S60 Mobile Phone Applications

There are literally thousands of applications available for all of the major mobile phone smartphone platforms. The iPhone store has many to choose from, as does the new Blackberry Appworld. Then there is the new platform on the block, Android, and the long term stalwart S60. In the first of a series of articles, we are going to choose a few of our favourite applications on each of these platforms, starting with S60, (compatible with Nokia, Samsung and LG Handsets)

1. Shozu

All S60 handsets have a sharp focus on multimedia, especially the Nseries line-up. But even the business focussed Eseries and general handsets such as the 6710 Navigator, or 5800 Xpress Music offer high quality multimedia features, be that image or video recording. But what use all those pictures and video clips if no one gets to see them? This is where an application like Shozu comes in. With Shozu, you can instantly upload pictures and video to multiple social networking and image hosting sites such as Flickr, Picasa, MySpace, Facebook and the ever-popular Twitter. The possibilities this offers are pretty much limited only by your imagination. Share birthdays, weddings, anniversaries and parties with friends and family who can’t be with you in an instant. This truly is social media at its best. But there is another side to Shozu; with the proliferation of media capable handsets available, the way news is reported has changed immensely in recent years. More and more, news corporations rely on user generated content, images and videos captured on the spot by people on their mobile phones, as incidents happen. With Shozu, you can quickly and easily upload your media to the BBC, Sky and CNN amongst others.

2. Joiku

Joiku is a fantastic little application that turns your S60 smartphone into a mini WiFi hotspot – simply, a compatible device connects to your S60 smartphone via WiFi, and then utilises the handsets 3G connection to access the internet. And that about sums it up, a simple to use, easy to set up application that opens a whole host of web browsing options. There are two versions of Joiku, a Lite version which is free, and a professional version which has to be paid for.

3. Sports Tracker

Sports Tracker is a free application for compatible Nokia S60 phones, best used with a GPS connection. Sports Tracker allows you to track your progress as you go for a run, walk, or bike ride, recording information such as distance travelled, average speed, highest speed, etc. Additionally, this information can be exported to applications such as Google Earth, so you can get a visualisation on your route. This information can also be uploaded to sites such as Facebook – so, if you create a group for yourself and your cycling buddies, you can upload details of your latest trek, compare times, routes and take in gentle competition with best times over a certain distance or course.

4. World Mate

World Mate is a useful utility application, ideal for people on the move. The application itself is free to download, and many of the services it offers are free to use, also, such as the Weathercaster. This service provides you with automatic weather updates, which can be configured to provide you with a vocal or visual weather update for the location of your choice. This sits nicely with the Global Weather Forecasts, which offers 5 day forecasts for over 400 locations worldwide, which are updated 4 times daily. For any busy traveller, time is of the essence, and Worldmate offers a World Clock screen where you can view the time in up to 5 different locations simultaneously, ideal for ensuring you call during working hours, and not in the middle of the night. There is also a night/day map, with city locator and world clock display and a very useful currency convertor. This is an excellent all round package, with a host of vital services for the busy traveller. Extra subscription services are also available via Worldmate, such as flight alerts and a comprehensive flight scheduler.

5. Fring

Finally, in this list of top S60 applications, we look at top communication application Fring. Fring works like an aggregator service, offering access to a whole host of social media and internet communication sites. As you would expect, all the top names are there; Talk on Skype, keep in touch with Yahoo and MSN Messenger, communicate via Google Talk, chat on ICQ and AIM, and keep up to date with your friends via Twitter and Facebook. The whole idea behind Fring is communication without limits, and whatever data connection you use, Fring is there, be it via 3G, Mobile Broadband, EDGE, GPRS, or WiFi. The whole interface on Fring is very simple and offers tab style navigation, so you can easily flick between services.

These are just a few of our favourite applications. What do you use? Have we missed your favourite app?  let us know what you think via the comments link below.