Slingplayer Mobile potentially coming to Android, future webOS player uncertain
Those with a Slingbox at home and a smartphone in your pocket appreciate the on-the-go mobile viewing that Slingplayer Mobile provides. Currently, Slingplayer Mobile supports most handsets running Windows Mobile, Symbian, and the Palm OS. The recently released Blackberry beta client supports select GSM Blackberry handsets and the iPhone compatible version is slated to go through the App store approval process some time in Q1 2009. This leaves Android and the newly announced webOS as potential future candidates for upcoming versions of SlingPlayer Mobile. A forum post over at Sling Community by MegaZone, Community Manager for Sling Media, sheds some light on the future of SlingPlayer Mobile. According to MegaZone, Android is the “next logical platform”. With several handsets already slated for release, many handset manufacturers committed to producing future handsets and carriers from around the world lining up to offer an Android handset, Android is a platform that is certainly worth the cost of development. Palm’s webOS on the other hand is, at this point, not as attractive as Android according to the Sling rep. MegaZone writes,
From what we have seen it looks like webOS is an all-new environment, so it would need an all-new SPM which would not be a small task. At this time we’re taking a wait and see approach to webOS. When it ships we’ll watch the adoption rate and decide if it warrants developing SPM for webOS or not. Keep in mind it has currently been announced for one device (the Pre) on one carrier (#3 and currently falling) so it remains to be seen if and when it appears on additional devices and carriers for the worldwide market and achieves a significant market share.
Burn! Whether his view on Sprint, Palm and its webOS is shared by other member of Sling Media remains to be seen but if it is indeed the consensus, then a mobile version of Sling Player for webOS may be a long time in the making.
[Via Zatz Not Funny]
This isn’t really new at all, when I talked to a Sling rep on slingcommunity.com like 6 months ago he told me all of this. He said the Blackberry and iPhone SPM’s were “already in the pipeline”, and that Android MAY follow, but no guarantees.
backbeat? You there?
I think by early to mid 2010 you will see some serious developer attention on webOS. Maybe with follow-on business oriented hardware that has more power.
i love how you have the omnia there
its a beautiful windows mobile phone isnt it???
Come to my storrrrrrrrrrrrrrm!
With limited resources I can see them waiting on WebOS to take off first, but the “one carrier” argument is weak. Palm has already said a GSM version for the rest of the world would be available about the same time as Sprint’s Pre, and Sprint’s exclusivity in the USA will only last 3-6 months.
But if Sprint which is well behind other the other major carrier in numbers and dropping fast bring the Pre in as early as May, instead of June, we are into the fall before you see serious play.
One carrier is not a “weak argument.” There is zero evidence that the Pre will be picked up by anyone else, there is an avalanche of new smartphones on the way from so many quarters, not the least of which is Apple itself. I don’t think anyone at Palm would expect in their wildest wet dreams to have 10% or 15% of the Windows Mobile or iPhone market 12 months from now.
While I’m a Sprint customer, I’m still taking a wait-and-see approach with the Pre as well. With more Android devices looming and WM7 on the horizon early next year I can maybe be content to wait if it’s not a real-world home run. But their exclusivity almost certainly won’t last long. And since it’s a CDMA device you’d have to think Verizon would be next on the launch list (which could quickly bring it to a whole other level of audience.) Plus, Palm has already stated that the WebOS platform is going to be on future iterations of other Palm phones (like the very popular Centro.)
Well, I was fired for making that post – sharing too much.
SELL YOUR SLINGBOXES cause they’re NOT going to support ANDROID !!!!!! Here’s the message I got from SlingMedia Support when I asked the question….How sad !!!
Thank you for contacting Sling Media Technical Support.
As we understand, you want to know if the Slingbox will support the Android Mobile devices any time soon. We will be more than willing to assist you.
Android is a software platform and operating system for mobile devices, based on the Linux operating system, developed by Google and later the Open Handset Alliance. It allows developers to write managed code in a Java-like language that utilizes Google-developed Java libraries, but does not support programs developed in native code.
Most of the supported cell phones run on Windows OS. Since Android runs on Linux OS, it is not compatible with the SlingPlayer. Therefore, Slingbox will not support it and we do not know if it will be supported any time soon.
If you require further assistance, feel free to visit Sling Media Support – Support or contact us at 1-877-GO-SLING (877-467-5464) Monday through Sunday 7am-7pm Pacific Time.