giffgaff Blog

Since Nokia announced in February that they would be moving to the Windows Phone platform, Nokia’s first Windows Phone devices have been eagerly awaited in the industry. The Nokia Lumia 800 finally launched in the UK this month and it’s been turning a lot of heads. But what is Windows Phone 7 actually like? How does the Nokia Lumia 800 compare to other top smartphones which run Android or iOS? Are there more devices to come in the Lumia family? Is it possible to use a Nokia Lumia device on giffgaff?

Today giffgaff turns a whole two years old! Hooray, hooray for all of us

In our on-going series of articles about mobile technology, we’ve been looking at various different parts of your mobile phone and how they work. We’ve also been asking for your thoughts on which features you’d put in your ideal phone for giffgaff members. Would it have a hardware keyboard or a software keyboard? Would voice-control features such as Siri be an essential feature for you? Would you have a LCD display or an organic LED display? Would it run Android, iOS, Windows Phone or something else?

In this latest article, we look at location-based services and positioning technology. Many modern smartphones can determine your current location using GPS, wi-fi or the mobile network. These technologies allow you to use your phone to find local businesses or for navigation. But how do these technologies actually work? Is battery life a big worry with these technologies? How can mobile phones utilise your current location in order to become smarter?

If you've ever tried to feed notes into a supermarket's automated checkout, found a dodgy pound coin in your change or lost a fortune on a night out, you'll know that cash isn't perfect. Wouldn't it be great if we could replace it with something more up-to-date? If that's what you're thinking, the giants of tech are thinking what you're thinking too. Thanks to Near Field Communications (NFC) technology, your mobile phone could be your wallet too.

Mobile phones grow at such a rate, I find it quite surprising that the vast majority of users have no idea how they work - even when they use it every day!

Because of this mobile phone urban myths spread around all the time, some true and some far from the truth!

Here's 10 things you (probably) didn't know about mobile phones..

I mentioned in my blog on Tuesday that we’d be looking at the timing of our Blackberry launch given the website capacity problems we have been experiencing over the last few weeks. Our concern is that the demand for Blackberry could make matters worse if we launched when the site is less than perfect.

So we’ve conducted the review today and we’ve made a decision to delay the launch of Blackberry for a short time.

Find out about Unlocking your Samsung Galaxy Mini and see how easy it is to apply giffgaff settings.

Over the last couple of weeks many of our members’ experience of giffgaff has been a long way below the standards they deserve. Our website has sometimes been slow with things like topping up and activation whilst in the background some of our processes such as applying queued goodybags haven’t completed successfully.

There has been a knock on impact on our member services team – they have seen a big increase in queries related to the above problems and as a result have taken longer than we’d like to work through all the replies.

So the purpose of this blog is to explain what's happened and what we're doing to put things right......

The one thing you need to do today is vote on the charity poll! Go - do it now and come back and see the oddness we have in store for you today.  

This week we asked what you were doing, if anything, to celebrate the 5th of November - Bonfire night.

The results were explosive!

After months of speculation they're finally here: Nokia's first Windows Phone smartphones will go on sale on the 16th of November. The Lumia 800 isn't just a smartphone, though. It's the first shot in a new technology battle. Fed up with Apple and Android getting all the attention, Nokia and Microsoft want to be the Phone Kings once again.

Having already discussed the invention of the phone and the birth and growth of the networks, this week we look at the growth of the copper cable infrastructure in the US and at home.

In our on-going series of articles, we’d like to find out what the ideal mobile phone might look like if it were designed by giffgaff members. What kind of specifications would it have? Would it have a hardware keyboard or a software keyboard? Would voice-control features such as Siri be an essential feature for you?  Would it run Android, iOS, Windows Phone or something else?

In this latest article, we look at mobile display technology. As giffgaff members, you can make the most out of the multimedia features of your phone with unlimited data on our giffgaff goodybags. That means you can use your phone to watch YouTube videos, browse the latest photos from last night’s party on Facebook and to tweet your snaps from the front row of the concert. You can also use one of our SIMs in your tablet with a giffgaff gigabag. In order to get the best multimedia experience from your smartphone or tablet, you’ll want a sharp, vibrant and high-resolution display. We’d like to find out which type of display you prefer. Do you prefer LCD displays, organic LED (OLED) displays or something a bit different like an electronic ink display?

As most of you will know, at giffgaff we have a specific part on our boards dedicated to capturing your ideas. We work very hard with you to ensure the ideas people come up with are right for giffgaff and our community. And we continue to work to implement as many as we can. With the end of the year fast approaching and everyone looking forward to fireworks and snow we felt it would be a good time to have another look at the ideas board and what we've done in the last couple of months.

Surfers being eaten by whales, laughing rats, child vs the world, pac ghostbusters and the science behind you going blind daily for 40 minutes. 

With Halloween having passed, we asked you what your favourite type of horrow films were.

The results are spooky.

This week we look at the deployment and growth of mobile networks as we know them