer "unlimited" mobile data plans. These "unlimited" data plans are usually limited to web browsing, and sometimes allow applications to connect using HTTP. These data plans have never been unlimited when it comes to what you can do with them. Applications such as EQO Mobile can connect using HTTP, but TCP is preferred because it is faster and consumes less data. I have never been impressed with the marketing of "unlimited" data plans. Now, much to my chagrin and to the displeasure or the mobile community in general, Orange is blatantly misconstruing the concept of the "unlimited" data plan by capping theirs at 30MB. I'd heard mentions of 500MB limits by the likes of Cingular in the past, but 30MB? At least 500MB is tough to reach on a mobile, 30MB is a down right attainable. I wonder if they don't want their users on the web so much? Maybe that would bog down their network?

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

It's official, mobile social networking is now a big deal, the key indicator being that it has its own conference.  It's true, there will be a Mobile Social Networking conference held in San Francisco at the end of July this year.  EQO will be in attendance and I assume will be bringing its big guns.  EQO CEO Bill Tam will surely be there to divulge the EQO perspective.  It should be an illuminating conference with many interesting discussions emerging for the blogosphere to feast on.

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

The EQO Support team has increased its membership by one. We've recently acquired the services of summer intern Christine, who we are delighted to have with us. Christine is a sharp and bubbly student going into her fourth year of the business program at UBC. She gained the opportunity to work with us at EQO by winning a competition at Enterprize2007. Instead of enjoying the relaxation and sun of a college summer she decided to slog it out with EQO Support helping to solve our users connection problems, good call. I mean, that's the sort of drive and determination that makes Christine a winner. Christine was delighted to have her picture taken for the purpose of this blog post (you should have seen the first one!). Peter pitched in by pretending to ponder a problem, good on him.

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

Today we at EQO Support received a voice mail message from a man in India wanting information for a blog post he was planning to write. The voice recording was very faint and we could not make out the man's contact details. If you are from India, called us today, and would like us to get back to you, please respond to this post and we'll contact you!

Thanks

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

The other day I was reading the blog of the famed Alec Saunders (check out his EQO review) when I came across this dandy: "Has mobile data finally arrived?" I hope it has. Here at EQO, the number one problem our users have is trouble connecting. This concept is a bit ridiculous to me because our users come to us knowing that the have some form of internet access. The problem lies in that "the internet" as its sold by the carriers is not truly "the internet". Why must there be so much confusion over different access points, restricted sites, unsupported protocols, and so on? Carriers, why can't you sell us "the internet" and make it just work?

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

I read an interesting post on MobileCrunch the other day, regarding Cingular's new linking policy.  Apparently they don't want anyone linking to anything but their homepage and you can only link to their homepage if you don't say anything negative about them.  The new AT&T I ask you this, what's the best way to get people to link to you and say negative things about you?  Answer: tell them they aren't allowed.

I was talking to Darla Mack about this in the light of her post about, and our subsequent conversation regarding, the restrictions put on the Cingular Nokia E62 (that's another post/rant right there) and decided to blog about it as well.   Turns out I am most definitely an infringer upon Cingular/AT&T's linking policy from when I negatively portrayed Cingular as evil (and linked to them at the same time, oh my!) for restricting third party application installation on the Nokia E62.  I wonder if they will sue me?  Here's hoping...

EQO Mobile users, this stance taken by a major wireless carrier epitomizes the challenges we face in delivering you quality service.  Application signing you ask?  We can't even link to them...

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

Engadget Mobile just told me the EU has struck a roaming deal. The particulars are a cap on rates, $0.66/min for outgoing and $0.33/min for incoming. That's the best they could do? No wonder we exist...

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

The Right Honorable Bill Tam, CEO of EQO, had the privilege of talking to Michele Steele of Forbes.com last week.

Check out the Video!

Send your fan mail to me and I'll pass it on, he's a busy man.

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist

The new EQO Mobile is here with mobile VoIP support for 20 countries, mobile IM, and mobile messaging!  The EQO team worked ridiculously hard to bring you this latest offering, especially our Operations, QA, Dev, and Management teams!  There is some real dedication here at EQO and I hope it shows in our new application.

We've revamped the whole interface, removed Skype support in favor of our own VoIP network, and built a Blackberry native version of EQO Mobile too!  Please check out www.eqo.com to download and find out all of the nitty gritty details.  Peter and I have started writing some forum posts at http://community.eqo.com/forums in anticipation of some of your questions.  Please post anything else you'd like to know there and we'll get on the case.  Also, your feedback is most definitely appreciated, we really want to hear what you think for the sake of improvement!

Cheers,

Chris
EQO Customer Evangelist