Spotify’s mobile app has been available on Symbian/S60 phones (including most Nokia smartphones and some Sony Ericssons and Samsungs – see a full list of supported phones here) for a few weeks now, and I’ve had a chance to try it on my N78, and also compare the Nokia app to the iPhone version.

Spotify Mobile allows users to stream a huge catalogue of music over WiFi or 3G and, crucially, to store 3,333 tracks in offline playlists. The Spotify Mobile app is free to download, but you’ll need a Spotify Premium account to use it, which costs £9.99 a month.

Downloading and installing is a breeze. Just access m.spotify.com on your mobile browser, and you’ll automatically get the appropriate version. Once installed, just enter your Spotify username and password and the playlists from your desktop version of Spotify appear.

Various Symbian phones look to have different onscreen layouts – neccessary, of course, as the various phones have different sized screens. Read more…

Music, Technology

Hal Graham, the first man to officially fly a rocketbelt, has died. The following is an edited extract from The Rocketbelt Caper:

Harold ‘Hal’ Graham was a 27-year-old science graduate from Buffalo who had been working for the Bell Aircraft Company as a test engineer for just over a year when he was selected to be the first man to pilot the rocketbelt – the iconic flying jetpack created by engineer Wendell Moore.

It would be Graham’s first taste of flying. He was not a registered pilot, and the only machine he had previous experience of driving was a car. He was, however, a rocketbelt fan, having grown up with Buck Rogers comics and Commando Cody serials. When Bell began to ask around for a volunteer to fly the rocketbelt he had no hesitation in applying for the job.

Graham’s first tethered flight took place in March 1961. These flights took place in a large aircraft hangar. The rocketbelt was suspended from the ceiling, and small amounts of thrust were used to generate moderate lift. 36 tethered flights later, it was time for the safety ropes to come off. Read more…

Books, Technology

Newcastle Brown Ale will not longer be brewed on Tyneside, Scottish & Newcastle has announced, making you wonder what appreciation anyone at the brewing conglomerate has of its world famous brand. Brewing will be shifted to Tadcaster, but the drink will still be labelled ‘Newcastle’ and sold by the boatload around the world. What a sham.

In fact, the last true bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale was brewed in April 2005, after which S&N’s Tyne brewery was closed and demolished, and production was moved across the River Tyne to Gateshead, at the Federation Brewery. The ‘Fed’ will now close, with the loss of 63 jobs.

Given that Scottish & Newcastle has previously closed its Edinburgh brewery, you could be forgiven for suggesting that it should now just call itself ‘&’. Read more…

Miscellaneous

Taken: DVD Review

Liam Neeson is a former Government “preventer”, which basically means he can do karate and shoot some guns. But he has given that up to be closer to his estranged daughter, who is meant to be 17 but inexplicably acts like she’s 12, skipping around in pigtails, yelling “Daddy!” and cuddling ponies. Then she does what all 17-year-old girls dream of – she heads off with an equally gormless friend to Europe to follow hip young rock cobblers U2 on tour.

Unluckily, within minutes of arriving in an apparently lawless backwater known as Paris, France, the two girls are kidnapped by a people trafficking gang, chained to a mucky bed and shot full of heroin. Luckily, Liam knows a man who can work computers, and soon he has the name of the gang boss, and a private flight to Paris. Read more…

Film