Motorola revealed six new clamshell phones today, and entertainment is clearly foremost in the company's mind. The top of the range V620 features an impressive 262,000 colour screen, and most of the models come with several in-built games including Wakeboarder and the carefully titled, Golf. However, gaming seems to take a backseat to video capture and sharing - all the models offer this option. Manufacturers seem to be determined that we're going to take and swap images on our phones whether we want to or not. You've no doubt seen the achingly stylish Sony Ericsson K700i TV ads with that foppish unsmiling couple wandering around a neon-sprinkled city, moodily snapping photos before holding their handsets up to each other with sulky pouts. All very interesting, but most people are yet to find compelling reasons to share their snapshots, and are worried about how much it'll cost to send 'em and whether they can transmit them across different networks. Until these issues are sorted, its going to remain a minority pursuit.
In contrast, we all like playing games on our shiny new high-end phones, don't we? Indeed, telecoms research company, Juniper, has released a white paper, speculating that, "Java™ downloads will generate over $4.8bn in mobile revenues by 2009, with Mobile Games accounting for the vast majority of revenues". So perhaps some more imaginative offerings than 'Golf' might be an idea.
On the plus side, Motorola's press release mentions that its handsets will feature, "vibration technology for interactive feedback". Let your imagination run wild...
