While on vacation in Brazil, I missed Orange’s launch of 3G in France late in December 2004. A friend of mine, Fabrice Hamaide, CEO of Talkway, is one of the first subscribers. Using his Samsung Z105U, we viewed Guy Roux from Auxerre football club giving a post-match interview on Infosport. This was real time TV on a mobile phone and the quality was great!
There are still a couple of things to iron out. Apparently voice calls drop more frequently on 3G than on 2.5G. Also, the battery runs out much quicker, so my friend sets 2.5G as the default service. He also carries an extended battery pack, which adds bulk and weight to the phone.
Fabrice then gave a demo of Talkway’s VMailTalk, streaming video by mail. Essentially, you leave a video message on your webcam and upload it to a central server. You then e-mail the link to your intended recipient, who doesn’t need a plugin to view it … your video message will stream automatically. Heard of voice mail? This is video mail. And guess what … Talkway’s streaming video mail works perfectly on 3G.
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