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Broadcasting via a mobile phone at the Samsung Moblie launch for bloggers

It has been quite awhile since I was invited to an event as blogger or as media.

Daniel Goh for Samsung invited me to this evening announcement of the new Samsung phones via Twitter earlier in the day.

The invitation via Twitter was as sign of how things have changed since having left the media scene some six years ago when I was writing for PC World Singapore and Hardwarezone.com.

Armed with the Samsung Omnia and Qik.com installed, I was able to do some “live” broadcast of short clips of the launch.

Unfortunately during the launch, I wasn’t able to access Twitter so I updated via my Facebook status page.


Winston Goh, product manager for Samsung, introducing the
new Samsung mobile models

It was after the event and during the train ride home that it struck me to how the tools of content creation have changed so much since my media days.

Mobile data rates have fallen by so much that it allows me to transfer data via mobile Internet without me having to worry about the cost. I currently pay SGD10 a month for unlimited data.

In those days, WAP was the in-thing and data transfer rate were by kbps rather than mbps.


Mohd Hisham hands-on with the Samsung DJ Beat

In my hands, I held a mobile phone equipped with a software that allowed me to create “live” broadcast of the event.

In those days, I only had pen and paper and you were lucky if you get your hands on a digital camera that cost close to a few thousand and we are not talking about DSLRs.


Winston Goh, product manager at Samsung, explaining to bloggers why some of the new models will not have Wi-Fi

I was also providing updates of the event with a limit of 140 characters, even via Facebook. As it was impossible for me to update the entire presentation, I had to be my picky in selecting the right quotes to be entered into my status updates.

Below are some of the notable questions and quotes from bloggers and Samsung spokespeople respectively.

  1. “OmniaHD to run on Symbian s60 r5.0” – This is interesting as the current Omnia runs on Windows Mobile 6.1. Will this be a concern for Microsoft as the Samsung OmniaHD is touted as one of the mobile phones to look out for in 2009?
  2. I think it was Daniel Tsou for Tech65.org who asked if Samsung would launch a phone with Google Android OS. Samsung reply was “the Android OS in a Samsung phone might be available in 2nd half of this year”. Interesting comment as Samsung looks to add another OS to its mobile phones and will this reduce the first-mover advantage HTC has over competitors in the Android OS arena?
  3. One other blogger also asked if Samsung will be launching moblie phones targeted at businesses. Samsung spokesperson was tight-lipped about that but was honest with the bloggers that Samsung is not ready to announce.


A Samsung representative demonstrating the new SharePic application

For PRs, the availability of these content creation tools can also poise a new set of challenges for them.

One such challenge would be how would PR agencies clip Twitter status if the blogger choose Twitter as a medium of choice for reporting the event. What would the ad-value to a couple of tweets read by thousands of followers vs a blog post with only tens of readers?


Bloggers comparing the Apple iPhone and the New Samsung Ultra mobile

The other is actually a common mistake made by spokesperson/s. Even with traditional media, my advice to the spokesperson is that if that statement is going to start or end with him/her saying ‘This is off-the-record”, then don’t say it all.

The thing here is that with all the recording tools made affordable and available to bloggers or even journalists, off the record does seem like an oxymoron.

Hence, be it bloggers or journalists, nothing is “off-the-record”.

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Anonymous said…
I wrote something, but my computer hanged. I'm not sure if the comment went through but I can't remember what I wrote anyway. Just in case it didn't go through, what I do remember from the previous comment is... "YOU IDIOT!"

This is totally pointless :)
February 18, 2009 at 6:32 PM
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