Tag Archives: entertainment
BlackBerry’s ‘next-level’ Z30 launched in Dubai
BlackBerry’s ‘next-level’ Z30 launched in Dubai Alvin R. Cabral / 24 September 2013 BlackBerry has launched its new all-touch Z30 smartphone in the Middle East on Monday, with the first units having been made available at its BlackBerry Store in The Dubai Mall late last night, as the Canadian handset maker looks to ride the momentum borne out of its latest suite of BlackBerry 10 OS-powered devices. After the exclusive launch, the Z30 will be available through BlackBerry’s partners beginning today. While the competition in the smartphone segment is getting tougher by the day, BlackBerry is “actually doing very well” especially in the Middle East, according to a top official, who pointed out that the firm is still enjoying consumers’ trust with its devices and services. “The Middle East is definitely one of our key growth markets… because people trust us and have utmost confidence in BlackBerry,” Mike Al Mefleh, senior director of Product Management and Platform – Software Services at BlackBerry, told Khaleej Times in an interview. “We laid out the foundation with our OS 10 devices and we took it to the next level.” He pointed out that BlackBerry provides important aspects in mobile computing — security, integrity, privacy and reliability — components that are critical especially in today’s fast-paced and broader world of mobile computing. “As a consumer you want your information available to you, and we provide that,” Al Mefleh said, pointing out that its flagship BlackBerry Messenger, or BBM, continues to enjoy the support of users especially here in the region. “Consumers enjoy BBM because it is very secure and very private, unlike other social media apps,” he said, adding that in the Middle East, BBM’s penetration rate is at 98 per cent, and even 99 per cent in some countries. New flagship Z30 Last week, BlackBerry — the former Research In Motion — released a statement from its Waterloo What’s new in the z30? BlackBerry has touted its new all-touch Z30 smartphone as its “biggest, fastest and most advanced”. Here’s the lowdown: BlackBerry Priority Hub — You can now learn what conversations and what people are important to you making it fast and easy to find the messages and information you need. BBM now in any app and message previews everywhere — You can now get a preview of any message as it arrives in whatever app you’re using, and immediately dismiss it or tap it to read the full content and respond. Stereo audio and BlackBerry Natural Sound — The Z30 smartphone comes with stereo speakers that immerse you in your sounds, and makes conversations look like it’s face-to-face. New antennae technology — A new-generation antennae technology dynamically tunes reception to give better connectivity in low-signal areas. headquarters that it would be launching its Z30 smartphone this week in the Middle East and the United Kingdom, with other regions to follow soon. It comes after the company released its new devices running the latest BlackBerry 10 OS — the all-touch Z10 and the touch-and-type Q10 and Q5. Most recently, it unveiled the 9720 that runs on OS 7. The Z30 will be its “biggest, fastest and most advanced” smartphone to date, featuring BlackBerry 10 OS version 10.2, a five-inch Super Amoled display, a 1.7GHz processor with quad-core graphics and the largest battery — 2880mAh — yet on a BlackBerry device. It has four stereo speakers with BlackBerry Natural Sound, a new-generation BlackBerry Paratek Antennae that gives faster data transfers and many other features. Demonstrating the Z30, Al Mefleh says that the company continues to highlight its BlackBerry Hub — the “centre of communications” — on the phone, which has been well-received by users. Enhanced as the BlackBerry Priority Hub, it is now able to list the most important messages and collects priority messages. It also has a new attachment button to save time when sending files. He said that the BlackBerry Hub — as it has always been — is a “shift and transformation in making life easier for users”. A new notification feature has also been added on the Z30; for example, a message can be read and replied to while browsing, without closing the latter. This feature can also be disabled for privacy reasons. And good news for those considering a BlackBerry for their next phone: Al Mefleh confirmed that the Z30 will now be able to run more apps based on Google’s Android operating system, a welcome development in the cross-platform arena. He added that the number of apps available for the OS 10 on the BlackBerry AppWorld site is now up from an initial 50,000 to 140,000, meaning that users have a broader choice — and more reasons to get themselves a BlackBerry. Its typing and browsing feature was touted by Al Mefleh, calling it “the best typing and browsing experience… we keep improving and mastering this”. He says that continuing to improve user experience on a smartphone “is the future; we continue to make life easier and simpler”. “We have enjoyed the success of the BlackBerry OS 10. Since we introduced it, we have seen that… people have liked what we’ve given them.” Al Mefleh was confident that the Z30 — selling for Dh2,499 — will be met positively by consumers. And when asked on what other devices are to be launched in 2013, he reiterated an earlier announcement this year that BlackBerry was slated to roll out six new ones. “You know what we’ve launched; you do the math,” he said candidly. – alvin@khaleejtimes.com Continue reading
Kenya mall attack: combats continue as the President addresses the nation
The assault, and the siege of the mall in Nairobi, Kenya, is still on-going, as the president Uhuru Kenyatta addressed the nation, and called for the support… Continue reading
Syria meets deadline for chemical weapons disclosure
Syria meets deadline for chemical weapons disclosure (Reuters) / 22 September 2013 Syria has handed over information about its chemical arsenal to a UN-backed weapons watchdog, meeting the first deadline of an ambitious disarmament operation that averted the threat of Western air strikes. The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said on Saturday it had “received the expected disclosure” from Damascus, 24 hours after saying it had been given a partial document from Syrian authorities. It said it was reviewing the information, handed over after President Bashar Al Assad agreed to destroy Syria’s chemical weapons in the wake of a sarin gas strike in Damascus’s suburbs last month – the world’s deadliest chemical attack in 25 years. The timetable for disarmament was laid down by US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov a week ago in Geneva when they set aside sharp differences over Syria to address the chemical weapons issue. Their plan set a Saturday deadline for Syria to give a full account of the weapons it possesses. Security experts say it has about 1,000 tonnes of mustard gas, VX and sarin – the nerve gas UN inspectors found had been used in the Aug. 21 attack. The US State Department said on Friday, after the OPCW announced Syria’s initial declaration, that it was studying the material. “An accurate list is vital to ensure the effective implementation,” spokeswoman Marie Harf said. Once the OPCW executive has voted to follow the Lavrov-Kerry plan in a meeting expected early next week, the Security Council is due to give its endorsement of the arrangements – marking a rare consensus after two years of East-West deadlock over Syria. However, the two powers are divided over how to ensure compliance with the accord. US President Barack Obama has warned that he is still prepared to attack Syria, even without a U.N. mandate, if Assad reneges on the deal. Russia, which says it is not clear who was behind the August 21 attack and has a veto in the Security Council, opposes attempts by Western powers to write in an explicit and immediate threat of penalties under what are known as Chapter VII powers. It wants to discuss ways of forcing Syrian compliance only in the event that Damascus fails to cooperate. But a senior Russian official suggested on Saturday that if there were clear indications that Assad were not committed to handing over chemical weapons, Moscow may stop supporting him. “I’m talking theoretically and hypothetically, but if we became sure that Assad is cheating, we could change our position,” said Sergei Ivanov, chief of staff for President Vladimir Putin. Ivanov said it would take two to three months to decide how long it would take to eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons, a task that the Kerry-Lavrov agreement aims to complete by mid-2014. The accord has been welcomed internationally because of its potential to remove a toxic arsenal from Syria’s battlefield and possibly revive international efforts to press for a political solution to the civil war. But it has done nothing in the short term to stem fighting with conventional weapons, which has killed more than 100,000 people, according to the United Nations. Rebel forces, some of whom accused the West of betrayal when Obama stepped back from air strikes against Assad’s forces three weeks ago, seized several villages south of Aleppo on Saturday. Their offensive was the latest effort to cut Assad’s supply lines to Syria’s biggest city, preventing reinforcements by road from Damascus to the south. Video posted on the Internet showed rebels from the Tawhid brigade firing from a tank and a truck-mounted machine gun at army positions near the Sheikh Said suburb south of Aleppo. Further south, in Hama province, soldiers and pro-Assad militiamen killed at least 15 people, including a woman and two children, in the Sunni Muslim village of Sheikh Hadid, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. The opposition Syrian National Coalition rejected an offer by Iran’s president Hasan Rohani to help start talks with the Syrian government, saying Tehran could not mediate while providing political, economic, and military support to Assad. “If serious, the Iranian government would withdraw its military experts and extremist fighters from Syria before embarking on dialogue proposals,” it said in a statement. Continue reading
