Sticking with Orange, credit where it is due: The company's FilmToGo offer is really giving them a lot to talk about. And it's a pretty sweet offer: A free movie every Thursday (provided you pay the 35p text charge). This week it's the 1989 classic, Batman. I have seen this add about six times today in four different formats -- an every time I see it, I feel a little bit satisfied that I'm an Orange customer and I get free movies every week... super work Orange!

I just spotted this offer from Orange in today's Independent: An iPhone 3GS, free, for £15/month on a 24-month contract. At this contract price point, the iPhone has truly become a phone of the people. Anyone who wants one (and who can pass the credit check) can have one. I wonder how many will take up this offer?

Given you've spent about £399 or thereabouts for the device, is spending half of the value on a case worth it? How much did you spend on your iPad case? Me? I didn't bother with a case!

Although I've now been living in Ascot for three weeks I am only just getting used to the train times and station sequences. For instance, we just pulled up at Virginia Water station and I found myself wondering 'how many more stations'.

I flipped up the National Rail app, looked at the next train and then saw a helpful blue dot showing where my train is on the list of stations.
It's just a small thing but I do have to pinch myself sometimes the technology is fundamentally so amazing. The experience made my day just a little bit nicer.

What do you use for train times? I'm using the National Rail app.

In Bracknell this weekend I came across this shop -- I'm not quite sure if it's an Everything Everywhere shop. I was under the impression those were branded differently. This place just had the two operator logos and inside the shop was roughly split in two with T-Mobile on the left and Orange on the right. Whatever the actual branding I think this approach does work. It didn't seem to bother the consumers walking in and out. The company has done enough advertising to explain that both brands are now 'cooperating'. When you see both brands integrated into one store you can certainly recognise the financial savings that could be made across the country's High Streets if the company can reduce presence to just one store per area, rather than two. What does interest me is that if I was to walk into the shop, which network would I join? What would the sales folk advise? Do I get an iPhone from Orange or from T-Mobile? Of course they're the same thing nowadays (almost) so how would I make the determination? And can I 'churn' from Orange to T-Mobile in-store? ;) That must be at least theoretically possible!

I haven't shopped at any of these integrated stores yet -- have you?

I was in Bracknell town centre over the weekend. I had to pick up the 'repaired' iPhone -- do you remember? Vodafone's insurance people were going to replace the cracked screen. They just gave us a reconditioned one instead. That works. So since we were in Bracknell we had a look about. My wife ended up at the cosmetics counter in Bentalls so I took the baby for a stroll. I came across this shop, Cheque Centre -- as illustrated. They appear to offer a variety of cash related services. What caught my attention was their mobile phone offering. You can take any phone in there and walk out with cash a few minutes later. This concept is nothing new in the context of pawn shops or tech swap shops. What's appealing to me, however, is that the recycle-your-phone-for-cash online services take a little while to work. You have to post your phone to them and wait a week or so before you get notification of actual value -- and then you may need to wait another week for the cash. I really like the immediacy of being able to sell devices quickly -- same day -- and get the cash there and then. A sign inside the shop explained that you don't need to bother bringing manuals, boxes or chargers. I would imagine that there will be an overhead for this service -- that is, they will probably pay less cash than the online services. I should have gone in and asked how much they'd pay for an iPhone 4 just to get an idea. How many devices have you got sitting about cluttering up the place? Your local Cheque Centre (or equivalent) might be worth a visit. I reckon I must have at least a grand's worth of old stuff near my desk. Has anyone tried out Cheque Centre or any High Street place for this kind of thing?

I was arguing with a chap last night about the state of M-Commerce. I
was extolling the virtues, pointing out just how useful it is -- and
how huge the market is set to become.

I pointed to my favourite example: Amazon and shoelaces. I explained
that I don't give a hoot about shopping for shoelaces -- I just want
it done. I want them delivered next day and I don't want to spend more
than a jillisecond thinking about it. Life is short. Taking 30 minutes
out of my day to go hunting for shoelaces is a poor use of time. I
demonstrated being able to locate and order shoelaces in about 10
seconds with the Amazon mobile app.

Then I talked about Pizza Express. Then I explained Masabi's mobile
ticketing. Then...

I ran out of examples.

I briefly remembered that Ocado in the UK does (or did, in 2009 if
memory serves) 7-8% of its whole revenues through mobile. I quoted
that.

The chap wasn't having any of it, saying that these were just isolated
issues of particular need and that in 10 years time we'll still be
shopping via a 'proper' (desktop) computer.

Setting aside the fact this chap has his head in the sand, I wondered
if you had any good examples of mobile commerce that you could tell me
about? Just a sentence or two. I need to bolster my example array
beyond just quoting Amazon or eBay stats.

If you've got a second, stick a quick one-liner comment below telling
me about your favourite M-Commerce example?

I do think I have a bit of a problem -- I seem to be about a donkey's
whisker away from flying off the handle in outrage, annoyance and
frustration when it comes to the mobile marketplace.

Last night if you were following my tweets, you'll have noted my 'shit, I
need a dentist' messages. The first thing I did after realising this need
was recognising that I'd have to do the sodding work for myself -- that
is, go and find a 24-hour dentist, phone them up, check there's space for
me, try and locate the nearest one, etc. I blamed the mobile industry -- I
should be able to query basic things like local dental or medical
availability real-time from my handset.

Quite a few people replied pointing out that it wasn't mobile technology
to blame -- it was stupid dentists for not surfacing their
locations/availability/services into some kind of API that could be
queried. Fair point. It's a fundamental failure of the industry though. We
are, it seems, at least 5-10 years away from me being able to book a
dental appointment through a real-time auction of locally available
assets.

When I say it's a failure of the industry, fundamentally I mean the
operators. They are too busy dicking about rearranging their calling price
plans to squeeze an extra 16p out of me every month to recognise that,
last night, at 7pm, I'd have paid them 50 pounds to have been able to
locate and book a dental appointment there-and-then. The operator would
also have been able to take a commission from the dentist too. But no.

"This isn't their primary business!" Hundreds will cry.

Of course not. But it's a good second-tier service business that would
support the operator's... Oh I can't be bothered even writing it out, it's
so patently simple. Why isn't there a Vodafone LifeTools service that I
subscribe to for a fiver a month offering me real-time stuff like this,
when I really need it? If Voda jumped into the market and started
originating demand for emergency dental, medical, plumbing and locksmith
services, they could do some damage.

But as we know, the standard operator viewpoint is that they couldn't
innovate themselves out of a wet paper bag. Which is why Google, Apple and
a host of third party independents are busy treating the operators like
the bit-pipes they so clearly wish to be.

Which brings me to today's bollocks experience at Ascot railway station. I
didn't even bother running for the train as I saw it pull in. Because I
thought the queue at the ticket office would have made it pointless.

I was correct.

As the train had pulled away I wasn't surprised to see a line or plebs
queued up, credit cards in hand. Nowadays it seems to take 30-seconds
minimum for a credit card transaction to complete -- which is highly
frustrating when you're in the queue willing it to move quicker. I try and
do my transactions really fast however others seem to be quite happy to
plod along.

I used cash this morning and my total transaction time was, I reckon, 8
seconds. I slowly counted in my head.

Why do I have to do this? I could have ran for the train but then I'd be
subject to possible buffoonery at the other end when I arrived without a
ticket. I'd most probably be fined. Explaining "there was a queue" would,
I suspect, not excuse the fine.

I'm happy to pay: I just want it faster, more seamless. I don't mind using
an Oyster card but that doesn't work out of London. I just want this done.
Dicking about with paper tickets is highly annoying.

Enter Masabi. The chaps there have
developed some phenomenal mobile ticketing technology. Chiltern Railways
deployed it a little while ago. Kudos Chiltern. With the Masabi-developed
app, you can buy your ticket in a few taps and even use the resulting QR
code to get through the ticket barriers.

What about the other railway companies in the UK? I've no doubt Masabi are
busy pushing them. Meanwhile I am being exposed daily to this 18th Century
'paper ticket' model and I am finding it highly frustrating.

I do have to wonder why one of the big operators hasn't snapped up Masabi
or done a licensing deal to help push the market forward. Why can't they
all band together so that if you're a contract customer, buying a train
ticket is fully integrated into the device? One would imagine the railway
companies would be receptive to a five-way operator consortium wanting to
make life better and faster for their customers (and, take a slice of
profits obviously).

But no. The operators will largely be sticking to the tried and tested
formula of tinkering with the price plans.

I'm being far too forward thinking. Far too open minded. Far too
'rose-tinted', right?

Meanwhile keep at it Masabi. I will try and keep my frustrations in check
every time I have to buy paper tickets, stand in inane queues and carry
cash in the mornings to buy my tickets faster.

I'm looking forward to checking it out. Any recommendations for some apps and services to look at?

That's one way of using your Thinkpad. Indeed, CFOs around the world could avoid an expensive tablet bill by insisting on buying Lenovo laptops...