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EarthVision Newsletter Archive
Sent: February 5, 2000
Subject: EarthVision Cellular Consumer NewsAnother issue of the EarthVision Cellular Consumer Newsletter. This newsletter is for the soon to be educated cellular phone user community. If you know of anyone else that may have an interest in our newsletter, make sure to forward them a copy. Now we move forward at Mach II speed!
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More Products Coming to the EarthVision Cellular Site
WAP Service May Have Just Become Way Too Expensive
Nokia Tests Wireless Laptop Internet Access in Canada
New Technology Cellular Phone Batteries Are on the Way
New York is New York - Interesting Consumer Experience
EVC Contest - WIN A CELLULAR PHONE!
Free Software to get Wireless Messages
Bill Me Accounts to Customers & our New Site
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EarthVision Cellular Consumer News Issue #3 Volume 2
The word heard around the world. Find it here!
MORE PRODUCTS COMING TO THE EARTHVISION CELLULAR SITE
We are constantly surprised to find new products that are coming available to the market. We have found even more products that we just couldn't believe were manufactured. But they are fun and some are rather interesting. We found Nokia 5100/6100 series faceplates that change color based on your touching them. They react to your body heat. Some of you may remember the mood rings. Well they appear to work like that. We will also be adding sliding faceplates and flip faceplates for this model of phone too.
Some of the other products are for those of us lean toward the more eccentric level. The mobile hand stand. A pseudo type hand that holds the phone in the palm of it's hand for you. Fone pets, which are like stuffed animals to some degree but actually hold the cellular phone.
Phone cases. Well, here we have fallen off of our rocker. Transparent, "snakeskin", denim, and even rainbow. And we will be adding emergency chargers for the Nokia 5100/6100 series phone. We can't find them manufactured for other models of phones, otherwise we would have them on there too. We don't decide on what is manufactured for what phones. And colored batteries for the same model will also be available. We are considering carrying the prepaid pager alphanumeric watch. We have yet to decide on that product.
It is our ongoing commitment to offer the largest selection of products. Most of you have purchased from us and have seen the quality of our service and products. The reason why we can offer such quality products is because we actually perform a quality check on our products. Even though there may be products out there on the market, it doesn't mean that they are of the highest quality. Which is also why you will not find them listed on our site.
We understand that everyone is looking for a good deal at the lowest price. But we are not willing to sacrifice the quality of the products we provide just to offer the lowest pricing. Especially if it has our name attached to it. Instead, we have opted to provide the highest quality products at the lowest price. Why else would we offer a 3 year warranty against manufacturer defects on most of our products. And a 1 year warranty on USED phones. You will find it very difficult to find another company that has our confidence in the quality of their products to offer a 1 year warranty on a used phone.
WAP SERVICE MAY HAVE JUST BECAME WAY TOO EXPENSIVE
The WAP technology was developed and patented by a company called Geoworks. Just recently, they came out to say that they were going to charge an annual license fee to use the technology. The fee is in the tune of $20,000 to any application company that has at least 1 million dollars in revenue plus $1 per subscriber for WAP platform developers.
And if any of you have run a business, a million dollars in revenue per year is not really that much in annual sales when you add in the cost of doing business. A $20,000 fee could hurt a lot of the smaller companies attempting to enter the market as that would be a hefty sum. And if they have to pay $1 for each subscriber, that cost could well be the end of the small business.
Let us make it clear that it is normal for a license fee to be charged to use intellectual property rights. However, that would apply to non developers such as the manufacturers of cellular phones and developers would only pay a small processing fee ranging in the amount of $25 to $100.
In laymen terms, it would be like a website designer being charged a license fee to write HTML code for building a website. Imagine just how far the internet would have progressed had this been the case. And we are hoping to have our website WAP compatible at some point in the future. But if this fee goes through, we may be a while before we get it done.
NOKIA TESTS WIRELESS LAPTOP INTERNET ACCESS IN CANADA
Our neighbors to the north have been the first targeted by Nokia for developing a wireless internet service in airports. Nokia has developed a card that will allow travelers to access the wireless internet via the purchase of an access card for $199. And the user will then have to pay 20 cents per minute to access email or the internet.
The service will offer 2 megabit of data per second. Eventually, users can expect to see the speed rate go up to 11 megabits per second. And if you are in Canada's international airport in Ottawa, you may want to give it a shot out of curiosity. Americans cannot complain though since a company called Richochet is currently offering a similar service in ten of America's airports including New York's LaGuardia and Los Angeles International.
It appears as if pricing plans will be based on the speed that the user wishes to connect to the internet. The faster the connection, the more you pay. Internet junkies may want to avoid this service as it may prove too costly.
But Canadian folks have one up on us and for those who do not have a laptop. Bell Canada is looking to create booths that allow for users to jump on a computer to browse the web. Charging $1.72 for the first five minutes and 20 cents for each additional minute. Which could lay low the chances of Nokia actually entering the Canadian market with that service.
For our own curiosity, we will be checking with an editor/writer of telecom services in Canada to find out a bit more about this service to be offered by Bell Canada. Should our Canadian readers wish for more information on this subject, just contact us and we will let you know what we found out.
NEW TECHNOLOGY CELLULAR PHONE BATTERIES ARE ON THE WAY
Cellular Phone Accessory Distributors on the internet may be near an end. A new cell phone battery technology is being developed for cellular phones. Rather than replacing the battery, you will soon be able to simply change out the cells. In so doing, many retailers will be carrying these products just like regular batteries.
The fuel used in the battery is the same stuff used by NASA: liquid methanol which is a type of wood alcohol found in the most common product. Windshield wiper fluid. Never thought that windshield wiper fluid would be powering our cellular phones. But it appears as if it is going to happen.
Motorola has said these new cells will provide 10 times the talk time of a similar sized lithium ion battery. And it does look as if they phone they are testing for the purposes of these prototype batteries is a Star Tac phone. And you will even be able to look at the battery to see just how much of the methanol is left to determine if you need to buy a new box of cartridges.
With the increased talk time and the lower amount of waste, these new fuel cells are expected to be a big hit with consumers. Another company is also developing a type of charging fuel cell that will fit into the holster of the phone giving the battery continuous charging and eliminating the use of a wall charger. We should see these products hit the market within the next couple of years if not sooner.
NEW YORK IS NEW YORK - INTERESTING CONSUMER EXPERIENCE
This is a tragic experience for the consumer but we publish it here so that our readers can take heed. A cellular phone user in New York had just bought a Star Tac phone only a month before. As he went on to the subway he put his phone into his holster. Soon after traveling and leaving the subway, he realized he needed to make a call.
He looked for his phone and realized that it wasn't in his holster. He checked to see if he may have put it in a pocket or in his briefcase. Not finding it there, he decided he must have lost it. And had an idea that maybe he should call his cellular phone to see if someone may have found it.
He goes to a payphone and calls his cellular phone. And gets an answer. The user tells the man that he lost his phone and thanked the person who answered it. The person who answered it told the user that he didn't lose his phone that he took it from him. The user then remembered getting bumped in the subway. So he asked the thief if he could have his phone back. The thief then asked if the user was stupid. There was no way he was giving back the phone that he had just stolen.
So the user called his carrier and explained the situation and had the phone service discontinued right then and there. The thief only made about 4 calls that came to about 15 minutes worth of calls. The user is very lucky that he was using a digital carrier on a rate plan. Although he is now without a phone.
Here is a point that was brought up in reference to the intelligence of the thief. First, he could have said that he would meet the user the following day and collect a reward. In the meantime, the thief could have sold phone calls to people wanting to make calls. In addition, it appears as if the thief decided to make personal calls with the stolen phone. Obviously, he didn't think about the fact that cellular calls are billed and tracked on the destination of the call. That was one real smart thief.
EVC CONTEST - WIN A CELLULAR PHONE!
We have implemented a new contest. We are always looking for referrals to our newsletter and our website. Not that we are complaining by any means with the traffic to our site nor to the number of new subscribers to our website. In fact, we are looking to doing the opposite. We are grateful to you for your support and wanted to offer something in return to those of you who have been helping us grow.
So here is what we are going to offer as the contest. For each person you refer that specifically states that they subscribed to our newsletter, you will get one point. And if they make a purchase from our website and again state that you referred them to us, you will get 5 points. And if you send us a "consumer experience" that we publish, we will use that as our tie breaker should it become the case. You will probably want to submit a consumer experience regardless since we expect this to be a really good contest.
We will be offering you three choices in the phone being offered. It may be a used or new phone. If it is a used phone, we will have a 1 year warranty on it the same as a new phone.
Choices:
Nokia 6160 (AT&T Display Model Phone)
Star Tac 8800 w/vibra call (Display Model Phone)
Prepaid Deluxe Package with a 918 Phone
All of them will come with a 1 year warranty. This specific contest will end as of March 15th, 2000. There will not be any shipping fee either. When we say it is free, we mean it is free!
FREE SOFTWARE TO GET WIRELESS MESSAGES
This is a company that submitted their press release to us. After we read it, we saw that it may be of interest to some of our readers. You may want to take a look at it if you think it would be of interest. For those of you who don't have WAP service, this may be an alternative to you and allow for a little more variety in the content that you get.
SpreadMsg software provides rule-based wireless messaging to pagers, digital cell phones, Palm VII, and other devices. It operates automatic and unattended, collecting data from "DataSources" specified by the user. If the data content meets user "rules" messages are created and delivered. Data can be captured from spreadsheets, internet pages, streaming real-time stock prices, files on PC or network, and even from email not yet downloaded!
The "rules" provide filtering and scanning on the data, and determine whether the data qualifies for messaging. So, data can be scanned for specific content, numerical value, keywords, email "from" a certain person, etc. - and this limits the wireless messages to only what the user wants to be notified of. Perfect for weather alerts, traders, auction bid notices, airline flight info, -- whatever the user's data or email contains!
There are three versions of SpreadMsg
Lite is free and has no expiration
/EM is $49.95 and features the EMail Scanning Agent
PRO is $119.95 and has "everything"User may upgrade to higher versions at any time
Here are details on the version differences: http://www.compuquestinc.com/spmver.html
SpreadMsg is available in a free "Lite" version, and two for-pay upgrades. It runs on W9x, NT and W2000 platforms. Details and links for free download are at: http://www.compuquestinc.com/spmsgl.html
BILL ME ACCOUNTS TO CUSTOMERS & OUR NEW SITE
We will now be offering "BILL ME" accounts to customers. You will need to complete an application for this service. The service will allow for you to be billed with paying the invoice upon receipt. For those of you who do not like using a credit card on the net, this will be a good alternative for you.
Should have an interest in this type of account, you can contact us via email and we will send you an application. You will need to print out the application and mail it back in for approval. Once you have been approved, you will be contacted by email and informed of the amount that you may order without paying by credit card.
Another announcement that we have for you is that we are currently in the process of planning our new auction site. This site will be strictly limited to wireless products. We will not allow for any other products to be listed on this site for auction purposes. That will ensure that we keep the products being offered to what you are expecting to find. We will maintain the site to ensure that it is kept "clean" of clutter.
Make sure to come back and visit our site often since we will be making changes and building the new site. We will keep you posted once we have the auction site up and running. And we thank everyone for informing us about how great our site has been designed. We can thank our web design company www.cybercid.com for doing such an excellent job. We are looking to them in building our new auction site as well.
PLEASE TELL YOUR FRIENDS, FAMILY, AND ASSOCIATES ABOUT OUR NEWSLETTER. WE APPRECIATE YOUR SUPPORT AND ASSISTANCE IN MAKING OUR NEWSLETTER A SUCCESS.
If you want your name to vanish from our list because our newsletter is just too boring or someone else signed you up, let us know. We will reluctantly take you off of our newsletter list. And we still reserve the right to make faces at you when you aren't looking.
Go to www.earthvisioncellular.com/newsletter to take your name off or to add your name to our newsletter.
EarthVision Communications Inc.
"Taking Cellular to Mach II Speed"
www.earthvisioncellular.com