08-18-2005, 08:00 AM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Mobile Forum Access Now Open To Everyone!
If you've visited any of the three mobile sites in the past few days for Pocket PC Thoughts, Smartphone Thoughts, or Digital Media Thoughts, you'll have noticed something new: a small "Sponsored by" graphic featuring the Windows Mobile and Windows Embedded logos. Our mobile forums are now open to everyone, subscriber or not. This is something I'm tremendously excited about!  This means people won't need to log in to read the content, and every article, post, and forum thread is fully consumable on their mobile device. This is something I've always wanted to enable, but given the amount of work Fabrizio did in optimizing the templates it was never an option to just give it away, so we kept it as a subscriber feature. Now that it has a commercial sponsor, everyone can take advantage of this. A very big thank you to the Microsoft Windows Mobile and Windows Embedded team for sponsoring our mobile site! :way to go:
So what if you're a subscriber who signed up just for the mobile forums? My hope is that you'll still see value in being a subscriber - the other features (ad blocking, media storage, email blasts, subscriber badge, and the warm fuzzy feeling you get by knowing you're supporting our work here) will continue to be subscribers only. ;-) I'm also going to be kicking off a new round of contests, including a new monthly giveaway sponsored by Pocket PC Techs where we'll be giving away several special accessory bundles every single month to subscribers! (and people who send me postcards) We're also looking at developing new subscriber features including full-text RSS feeds, and we have a simple (but useful) piece of software developed in conjunction with Two Peaks just for subscribers - you'll hear more about that next week.
Lastly, in the next 90 days or so we'll be merging the subscriber benefits from Pocket PC Thoughts and Digital Media Thoughts into one - meaning being a subscriber at any one site gives you an all-access pass. And that also means for those of you who've been waiting for Smartphone Thoughts subscriber benefits to be activated, this is it! We'll be tweaking a few of the benefits in the new configuration, such as getting one $20 Vaja coupon per year, not one per site (I have to pay for these after all). Overall though this change will give you even more value in being a subscriber.
Enjoy those mobile forums!
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08-18-2005, 08:21 AM
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Mystic
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,734
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As a subscriber I have no problem with everyone having proper mobile access to the forums. I do however feel that lack of advertising is one of the primary benefits of subscribing, and would therefore ask that the WM flag be removed for subscribers.
I find it very distracting, as it looks just like the "page loading" flag, and I end up waiting a few second longer for the page to finish loading.
Surur
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08-18-2005, 09:24 AM
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Thinker
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 330
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Cool. It's nice just to be able to have a quick look when you have a couple of minutes to spare at the mobile forums without having to login.
8)
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08-18-2005, 09:25 AM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Nov 2003
Posts: 59
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I'm a subscriber as well. Being able to access the mobile forums has always been my main reason behind subscribing but as things develop I can understand the need to move forward with the site.
My personal usage of the mobile forums has massively reduced since I moved to using the RSS feeds.
Maybe an new benefit for subscribers would be to offer full article RSS feeds and for non-subscribers offer summary feeds as you do now. Personally that would 'balance' things again to those of use who do subscribe.
But I will continue to pay my subscription as I want to support PPCT. I do the same with certain software authors, buying software that I don't really need to help fund the development of the software that I do use. It is a small price to pay for the service offered.
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08-18-2005, 09:37 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Dec 2004
Posts: 173
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Thanks Jason. Gonna enjoy it in a few minutes
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08-18-2005, 11:34 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Nov 2003
Posts: 181
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I had noticed this a few days ago and have been enjoying it! This is one of the best done mobile forums as well because it removes the unnecessary stuff and still keeps most functions available.
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08-18-2005, 11:35 AM
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Pupil
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 27
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While I mainly subscribed to support the site since I enjoy it regulary the non-working mobile forums was the thing that helped me surpass my lazyness So I hope the now public available mobile forums will not result in a decline of subscribtions.
BTW: The all-access pass to Digital Media Thoughts is a great addition!
Thorsten
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08-18-2005, 03:54 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by wocket
Cool. It's nice just to be able to have a quick look when you have a couple of minutes to spare at the mobile forums without having to login.
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Yeah, I enjoy that myself - because I change devices so often, it's a real pain to have to login again on all three sites to access the mobile forums. Now I don't have to. :mrgreen:
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08-18-2005, 03:56 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by acetuk
Maybe an new benefit for subscribers would be to offer full article RSS feeds and for non-subscribers offer summary feeds as you do now. Personally that would 'balance' things again to those of use who do subscribe.
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Yes, that's exactly what we're looking at doing - we're undergoing a BIG development project right now (back-end stuff) to make publishing and controling the sites easier, but once that's finished we're going to invest in new subscriber features and RSS is on the list of things to look at. We need to make sure it can be implemented in the right way.
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08-18-2005, 03:59 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by surfer
Thanks Jason. Gonna enjoy it in a few minutes |
Glad you're enjoying it! You can thank Fabrizio for the excellently designed templates. They're pretty old actually (more than two years old now) and we're looking at doing an update to make then even better. :wink:
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Linear Mode
