Mozilla reportedly plans $25 Firefox OS phones for India this year, but will it succeed?

June 12, 2014

Jun 12: Mozilla plans to further intensify the low-budget smartphone war in India with its smartphone. According to a report by WSJ (paywall), the company plans to launch the Firefox OS -based smartphone priced as low as $25 – translating to around Rs 1,500 – in the Indian market.

Firefox has earlier launched low-budget smartphones in Europe and Latin America with a price tag of $60 and realized to tap in to Indian and South East Asian markets with an aggressive pricing. High conversion rates are to be blamed in developing nations for a $60 smartphone to still feel expensive. The US-based company has collaborated with four handset makers which include ZTE, LG and five wireless carriers that include Telefonica, Deutsche Telekom, America Movil to name a few. This isn"t the first time, we have come across such a news. LG built Firefox OS running device was earlier rumoured to launch last year.

Firefox OS phonesThe population of India is over 1.3 billion and most of it could afford a $25 phone with Web apps, though the proliferation of cheap Android-based smartphones has spoilt the Indian consumer for choice. Setting itself apart from Android, would be the biggest challenge for Mozilla in India.

Secondly, there"s very little that is attractive about the Firefox OS from a consumer point of view, since it would be yet another smartphone OS which has to catch up in terms of apps. If Windows Phone was any indication, Firefox OS will have a tough time of it.

In India, smartphones or phones in general are bought off the shelf without a network provider subsidy, and while Firefox may not opt for the subsidy model, it could go with operator tie-ups for free data plans, or app-specific plans. It could also tie up with content providers to get free multimedia content for the new phone.

These are the value-additions that have helped Nokia"s Asha series in India. And Firefox also has to make sure that basic apps such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and perhaps other smartphone staples such as Instagram or Vine, are all on board from the word go. Firefox OS is coming to the market at a time when Android is king, and to dethrone it, Mozilla would need more than just a hot price tag.

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Agencies
March 18,2020

Thiruvananthapuram, Mar 18: To raise awareness about protective measures against coronavirus, Kerala Police released a dance video on the State Police Media Centre's Facebook page promoting the washing of hands, here on Tuesday.

In the video, the police officers were seen dancing to the tunes of Kalakkatha from the Malayalam action-drama thriller Ayyappanum Koshiyum while demonstrating the right technique for washing hands.

The video gained over 27,000 likes and over 2,400 comments and more than 33,000 netizens shared the video.

The video has received a positive response with users congratulating Kerala Police for the initiative.

"Congrats Kerala police media for this kind of initiative," one user commented on Facebook. Another user thanked the police in the comments section saying, "Super super thanks to KL (Kerala) police."

The number of people who have tested positive for the coronavirus in Kerala is 25.

The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in India has reached 147, including 122 Indians and 25 foreign nationals, said the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare earlier today.

Globally, the virus has infected more than 184,000 people and killed more than 7500, as per the data available on the World Health Organisation website.

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Agencies
July 9,2020

Twitter has hinted that it is planning a paid subscription platform that can be reused by other teams in the future.

The news that the micro-blogging platform is building a subscription platform with a team codenamed "Gryphon" resulted in Twitter stock rising over 8% on Wednesday.

Twitter revealed its plan via a job listing that seeks a full-stack senior software engineer in New York to join "Gryphon".

Interestingly, Twitter "edited" the job listing once the news broke, removing the part about "Gryphon" and any mention of their internal team or their subscription feature. The listing said the company is looking for an Android engineer to "work on a bevy of backend engineering teams to build components that allow for experimentation to deliver the best experience possible to all of our users".

Later, Twitter users noticed that the company restored the earlier job listing that mentioned the upcoming subscription platform and "Gryphon".

A spokesperson for Twitter told CNN on Wednesday that it's only a job posting, not a product announcement.

This is not the first time Twitter has thought of a paid product. 

In 2017, it sent out a survey to users and a preview of what a premium offering of its TweetDeck app might look like, including breaking news alerts and more analytics, according to The Verge.

"We're conducting this survey to assess the interest in a new, more enhanced version of Tweetdeck. We regularly conduct user research to gather feedback about people's Twitter experience and to better inform our product investment decisions, and we're exploring several ways to make TweetDeck even more valuable for professionals," a Twitter spokesperson had said at that time.

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Agencies
July 10,2020

In a first, the Supreme Court on Friday allowed the service of summons and notices, a necessity in almost all legal proceedings, through instant messenger like WhatsApp as well as by e-mail and fax.

A bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde observed that it has been brought to the notice of the court that it is not feasible to visit post offices for service of notices, summons, and pleadings. The bench also comprising Justices AS Bopanna and R Subhash Reddy observed that notice and summons should be sent through e-mail on the same day along with instant message through WhatsApp and other phone messenger services.

The bench clarified that all methods should be deployed for a valid service on the party. "Two blue ticks would convey that the receiver has seen the notice," noted the bench.

The bench declined the request of the Attorney General for specifically naming WhatsApp as a mode of effectuating service. The top court noted that it would not be practical to specify only WhatsApp. The apex court also permitted RBI to extend the validity of cheques in the backdrop of lockdown to contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Senior advocate V Giri representing RBI informed the bench that he had circulated the note regarding validity of a cheque as directions issued on the previous hearing.

The bench noted that it will be in discretion of the RBI to issue orders which are suitable to alter the validity of the period of a cheque.

During an earlier hearing on the matter on July 7, the Attorney General contended before the top court that the Centre had some reservations in connection with the utilization of mobile applications like WhatsApp and other apps for service of summons. The Centre's top law officer informed the apex court that these apps claimed to be encrypted, and they were not trustworthy.

The RBI counsel had contended before the top court that it was considering clarifying the validity of a cheque which has been reduced to 3 months from 6 months.

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