Archive for the ‘Entertainment’ Category

BlackBerry shoots, it SCORES! GOOOOOAAAALLLLLL!

Tuesday, June 15th, 2010

The World Cup is upon us and off to a rousing start with South Africa and Mexico playing to scintillating 1-1 tie in the opening game. One of the best parts of the World Cup is we all have our favorite teams. Maybe it is the USA or a team related to your heritage or just rooting for the underdog. It is truly the World’s game.

BlackBerry and Android both have great apps to help follow all of the games. Moreover, if you are anything like me, you will need an app to follow all the scores and news since the games are being played early or in the heart of the workday for most of us.

Search the BlackBerry App World for a good World Cup app or try this one: http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/content/10914

Or on an Android phone, search the Android Market for two of the best named “Goal.com Mobile” or “2010 World Cup.”

No smartphone? No problem.

Twitter has setup a special World Cup mini site that you can follow all of the action: http://twitter.com/worldcup/worldcup Find a couple of good tweeters to follow and have updates send straight to your phone via text messaging.

Enjoy the World Cup. For some of us it is a month of sporting bliss. And if someone randomly yells out “GOOOOAAAAALLLLL” while looking at their phone, you’ll know what is up.

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Foursquare?

Monday, May 31st, 2010

You may have heard of it or maybe you’ve have heard of the idea. “Foursquare is a cross between a friend-finder, a social city-guide and a game that rewards you for doing interesting things”. At the moment it appears as if this could be the next big thing (in the social networking world that is).

Using it is simple, you check-in when ever you go to a business or event. Using you phone’s GPS, Fousquare will only show you businesses that are nearby to keep us all honest! You can add your Facebook and Twitter friends in on the fun, and whenever they check-in – you know.

So what’s in it for you?

First of all, badges. You earn badges by performing certain tasks.

Second, you earn points. Currently, Foursquare is experimenting with point redemption. Recently, Fousquare had a promotion where they actually donated money based on points earned to CampInteractive. (read more here http://mashable.com/2009/12/07/foursquare-charity-drive/)

Third (and my personal favorite), more and more businesses are using Fousquare to promote themselves. In example, last month I went to a restaurant in the Bay Area that offered a 10% discount to anyone who checks-in there during dinner hours.

Foursquare is fun and it seems like more and more of my friends are using it everyday. For those concerned with privacy I would recommend going to http://www.foursquare.com for details on how your location data is used.

Foursquare is available in the BlackBerry App World and also the Android Market.

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Follow your sports teams on your BlackBerry

Monday, April 5th, 2010

The beginning of April is always one of my favorite times of the year: It’s the start of baseball season. And this year, I’m tracking the progress of my beloved Seattle Mariners using a free app for my BlackBerry called ScoreMobile.

With ScoreMobile, you can check in on how your favorite teams are doing across numerous sports — football, baseball, basketball, hockey, golf, auto racing, and soccer. With a few clicks, you see the live scores from across all the games being played that day, the schedule for upcoming games, the leaderboards of key statistics, and the standings of teams in the league.

Wondering when an important game starts? The start times are customized based on your phone’s time zone setting, so you don’t have to worry about converting time in your head.

Miss a game? Just pull up the summary of it to see the stats from all the players of the game and a recap of all the action.

You can also personalize the ScoreMobile app by noting your favorite teams to make it easier to keep track of how your favorites are doing.

As a free app, there are ads that take up a small chunk of the BlackBerry screen. But for all of the great data you get in one app, I think it’s worth it. You can download ScoreMobile for BlackBerry from the BlackBerry App World.

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Zagat To Go on BlackBerry

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

Restaurant week is occurring in many cities so I thought this was the ideal time to try out Zagat to Go 7.0 for Blackberry. Zagat to Go provides up-to-date Zagat Survey ratings and reviews for over 40,000 restaurants, nightspots, hotels and golf courses in hundreds of cities worldwide.

ztg_blackberry_home

Features of the mobile version include:

Ratings: Just like the Zagat Survey books, Zagat to Go rates each restaurant on Food, Décor, Service and Cost using a 30 point scale.

Search: In the app you can search for a restaurant by name or browse by cuisine, neighborhood, or one of the numerous features like child friendly and power scene. I often also take advantage of a variety of lists of top rated restaurants by category. When traveling, it’s especially valuable to use the GPS search to find a nearby location.

Usability: The app is easy to use and navigate. It allows you to quickly make a reservation using the click-to-call button or map it using a full color downloadable map and directions. You can even add a reservation to your calendar or establishment to your address book.

Coverage: People typically either love or hate this application and it primarily boils down to the coverage in your area. I recommend the 14-day trial to ensure you’re satisfied with the results before you invest in this app. Zagat covers restaurants in the following regions: New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, London, Washington DC/ Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Miami /Ft Lauderdale, Seattle, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas Ft. Worth, Sacramento, Las Vegas, New Orleans, San Diego, Hawaii, New Jersey, Connecticut, Texas, Westchester NY/Hudson Valley, Long Island, Montreal, Toronto, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and the top restaurants and hotels in other major cities and regions.

Download 14-day trial: Go to http://mobile.zagat.com/blackberry.htm. You can download the 14-day trial by entering your phone number to receive installation instructions via text message or use the BlackBerry Desktop Manager (Note: Only supports Windows based operating systems) to download directly from this page.

Purchase Zagat to Go:

  1. Go to Handmark’s site. www.handmark.com
  2. On the site – select your handset model and type “Zagat to Go” into the search box.
  3. In order to download the application you’ll need to set up an account. Handmark charges downloads to a credit card, debit card, or paypal account that you provide. Handmark is a partner that CREDO recommends to our customers for Smartphone content. In addition to the BlackBerry, Handmark offers content and applications for many other phones including almost all smartphones and some standard phones including the Motorola Razor.
  4. You have the option of selecting an annual membership to Zagat to Go for $19.99 or a monthly subscription for $3.99/month. Once you’ve made a selection, you’ll receive a text message with a link to download the application. You’ll need to have a phone with a data service plan in order to access the mobile web link and download the application.
  5. After you have successfully downloaded you’ll find the application’s Icon on your phone’s main menu/icon list.

BTW wondering when restaurant week is in your area? Check out: http://www.eatdrinkdeals.com/2010/01/restaurant-week-across-usa-2/

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Fandango BlackBerry Application

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

Fandango has released a BlackBerry application that provides a quick way to browse movies, preview coming attractions, and purchase tickets through the application. The application has three main sections: Movies, Theaters, and Search. The Movies section of the application pulls up current movies based on newly released features, top box office draws, and movies that are playing near a specific zip code. The Theaters lists movie theaters near your zip code and allows quick access to show times and links to purchase tickets. The Search function has a very basic feature set, but gets the job done as far as pulling up movie title results.

Overall there are many helpful movie research features to the application in terms of browsing movies and checking out upcoming movies. Where the application is a let down is in terms of the location settings; which don’t seem to take advantage of the GPS capabilities of BlackBerry smartphones. The ticket purchasing feature works well with a way to store a credit card and Fandango account information in the application. Perhaps the biggest letdown of the application is that it still requires you to print the tickets, show a credit card at the ticket booth, or retrieve the tickets from a Fandango kiosk. The application would be better if tickets could be purchased on the BlackBerry and then a unique barcode was generated which could be scanned directly from the phone to grant theater admission.

You can find more information on the Fandango BlackBerry application and a link to send the application to your smartphone:
Fandango BlackBerry Download Link

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Ebay BlackBerry Application

Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

Ebay has released a new free mobile BlackBerry application currently in beta that allows users to bid on auctions, track auctions, and monitor saved searches and favorite sellers. The application fares pretty well as far as searching for items and saving items to your Ebay Watch list or to your calendar. I don’t quite feel as comfortable bidding or buying items on Ebay via the application, though, because the item pictures aren’t very detailed and reading through the terms and conditions in auction descriptions is hard on a mobile screen.

You can find a link to download the application via this link:

Ebay Application @ BlackBerry AppWorld

The downside is the application is only geared towards buyers on Ebay and completely omits sellers from utilizing the application. The reviews on BlackBerry AppWorld are very critical of this missing feature in the application. This is a big omission, as much of the appeal of an Ebay application is for Ebay sellers to monitor live auctions. I hope Ebay can improve the application in the future by including more sellers’ tools and allowing users to set preferences in terms of which items are highlighted on the main search page.
ebay_blackberry_beta

To use the eBay for BlackBerry smartphones, you will need the following: 175KB of available application memory, BlackBerry Internet Service browsing capabilities, and BlackBerry® Device Software Version 4.5 or later.

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Food Network Everyday Chef for BlackBerry Curve

Friday, December 4th, 2009

I often browse to mobile.foodnetwork.com on my phone when I’m in the grocery store in need of inspiration. The site works well on my BlackBerry and allows me to quickly type in an ingredient or the name of a specific dish in order to see ingredients needed for the various recipes offered. Recently, I found another service offered by the Food Network in the form of a downloadable BlackBerry Application.

everyday-chef1

The Food Network Everyday Chef app is available from the Handmark store online for $9.99. It has more than 1,000 recipes to search from and offers advanced features such as the ability to set personal dietary preferences and create a meal planner up to two weeks in advance.

Key Features:

  • Set Preferences: Allows you to set food preferences (i.e. vegetarian, vegan or don’t eat pork/beef) and food allergies so you only see recipes that work for your diet.

  • Recipe Search: Decide what to fix based on ingredients, category or keyword search. You can even get recipe suggestions based on other recipes you like.

  • Grocery List: The Quick Shop feature instantly generates a grocery list based on the recipe you selected. If you’ve planned ahead there is even a feature that will collect all the ingredients needed based on selected recipes and put them into a single grocery list organized by grocery store department so it is easy to shop. You can manually add additional grocery items as needed to this list.

  • Planner: Plan up to three meals daily for two weeks in advanced.

  • Favorites: Once you’ve found a successful recipe, you can bookmark it to use again later.

    • If you haven’t yet experienced the difference between a downloaded application and the mobile internet perhaps this is a good application to try out in order to see which you prefer.

    Download Instructions:

    1. Go to Handmark’s site. www.handmark.com

    2. On the site – select your handset model and type “Everyday Chef” into the search box.

    3. In order to download the application you’ll need to set up an account. Handmark charges downloads to a credit card, debit card, or paypal account that you provide. Handmark is a partner that CREDO recommends to our customers for Smartphone content. In addition to the BlackBerry, Handmark offers content and applications for many other phones including almost all smartphones and some standard phones including the Motorola Razor.

    4. Once you purchase a piece of content, you’ll receive a text message with a link to download the application. You’ll need to have a phone with a data service plan in order to access the mobile web link and download the application.

    5. After you have successfully downloaded you’ll find the application’s Icon on your phone’s main menu/icon list.

      6. I hope that either the website or the application inspire you to cook up something fabulous!

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    Content Is King

    Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009

    Today I just wanted to give a shout out to my favorite site on the mobile web, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, easily found at www.mcsweeneys.net from your mobile browser. It’s literary, it’s funny, and mostly just very entertaining. Simply put it’s my favorite source of content on the mobile web.

    Now I’ve been a fan of the web verion of this site for years and years. Only very recently – by following @mcsweeneysbooks on twitter – did I discover the wonderful mobile verion of the site. My 40-minute ferry ride commute hasn’t been the same since.

    Not only is the content good, the user experience is similarly awesome. There are no ads or even graphics on McSweeneys so the content is really perfect for surfing on a mobile device. On my Blackberry Curve the articles load faster than any other site, the font size is nice and readable, and navigation is all very simple and link-based.

    But a little more about McSweeney’s and why you may want to check it out. McSweeney’s is actually a publishing house founded by author Dave Eggers and in addition to publishing books, DVD’s, and periodicals, they also maintain this site which Wikipedia describes as a “daily updated literature and humor site.” The content is primarily fiction in the form of short essays and narratives, but there are occasional articles of non-fiction and other general randomness. It’s mostly funny and only occasionally serious.

    I think the content can best be described as eclectic and best discovered for yourself, perhaps on your commute home tonight. I only hope you enjoy it as much as I do!

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    This should keep her busy for at least 15 minutes.

    Wednesday, November 4th, 2009

    I’m headed out a pretty long plane flight with my two-year-old next weekend. While she’s usually quite well behaved, any parent out there knows that it’s good to have a trick or two up your sleeves for those moments when you see the tantrum gathering, but there’s still time to head it off with something shiny and distracting. Enter…Daddy’s mobile phone.

    Baby Go App screenshot

    Baby Go App screenshot

    Since my daughter is always taking a close interest in my phone (which of course led to me taking a close interest in how to lock my phone), here’s what will be up my sleeve on Sunday: the free BabyGo application I found in the Blackberry App World the other day.

    Basically, the app will close down all other functions of your BlackBerry to keep them safe, and then — when any key is pressed on your phone — show that letter in a graphic on the screen that floats & bounces around, and say the letter out loud.

    Pretty basic…but could prove to be loads of fun for a two-year-old who’s just about done learning the alphabet, and wants to “use” Dad’s phone but can never seem to make it do anything.

    Of course, this got me to thinking…what other neat stuff should I put on my phone for additional distractions should we need them? So I went & did a little searching, and found some more cool stuff BlackBerry-related for parents and kids here on Crackberry.com and here on Brighthub.com (which is a little more oriented to games for the older kids.) Check ‘em out!

    So with a few free apps and a bit of luck, we hope to have the most well-behaved and quiet child on the plane — not just for our enjoyment, but that of our fellow travelers as well.

    (NOTE: Whenever traveling by plane, do please make sure to comply with all the rules as well as the flight attendants’ instructions about what devices can be powered up when. You’ll also want to be sure to turn off all the connections on your phone while in flight so it doesn’t waste battery life, and create electronic interference, searching for a signal it’s not going to find.)

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    Barnes and Nobel eReader for BlackBerry Curve

    Thursday, October 29th, 2009

    I love to read so I’ve looked at a few eReaders and just downloaded the free Barnes & Nobel version. If you aren’t familiar with the term eReader it is way to read books electronically.

    Bottom line – personally, I’m still a fan of the old school paper format but given my desire to lower the number of trees I destroy and the fact that I don’t have much time to make it to the library I think that digital books are worth a try. Who knows, maybe I can evolve.

    Here’s what I like about the Barnes and Nobel version…
    -Access: I can easily read my e-Books from my BlackBerry Curve or any PC or Mac. I just log into my B&N account and they’re available. This feature also benefits me if I switch devices. Since the e-Books are stored on my personal library at BN.com, I can download the ones I want anytime to any supported device.

    -Selection: The library touts more than 700,000 titles (Amazon has about 300,000). You can even download 500,000 free public domain books courtesy of Google Books.

    -Try before you buy: Read the first chapter for free before buying the book by clicking “Get Free Sample”. They even included five free books with the eReader download – Classics like Pride and Prejudice, Dracula and a dictionary. This gave me a good opportunity to test out the interface and features before investing more.

    Here’s what I was worried about…
    -
    -Cost: The reader is free, but the e-books aren’t. e-Books cost less than what you’d pay to buy a physical copy, but it adds up as you start to build a library. Many best sellers go for $9.99. You’ll also need a mobile data plan to download the books. Most Smartphones come with an unlimited data plan but if you have a pay as you go plan this may add up quickly.

    -Memory: How much space does each book take? It wasn’t immediately obvious to me where to find this, but B&N must have some issue with this since they include a memory check with the eReader to alert you if there is limited space on your device. If you plan to use the reader a lot I recommend investing in a larger memory card for your BlackBerry.

    -Time to Load: The books take a while to load and I noticed that when I’d switch chapters there was a significant time delay. Once the section I’m reading is loaded however, it worked fairly well. I checked a few tech blogs and it looks like this is an issue that some people have experienced and others have not. Worst case scenario you just have to mess with it a little bit and be patient. I’m not a terribly patient person and found the wait to be long but not enough to prevent me from using the application.

    -Usability: How enjoyable is it to read a novel on such a small form factor? This clearly is a personal preference, but for me it worked. I like that when I’m out and about I can read conveniently on my BlackBerry Curve and then when I’m home I can keep reading on my laptop. I always have my phone with me but there are many instances where I don’t want to carry a book or larger eReader as well.

    -How to use: I’ve only started using this app but one tip I can give is that if you’re using a BlackBerry you’ll want to use the BlackBerry key (with the BlackBerry dots on it) to get access to the applications menu. That will allow you to change font sizes, skip to new sections, add bookmarks to the section you’ve just read, and finally close the application. All features that you’ll need!

    The download was simple and just takes a minute. Go to bn.com on your device’s browser and click the link Download free B&N eReader App. Once installed, you’ll need to enter your B&N account info or create a new account.

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