Follow us on www.mobilevikings.com

Since the launch of Mobile Vikings we are very focussed in turning this new exciting Mobile Operator into a success. This is why we concentrate all of our communication on http://mobilevikings.com/news/.

City Live remains dedicated to it’s core CSP technology platform and is happy to be able to show of their capabilities in Mobile Vikings.

See you on www.mobilevikings.com !

Mobile Vikings already popular before release

The word is out. City Live is changing the Belgian telecoms landscape by starting up a new mobile operator with a heart for internet.

Mobile Vikings was supposed to be launched in silence today. With an invite based system, we are aiming for a controlled growth path to let the world get used to our model. Instead, Frederik Tibau from Datanews spotted what we were doing, with a host of other coverage on the internet in it’s slipstream:

http://www.iphoned.nl/gratis-internetten-op-de-iphone/4005/
http://pi007.wordpress.com/2008/12/15/mobile-vikings/
http://www.mobisphere.be/mobisphere/2008/12/mobile-vikings-apporte-linternet-mobile-gratuit-en-belgique.html
http://www.tijd.be/nieuws/ondernemingen_media_telecom/Kleine_gsm-spelers_hebben_bijna_tiende_van_markt.8118364-435.art
http://www.telecompaper.com/nl/article.aspx?cid=650027
http://www.datanews.be/nl/news/90-5-21513/nieuwe-operator–mobile-vikings–biedt-gratis-mobiel-internet.html
http://www.iii.co.uk/investment/detail?code=cotn%3AARTA.L&display=discussion&action=detail&id=4379533
http://www.nieuws.be/nieuws/Nieuwe_operator_Mobile_Vikings_biedt_gratis_mobiel_internet_2853b6c9.aspx
http://www.iphonic.be/profiles/blogs/gratis-mobiel-internet-met
http://belgoit.be/un-nouvel-operateur-offrira-linternet-mobile-gratuit

Today at noon we will send out an email with more information to everyone who requested to stay informed on http://mobilevikings.com. Stay tuned over the next days, we’re in for a hell of a ride.

Web Goes Mobile 2008: We have lift-off!

Today, our colleagues from MobileWeb organised their Web Goes Mobile seminar for the third time. Lot’s of IT, media and communications people learned how they should handle the mobile web in their business.

At this kind of seminar the word used to be “going to”. The mobile web is going to change your business, yes, sometimes in the future, it will. Not for this edtion. Both speakers and audience where discussing real business, real projects and measurable results.

MOBILE WEB 2.0, when will the bomb explode?

Marc Vanlerberghe Google Inc.	Peter Vandermeersch De Standaard	Paul Golding Mobile 2.0 Expert	Nanno Palte InSites Consulting

The speakers where top notch, the discussions where interesting and the host and sponsors provided everyone with a warm welcome. Most importantly, this event convinced me that the feeling I’m having since a few months is reality: The mobile web market in Belgium is now really taking off.

PS: to know more about the content of the presentations, read up on the live twittering by Clo Willaerts and myself

City Live featured on Techncrunch

It is fun to be cool. A few weeks ago I pitched at the Techcrunch Belgian meetup. Having told the story about Gloweme already a dozen times, I decided it was now time to unveil our MVNO plans.

Mike Butcher was quite enthusiastic about it, although he got a few details wrong (gloweme.com is not the home of our new MVNO, the name is still a well kept secret). But we’re more then happy with the article he wrote on Techcrunch.

Anyway, if you want to learn more, monitor this blog. ON Decmber 6th  we’ll publish the website.

Mobile Monday Brussels: a strong start

Last Monday the Belgian mobile internet professionals gathered for Mobile Monday Brussels. The meeting proved that the industry is really getting started.

(picture by Simon Schoeters)

It was in the wonderful new office of IBBT in Brussels that more than 50 people gathered to listen to the talks of Pieter Ballon (IBBT) and Fabian Tilmant (Cleverwoods). Tanguy De Lestré made sure everyone was happy. He also gave an overview of the status of other Mobile Monday chapters in the world.
On to the next one, maybe City Live can present their new MVNO venture with free mobile internet as a topic!

Mobile internet for the masses: let’s get social

City Live has preached it for more then a year now: If you want to unleash the mobile internet, you need to focus on the average consumer. The operator 3 in the UK has done just that.

Although the iPhone, Android, Windows mobile and Blackberry are top notch mobile internet devices, for many consumers they are just too expensive for a phone. If mobile internet wants to penetrate into the mainstream, it needs to be available on cheaper phones.

After the success of the Skype phone last year, 3 introduced the Facebook phone: 94 € buys you a nice slider phone with perfect Facebook integration. You are “always on”, with messages being pushed to you in realtime. Furthermore, your contacts are automatically updated with the facebook profile pictures of your friends and all status messages come together with your Gmail and Hotmail messages in one single inbox.

We’ll give the people of Hutchison (makers of the phone) a call and see if we can distribute it in Belgium!

City Live presentation: The magic of mobile

Last Friday, my colleague Koen and I gave a presentation about the future of mobile and the choices City Live makes. We called it ‘the magic of mobile’. Our public? Students communication and multimedia design or the web decision makers of tomorrow. Take a look:

The presentation was part of a set of experimental media classes, in which the students are challenged to do an assignment with the tools they are introduced to. That’s why our R&D director Davy ended the presentation with a GLOWE workshop. He showed amongst others how you can make a mobile application with the GLOWE specification and put it on iGoogle or your blog as well.

Mobile internet for 10 euro per month with ‘ME by Metro’

The free Belgian newspaper Metro has introduced its own mobile product: ME by Metro.

For 10 euro per month, subscribers can monthly

• call for 60 minutes to Belgian numbers or
• send 120 text messages to all Belgian networks or
• send 120 MMS messages to all ME and Base numbers and
• use a 10mb data package that allows users to go on mobile internet

Customers can combine those options the way they want. Metro has chosen the Belgian BASE network for its mobile product. It’s the most modern network and it has an excellent coverage, says the free newspaper.

At City Live, we are especially thrilled with the 10mb internet offer. It introduces subscribers to mobile internet and therefore helps to bring it into the mainstream market.

Metro has introduced the ‘Are You Me’ action to put its newest product in the picture. People visiting the website are challenged to find their lookalike. They are asked to upload a picture, find someone they are really similiar to, and then others can vote for the best lookalikes. The winners get a ME package.

Social Bookmarks:

Stefan Fountain about the evolution of mobile

My colleague Gert pointed me at a presentation at FOWA (Future of Web Apps) last week, in which Stefan Fountain talks about the future of mobile. Especially minutes 18 to 25 are interesting. They are about commoditisation or “to turn yesterday’s hot stuff into today’s boredom”.

Fountain compares internet to electricity in order to make clear how a rare thing eventually becomes ubiquitous. “And when something becomes normal, it disappears”. In his speech, he talks about the different layers we constantly build new layers on. The new internet layers (like eg the micro-blogging tool Twitter) are very visible at the moment, but it doesn’t mean that ‘old’ layers (like internet connections) aren’t important.  If we hadn’t internet connections, there would never be Twitter. Yet, internet connections have already turned into boredom, we just assume they are there. And thanks to those layers, there will always be new ones.

Check it out:

more about “Future Of Web Apps – London 2008“, posted with vodpod

Social Bookmarks:

Mobile Marketing becomes commonplace

There was a time that only large companies made the effort to set up their own website. It took the internet about 5 years before the local merchants jumped on the bandwagon. The mobile industry again proves to be faster.
Today Unizo, the official Belgian interest group of self-employed people and small or medium-sized enterprises, published an article about Mobile Marketing in their magazine “ZOMagazine”.

Mobile Marketing article

The article discusses how local merchants can use mobile marketing to their benefit. Our colleagues from Mobileweb are cited for their market lead in SMS solutions. The article also explains that you can go further than SMS and opt for an MMS or mobile internet solution. Unizo did their homework well. They even analysed the Belgian situation and concluded that due to the lack of subsidized handsets there is still less mobile internet penetration than in our neighbouring countries.

A nice view on technology from an organisation whose main goal is to represent plumbers, butchers and shopkeepers!

Social Bookmarks: