Hi guys,

We’ve just released a new version for you, S60 (Nokia) users.
The new version provides an even better and much faster Twitter experience; solves connectivity issues including fixes to some issues fringsters have been reporting in certain connectivity states & includes a few other bug fixes, all making for an even better fringing experience!

Users of Nokia’s latest E52, 5630, 5530 and E72 devices – we didn’t forget you either. We followed through with our promise to spread the fringing freedom to you, as well, all reported issues have been addressed and resolved.

The new version (3.40.29/29) is now available on our download page.

As always, your comments & suggestions are welcome.
The fringTEAM

Google has just announced that Streetview will come to South Africa. This according to mybroadband.co.za

Apparently “in the coming weeks Google will begin driving around South Africa and taking photographs of locations in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban.”

The news was barely out the door when twitter started going wild. I also got an sms from a friend traveling along the N3 near Pretoria to say that he had just past a White streetview car traveling South towards Durban. After unhitching his tralor next to the highway he turned around and gave chase trying to snap a picture of the car in action. 130km later and he could not catch them, Obviously the streetview car was traveling alot faster than my friend and sadly no pictures are forthcoming. Better luck next time John

Luckily a few pictures of the new South African Google Prius Streetview car have already made there way onto the net and it’s going to be interesting to see how South Africans feel about the streetview car driving their streets in the next few weeks. I personally can’t wait to have localized streetview images on my mobile device.

Welcome to South Africa Google Street View, looking forward to seeing you in my part of the world soon.

Nokia last night introduced the shiny new Nokia 5530 Xpress Music handset to the South African market at an exclusive event hosted in the Holiday Inn, Sandton. After the event everyone in attendance was issued with a review handset to use for a period of 12 months. Wow thanx Nokia

The shiny new Nokia 5530 Xpress Music is a low cost device and supports the same applications as the Nokia 5800 and N97. Most applications can be easily downloaded via the Nokia Ovi Store. I thought it may be good to do a post showing the applications I have personally found to be the most useful on my review handset, the sexy new Nokia 5530 Xpress music.

Please note that my list of top 10 must have apps for the 5530 includes both free and premium services.

1. fring – Lets you talk, chat and interact freely between: Skype, Yahoo, MSN, ICQ, Twitter, Facebook, GoogleTalk, AIM, SIP, Gmail Notifier, LastFM, Orkut and Yandex
2. JoikuSpot – Turns your mobile handset into a secure WLAN (Wi-Fi) HotSpot.
3. Gmail – Google’s free email service – this is the best email service on earth.
4. Google Maps – Possibly the best free mobile mapping software available.
5. Shazam - Amazingly powerful music search application
6. BrightLight - Turns your handset into a handy torch.
7. Accuweather – The best weather application on the 5530. It’s also in the download menu on handset.
8. Best Screensnap – A cool application for taking screenshots. In the download menu on handset.
9. Qik - A cool live video streaming service.
10. Digia Web Browser – The best touch screen web browser available.

This is my current Top 10 and when more applications become available the list will change

fringsters put your hands together for the one and only Nokia 5530 Xpress Music.

This sleek and sexy Nokia handset is now officially available in South Africa and we are excited to announce that fring already lets you take your friends mobile with this great new Nokia device.

Although “Nokia might have been late to the touchscreen game,” it sure is “making up for lost time now by following up the successful 5800 XpressMusic and N97 with the budget 5530 XpressMusic.”

Most of the western world is abuzz after Apple recently introduced the Apple iPhone 3Gs. Here in Africa though things are different. Most of us cannot afford the high tech gadgetry on offer from Apple. I mean lets face it, most people here in Africa are just looking for something cool yet low cost which will do the job and boy oh boy does the Nokia 5530 do just that.

Nokia last night together with the launch of the Nokia 5530 and 5630 Xpress Music also launched “Comes with music.” “The service, which offers consumers a year of unlimited access to the entire Nokia Music Store catalogue, is now available in South Africa. Comes With Music devices enable the consumer to download an unlimited number of the over 5-million digital tracks available on the South African Nokia Music Store http://music.nokia.co.za for a one year period. In addition, the consumer is able to keep all their downloaded music from the diverse catalogue of international and local artists - even when the service period of one year is over – on both their Comes With Music device and dedicated PC.”

This is why in my humble opinion, companies like Nokia will always have market share in Africa. They are making sure that people of all walks of life are able to groove to the beat on a sexy touch screen device. Thank you Nokia

fringsters if you happen to be one of the lucky few who already has your hands on the Nokia 5530 what are you waiting for download fring today. If you are still thinking of upgrading to a new device, think no more, head over to your nearest cellphone dealer and grab yourself one of these beauties while stocks last.

Note: I will review the Nokia 5530 more closely in the coming weeks.

If pictures speak louder than words then twitter is a bit soft and dailybooth.com is speaking load and clear! This great new startup is already making huge waves in the social space and that after only a few months.

Dailybooth which started back in January 2009 already has well over 3million unique users and is growing at about “35% per month” according to Techcrunch.

Dailybooth founder Jon Wheatley had this to say on the Dailybooth blog: “The idea for dailybooth was coined a few days after I was laid off from a job I had at a web development company in Edinburgh. Everything happened quite quickly so I was frantically brainstorming some startup ideas that could potentially bring in some much needed money. DailyBooth (as it wasn’t yet known) was one of a list of ideas that was churned out in that brainstorming session.”

Well Jon, as they say, neccecity is the mother of invention and I must say, you seem to have struck a gold mine. fringsters mark my words, dailybooth.com is the next BIG thing to steam role over the internet, so go check it out and let me know what you think.

Hi,

You probably know this YouTube hoax from a few months ago where four guys are making popcorn using their cellphones. We thought we should try doing the same thing with fring and see what happens.

Here’s the results:

[Note: Please do not try this at home!]

During the 2nd quarter of what has probably been the worst year for global economies it is good to see that smartphones sales world wide are still booming with over 41 million handsets shipped. This is but a small number when you think that during the same time 228 million regular ‘junky’ handsets were shipped world wide.

During this quarter Apple reportedly sold 5.2 Million iPhone handsets, while Nokia reported sales of 5 million E71 and 6.8 million 5800 Xpress Music handsets, RIM sold around 8 million BlackBerries.

It’s going to be interesting to see how the fring family grows in the next few months as more and more people start to investigate the cool features of their newly aquaired smartphone handsets. We look forward to welcoming the 41 million new Smartphone users world wide to the fring family