On Day 3 of CTIA in Orlando, right after Bill Clinton & George Bush did their keynote speeches (I heard Clinton was amazing), they took a tour of the floor and spent about 10 minutes in the Nokia booth, mainly at the Nokia-pimped-out Mustang in the middle of the stand. I caught the event on video using my Nokia N95, skip to 1:20 to see some close-ups of former President Clinton...

First day of CTIA Wireless 2007 here in Orlando. I spent the afternoon between the S60 device showcase in the Nokia stand and the S60 table in the Symbian stand. The place was packed, had a lot of traffic and a lot of interest in S60. Although the questions were very polarizing - It was either, "What exactly *is* S60?" or something like, "I'm a developer and I'm wonder if Feature Pack 1 has an API to support custom video drivers" ...and nothing in between.

We have some nice S60-branded goodies to giveaway. S60 candy, S60 screenwipes, S60 keychain holder thingys, and S60 notepads. Usually people just grab one, but Dan Shugrue had a great idea - After someone took one, he asked, "What are you going to say when people see that [goodie] and ask what S60 is?" It was a great way to break the ice.

Took some photos throughout the day, you can find them in Flickr. Also took a quick video, more videos to come tomorrow. G'Night!

Welcome to CTIA 2007!

Jouni and Heidi on one side of the device showcase

The other side of the device showcase.

Visiting the beautiful warm weather of Florida makes you wonder why anyone in their right mind would want to live in Finland (like myself). Just arrived in early this morning, checked in to the Caribe Royale and saw all the nice pools (no WiFi here, only LAN. Grr!!) , then realized I don't have my bathing suit!! Ah well, I'm here on business, not pleasure.

I worked the Symbian stand last September at CTIA Wireless 2006 in Los Angeles. I wasn't overly impressed with that event - it was quite small and only people in the industry were in attendance. Talking with people who have a passion for mobile technology is much more enjoyable than chatting with people who have a job in mobile technology. But CTIA Wireless 2007 is supposed to be much bigger, they're due to have 35,000 guests from 100+ countries and 1000+ members of the press. Should be a great event!!

At 5pm the S60 screw (shown below) met up to go over the demos, our messages for the event, and last minute details. Then at 6pm we had a Nokia-wide meeting - the room was packed with 100+ people. Each of the demo groups briefly went over their presentations, a representative from Nokia security went over security-related reminders, the COMMS people did their thing. The demoers were really fired up, people were cheering and clapping and obviously anticipating the next three days. The S60 crew then went across the street for some Chinese food, then off to bed.

I'll be working the "Device Showcase" tomorrow in the Nokia stand - all our latest devices will be on display, similar to how we did it at 3GSM. I've been up trying to memorize all the details of each of the devices (you all probably know them better than me!) I'm working the afternoon shift so I can sleep a bit later tomorrow then hit up the fitness room before I'm off. I'll having my camera with me, I'll be sure to have photos and another blog post for you tomorrow. Good night!

From left to right: Minna, Dan Shugrue (U.S. Marketing), Heidi (event coordinator), Ganesh (web browser guru), Eero (Operator sales), Jouni (MRKTNGman)

Well it's 1am and I'm finally back in my hotel up here in White Plains. What an amazing bunch of people I met tonight! WoW!! I had so many great conversations with some many fantastic individuals, I think next time we need to reserve an entire weekend instead of just an evening.

The Nokia Flagship store in New York shut down early at 5pm. The store staff were extremely friendly and did a stellar job getting everything set up and accommodating our needs. We opened the doors at 6pm, guests trickled in till about 7pm. Darla Mack promised she'd be there early but was one of the last to arrive cause she was shopping! LOL!

As everyone entered, I welcomed them and gave them two cards, one for their nametag, the other to go in a bag for the "mystery prize" to be given out at the end. The device showcase was located on the first floor, the bar was on the 2nd floor, the Verttu lounge on the 3rd, meanwhile the caterers were going around serving food.

About 7:10 we cut the music and grabbed the mic. Dan Shugrue welcomed everyone and introduced all the Nokia staff. I then grabbed the mic, said a few words about S60.com and the S60 Blogs. Then announced Dean Andrews' (author of "101 Smartphone Techniques") new S60 blog, "Business2G0". Dean then said a few words then the event continued, I think the last person left around 9:30. The big mystery prize for the night was a new N95!! Congrats to Alan for winning!

It was such a great night and I didn't want it to end. I have alot more to write but I'm dead tired, I'll continue tomorrow! Until then, enjoy the photos from the event from our Flickr Group.

Hi all! We're just a couple days from the "An evening with S60" event!! The catering has been ordered, the beer and wine has been chosen, the S60 devices are on loan, the guest list has been prepared, the music playlist has been decided on, the super-cool-ultra-mystery-prize has been obtained, and I've yet to even think about what to say during my little two minute speech.

For all of you who are attending and will have a camera (that better be all of you, E61 users excluded), and for those of you who are unable to attend the event (I'm trying my hardest to make London & Helsinki the two next cities!)...I've setup a Flickr group. Throughout the night and afterwards, please send all your photos to: http://www.flickr.com/groups/s60online/ (it's a public group). Please use the tag "Evening-NYC", but no worries if you don't, I can add it later.

One special request for all those attending - Even though I'm going to make you all wear dorky name tags as you enter the store (mwahahaha!), I was hoping that everyone could get to know each other beforehand. Send a photo of yourself to the Flickr group and include your name (and whatever else you like, like forum username etc..) in the comments section. That way, everyone will know everyone before everyone arrives! :-)

I'll be liveblogging throughout the evening (and I read that TheNokiaBlog will be too), so please visit this blog during the event! Dan will be running around with a video camera and we'll be uploading video to our YouTube channel (http://youtube.com/s60online) all night long. And I'll have my podcasting equipment with me for some impromptu interviews (Darla & Stefan are my first victims!).

Really looking forward to seeing you all there!!!!

So who's gonna be at CTIA Wireless 2007 in Orlando this month from the 27th to 29th? Although S60 won't have their own stand, we'll be represented with people in the Nokia stand and Symbian stand. I don't think our demos are quite finalized yet, I'll let you all know the details once we decide on them.

I'll be there for the entire week, I'd love to meet up if you'll be attending!! Shoot me an e-mail or comment below. Looking forward to seeing you there!!

I must say, "WOW!" When we had originally planned this event, it was just a last-minute idea and we had only figured a handful of S60 enthusiasts would be able to attend at such short notice. ...well we were completely mistaken! :-)

I'm so glad to hear that so many of you can make it! And I'm really looking forward to meeting each of you. I think we have a nice little event planned for our loyal readers of the S60 Blogs, I hope you'll all enjoy it! It's gonna be really cool to have so many S60 enthusiasts under one roof.

One quick thing though - because of the overwhelming response, we've quickly ran out of room and I'm not going to be able to take any more attendees. :-( So my sincere apologies if you're just hearing about this event and have yet to RSVP. But I can assure you that we'll be back in NYC sometime, and we'll be doing more of these this year. London and Helsinki are at the top of our list.

And apologies to all those who have already RSVP'ed, I've yet to send out confirmations, I'll do so this evening.

Looking forward to seeing you all there!!

Hey all you S60 enthusiasts in and around New York City! I'm writing to announce the very first "An evening with S60" to be held at the Nokia Flagship Store in New York City on March 15th from 6:30pm - 8:30pm (they're closing the store early for us!). It's a very exclusive event just for you readers of the S60 Blogs and S60 enthusiasts.

On the agenda for the evening…

- Food & Drinks
- Networking with Nokia/S60 crew and S60 enthusiasts in the NYC area.
- Dean Andrews, author of "101 Cool Smartphone Techniques", to launch his new S60 Blog.
- Hands-on with all the new S60 devices including the Nokia N95, E61i, E65, E90 Communicator, and 6110 Navigator.
- Demonstration and hands-on with S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2 hosted by Mikko Röntynen, Head of S60 Platform Marketing.
- A short presentation (TBD) hosted by yours truly.
- More details to come...

So if you're in the New York City metropolitan area, we'd love to have you! Apologies in advance but attendance is limited, so please RSVP as soon as you can to: phillip dot schwarzmann -at- nokia dot com

Looking forward to seeing you there!!