By Mattias Holm
29th July 2011.
17:57
Monthly Archives: July 2011
Hi,
We are pleased to confirm that the roll out of the software scripts for the Gingerbread upgrade for Xperia X10 has started as of today. The specifications of the upgrade can be found in the post that Rikard posted back in June. With regards to the roll-out plan, as stated earlier, this upgrade will first and foremost be made available to generic trade kits. Even if there will be some operator kits getting this upgrade – some of you will not be able to upgrade your customized version of XperiaTM X10. The roll out is phased (we have currently issued around 10% of the scripts) and they will all be made available over the next week. You will get a notification in your phone (if your kit is subject to the update) when the software upgrade is available. The software ugrade can only be installed using a computer and PC Companion software.
Regards
Mattias
If you love movies as much as us, we expect you will be excited to hear about the upcoming phased launch of the video service for Xperia phones starting on August 1st. The service will provide you with an intuitive and user friendly way to buy or rent movies and TV shows from NBC, Universal International Television Distribution, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment and Warner Bros. Digital Distribution as well as local studios. All the latest releases will be available along with an extensive back catalogue.
The service complements our recently announced cloud based digital music service Music Unlimited. The video service will initially be available on two devices (Xperia mini and Xperia mini pro) in nine markets with localisation of content and movies – UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Australia, Japan*, Canada and the United States. The mobile version of the video service is currently exclusive to Sony Ericsson 2011 Xperia smartphones and will be made available to Xperia arc, Xperia neo, Xperia PLAY, Xperia pro, and Xperia acro through a software upgrade later this year. The service will be available on Xperia active and Xperia ray when they launch**.
The video service will automatically appear on Xperia smartphones which have been upgraded with this software and users will also be able to download the video service application from Android Market™.
www.qriocity.com
* Service in Japan to become available by the end of August 2011
** Available Xperia models will differ by region and operator
Hi,
As some of you have seen we have communicated on www.sonyericsson.com that the Gingerbread software update for Xperia X10 is available. Unfortunately that information was a bit too premature. The launch is imminent and timing according to plan but we just need some more days before we can push the button. Please stay tuned here on the product blog where we will notify you as soon as the first software kits start to roll out.
Also, please note that there is a lot of false commenting and posts impersonating Rikard Skogberg. Please respect the guidelines so that we can continue to have an open spirit and direct dialogue on this forum.
Any new information regarding Sony Ericsson software updates will always be communicated as a blog post, not in the comments field.
We will shortly introduce to you the two new bloggers that will carry Rikard’s torch during his absence.
Best Regards
Mattias Holm
Head of Product PR
As you probably saw last week, Skype announced that Skype for Android now supports video calling. We have recorded a short video featuring Xperia neo and Xperia pro which are two out of only four phones supported on the initial release. I have to be honest that I haven’t used Skype video calling on a smartphone before, but it was surprisingly simple to make a call and the video quality was very good as well. In the video you also catch a glimpse of the use case with connecting an Xperia pro to a big screen TV. To manage expectations, you will not get this in HD quality even though you connect through the HDMI connector, but still, this basically turns your Xperia into a mobile video conferencing system to carry around in your pocket.
As we do quite a lot of phone calls across our company, and some of them last for a significant time, I once in a while miss the face to face meetings. So for next week I have set a personal target to replace at least 10 of my regular calls with video calls 
I have been working with this blog for almost two years now. It all started with me and my colleague Gustaf thinking we should do something special for the launch of the Sony Ericsson Satio. On the 7th of September 2009 the first post of the Satio Launch Blog was posted. After that we had some really nice times with reporting on the development of Satio up until launch. Because of the limited subject, one model only, and the huge excitement for the camera features of Satio it created a lot of interest and a quite tight community around it.
When Satio was launched the blog then changed into the Sony Ericsson Product Blog and got much wider to cover all of our products. The amount of visitors also boomed which made the comments section change as well. Because of the very heavy traffic and engagement among the comments the comments section changed from being almost a discussion forum into more of a traditional comments section. We also had some tough times with the more technical community during our first year with Android. All that feedback we got back then, even though it felt hard at times, was very important to us. I fully believe that we have been able to learn and change fast from that. My interaction with our developers has been taking lots of my time and I really feel that the feedback from you here have made a difference. A difference for our products, our development but also on the view of consumer needs and the importance of super user perception from our side.
I’ve almost felt like a representative for the tech-savvy consumers into our company and it has been a great journey leaving a feeling of being able to make a difference.
That said there are still of course areas where we still can and need to improve, I think there always will be. Therefore your continuous feedback is just as important now and in the future so keep it coming!
Things are about to change around here though.
First of all this blog will soon go through a change in look&feel and the comments system will be updated with support for thumbs-ups, threads of comments etc. Especially the revamp of the comments section will hopefully even further enhance the experience and the quality in the comments section. The re-design of the look of the blog is also a good improvement where you can look at the redesigned developer world page to get an idea on what it will look like. During the work with this redesign there will probably be some down-time though but hopefully not too much.
Secondly it’s now time for me to take some time off. My second daughter is now almost 1 year old and it’s time for me to take some parental leave to spend quality time with her and her older sister. Don’t worry though, there will be other bloggers taking care of this space and I’m sure they will do a great job until my return.
Being as interested as I am in our products and the mobile industry at large I’m sure I will have a hard time disconnecting fully though and I will keep track of things happening. Who knows, I might show up here in the comments section from time to time also
We have lots of exciting new products that will start shipping during this summer and fall and it will be a very different experience for me trying to keep track of that a little bit from the side rather then being in the very center of it all.
So, final blog post for a while, checking out!
Have a great summer all!
