If you’re looking tempted by Mundu, but remain a penny-pincher, Instango just launched, offering free support across multiple instant messaging systems, like GTalk, ICQ, AIM, MSN, Yahoo, QQ, Gadu-Gadu and Jabber. Instango also features SMS, mail and RSS access, file and picture sending, as well as a push-to-talk system. Sounds like it’s worth a shot if you’re still shopping around for that one client to handle all your chatting needs.
Tag: Yahoo!Page 2 of 3
Free IM client launches for BlackBerry
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Lots of guests this week! We talk with both the Yahoo! oneSearch team, as well as Vlingo, the force behind its voice recognition search. We also take some time with Alltel to talk about their upcoming BlackBerry 8330, what plans are available, as well as what it’s like being a CDMA carrier in a GSM world. We also bring in the news, including fresh news on the BlackBerry 9000, a significant raise in BlackBerry’s brand value, the due date for Sprint’s Curve, and plenty more. You can download Episode 27 directly here, get it via feed here, or subscribe via iTunes.
Not to be out-done by Yahoo’s oneSearch, Microsoft announced Tellme for your BlackBerry. Not only does it recognize voice commands like “weather”, “movies”, “traffic” and “map”, as well as search for any company name, but the app also takes into account your GPS coordinates to further narrow down search results. It’s odd that the BlackBerry version came out before Windows Mobile, but you’ll hardly hear us complaining. You can check it out at www.tellme.com.
Vlingo’s speech recognition technology is behind the recent release of Yahoo! oneSearch. They also offer their own search app called Vlingo FIND, which searches locally and includes maps. They’re developing an app that will add speech recognition to pretty much every aspect of the BlackBerry: calling, emailing, text messages, memos to self, and more. WES, of course, would make a perfect venue for release…
Yahoo! has teamed up with Vlingo (not to be confused with Vringo) to offer speech recognition in their mobile web search app. If you’re in the US on a Pearl, Curve, or 8800-series BlackBerry you can snag it here. It worked pretty well in my brief test, getting most of what I said right even when I sort of mumbled, although it seemed to have a little trouble with background noise. There are plans to make it work on more devices and in more countries too, so hopefully more people will be able to get their hands on it soon.
If you’ve somehow missed WorldMate Live, we’ve got you covered with a review, a spotlight, and a podcast. The software is a must-have for any globetrotter, allowing you to create itineraries and check world clocks, flight status, weather and more. Their latest update adds support for reading travel confirmation emails from a number of web-based email services including Yahoo! Mail and Windows Live Mail. Users can forward confirmations to WorldMate’s confirmation address to have them automatically added to their itinerary and pushed to their BlackBerry, or have their travel agents skip the middleman and send them directly to WorldMate. They’ve also added Safari support, so Mac users can jump in on the action as well. If you’d like to get 6 months of WML’s premium service, you should check out our Weekly Contest…
The latest version of Zimbra, a piece of open-source e-mail server software recently bought by Yahoo!, now supports BlackBerry Enterprise Servers. Zimbra’s been rocking Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, and iPhone devices before version 5.0, but it’s bound to take awhile to develop something of that magnitude without any help from RIM. Of course all the talk about Microsoft acquiring Yahoo! seriously leaves Zimbra’s future in question. You can download a trial of the BlackBerry connector here, the mobile client here, and the server software here.
Continental Airlines has announced that they will be offering Wi-Fi service to customers as part of their new LiveTV service, pending testing. LiveTV offers a wide variety of TV channels free to first class passengers or to economy class for a $6 fee. They are testing Wi-Fi access as part of the service and if all goes well, smartphone and laptop users will able to access BlackBerry email and instant messaging as well as Yahoo! equivalents. This isn’t the first time the BlackBerry has taken to the skies, but it seems a little more restrictive than other services.
Viigo released a little update today, the biggest change being support for feed aggregators like Google Reader. There’s also a few ads from American Express kicking around… They’re few and far between, pretty nondescript, and don’t distract too much from your reading. Aside from that, Viigo’s seen a few usability changes, like taking out the My Channels bar to make a bit more room for feeds, as well as supporting native fonts. I’ve had a few issues with Viigo’s feed menu text size when trying out new themes, so the native font support is a nice addition. There’s also a new E-Mail to Me menu option from articles, for when you’re sure you want to look at something on the big screen later on. As for aggregators, Viigo is now allowing you to add existing OPML files from aggregators such as Google Reader, My Yahoo! and Bloglines. It’s a bit tricky to find, though – go to Add Channels, Add your own channel, and Add Aggregator.
For those who haven’t tried it out, Viigo is a great little thing that lets you bring all of your RSS feeds under one roof for quick reading, as well as providing an impressive catalogue of feeds to allow you to find new content. I’m tempted to not call it an RSS reader anymore, since I’ve been getting promises galore from the Viigo guys that RSS is just the beginning. Cryptic, no? It’s a great little app, it’s free, and you can pick up BBCool’s version right here, or over the air at getviigo.com/bbcool.
Another bit of news out of the Consumer Electronics Show is the release of version 3 of Yahoo Go for BlackBerry is now available from go.yahoo.com. At first glance, it looks like Google-style software suite, but Yahoo’s bringing some pretty cool stuff to the table, including mobile widgets. Right now they’ve only got some for MySpace, MTV and soon eBay, but it still looks like a good platform with lots of growth in it. Still, Yahoo Go! looks more about getting extra features like e-mail and maps that BlackBerrys already have included. For more info on the new version of Yahoo! Go, take a look over here.
