Microsoft's new ad pokes fun at Samsung and Apple fans. Their solution is switching to Lumia!

   Microsoft have been doing their level best to get their Windows Phone platform out there lately. Windows Phone 7 was a good start and Windows Phone 8 carried on the good work, but the one thing they really need to make their platform a success is to convince a lot more people to 'switch'. 

   With that in mind the two obvious places to target are those people who are thinking about either picking up an iPhone or one of Samsung's Galaxy range of smartphones. Both of those groups have a big set of fans and if you read the comments sections on posts then you'll quite often see their fans squabbling. That's something which Microsoft have picked up on and their latest advert, set at a wedding, captures the mood rather well.

   As the ceremony gets under way both sides pull out their phones to capture the special moment, one Samsung owner is asked rather impolitely to get his 'enormous' phone out of the way, before a war of words kicks off. The retort 'enormously awesome' is thrown out, before S-Beam, Siri and the stereotypical age of iPhone users are all brought into the fray, just like the normal 'iSheep' and 'CopyBot' remarks too!

   One of our personal favourites in this ad is where a Galaxy user says, 'Autocorrect this', before proceeding to start a brawl, during which an iPhone user is thrown into the cake and asked 'is there an app for that?' which also made us chuckle.

   When all is said and done a pair of brightly coloured Nokia Lumia 920's are held out by the catering staff with the ultimate suggestion being 'Don't fight. Switch'. Will this ad be enough to stop the slide in Lumia sales in the US lately? Possibly not, but it's a good fun advert which certainly hits the mark!

Via TheVerge.

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Samsung confirm the Galaxy S4 will have a plastic back, while the possibility of eye scrolling is rumoured!

   With nine days to go until we 'meet the next Galaxy' the rumours and excitement are building, but today we've got wind of a rumour which could seems very plausible. We know Samsung advertised the Galaxy S3 as a phone 'designed for humans' with things such as smart alert which silences a phone call when you flip the phone over and direct call when you bring the phone to your ear if you're in a text message from someone. 

   But there's one feature in particular which is called 'smart stay', essentially this activates the front camera to see if you're still staring at the screen, if you are then the device will keep the screen on, if not then your screen will turn off! Today's rumour could see Samsung building on 'smart stay'; and taking it a step further so that you can automatically scroll with your eyes!

   An anonymous Samsung employee reportedly told The New York Times that the Galaxy S4 will feature 'Eye Scrolling'. The phone will be able to tell where you are by monitoring your eyes and will scroll up or down the page so you don't have to lift a finger! The paper said: 

"when users read articles and their eyes reach the bottom of the page, the software will automatically scroll down to reveal the next paragraphs of text."

   This whole rumour is made a lot more conceivable by the patents/trademarks that Samsung filed for in Europe this January. The first of which is called “Eye Scroll”  or patent No. 011510674 and it seems the American counterpart for this patent is called “Samsung Eye Scroll” and was applied for in February! The US filing describes the idea as a “Computer application software having a feature of sensing eye movements and scrolling displays of mobile devices, namely, mobile phones, smartphones and tablet computers according to eye movements; digital cameras; mobile telephones; smartphones; tablet computers.” Samsung also trademarked “Eye Pause”, but there weren't any details on that one available.

   Other than that we don't know all that much about Samsung's upcoming flagship, but one thing we have all but confirmed is that Samsung will be rocking that plastic backing that is a somewhat unpopular trait of their Galaxy series. Samsung's Vice President of the Mobile Division, Y. H. Lee, did say however that:

“I think the next product has a nice balance between this, We listen to the market and try to accommodate.”

   In Samsung's defence the plastic backing does allow them to offer a removable battery, better drop resistance and it also makes the devices easier to mass produce and potentially means reduced costs for consumers!

   What do you think would a plastic backing put you off or do you just love the option of a removable battery? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

New York Times Via PCAdvisor and CNet.

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