T3 Pretends Their 01 Phone Website is Real
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This morning, T3 (which, by the way, we love ’round here) posted a blurb in which they claim to have “stumbled across” the website at www.the01phone.com, which they’re reporting is going to make the iPhone, Nokia N96, Blackberry Bold and Samsung INNOV8 i850 obsolete. Read more after the clicky thingie…
Problem is the website – and presumably, the product itself – are fake. Well, it’s a real website, but it’s owned by Future Publishing, who publish T3 among others. And the ID for the Flash player showing off that ‘coming soon’ countdown timer (also fake: it always starts at the same time) is even called T3_phone.
So what are you up to, T3? Just trying to get your readers riled up for no good reason? Holding a future tech design contest? Or have you made some pact with the devil a tech company to be exclusive unveiler of some new piece of übergadgetry?
Hmm, probably none of the above. In fact, the site seems to have been built…or is at least being heavily monitored by…Omniture’s Hitbox service, which is sometimes considered to be spyware that installs “a tracking cookie that monitors your Internet activity and gathers your personal information as you surf the web. This information may be retrieved by the parent company, without your consent” according to SpywareRemove.com. Sounds a bit paranoid to us. Cookies are our friends!
But, this could be just a way for T3 to see how many people click through to the site, what browser they’re running, what resolution, etc.
Which isn’t really too much fun, especially when compared with a super-smartphone that has a laser keyboard.
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:19 am
There’s also heavy censorship of the original news story on T3’s site, which is quite amusing. Someone posted the (publicly available) whois information and it was quickly removed, though everyone has called it out.
The countdown timer does appear to work (it’s at 29 days 7 hours 41 minutes at present) so maybe they tweaked it.
There may well be something happening in mid-September, but eventually this kind of stuff gets boring enough when Apple’s fans do it, letalone a UK TnT magazine.
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:37 am
Good catch, Andy! Yup, looks like somebody’s working late over at T3 to do a little cleanup, as now the countdown timer’s actually working as you say.
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:54 am
“There’s also heavy censorship of the original news story on T3’s site, which is quite amusing.”
In it’s defence, all the comments are still there – the page automatically only ever displays the most recent three. So the one blowing the fakery whistle has disappeared off the bottom, giving the appearance of censorship.
Hit “See all comments” button, or try this: http://www.t3.com/news/the-01-phone-discovered-is-this-our-dream-phone-with-32gb-of-storage?=36478&allCom=y
“Yup, looks like somebody’s working late over at T3 to do a little cleanup”
Well, it’s only five o’clock here in the UK. Still, they’ve picked an odd time to pull this stunt and not the most effective means of covering their antics up. I hope there’s something more interesting to this tale than a simple publicity scam.
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:21 am
@Greg
I thought you all left at 3:30 to hit the pub 😉
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:49 am
@Lou Zucaro
Too bloody right. Which reminds me… I’m late!
August 22nd, 2008 at 5:33 pm
I hate doing this, because it’s adding to their hype (which I *hate*), but I’m wondering what’s so special about September 22nd 2008?
There’s a couple of mobile conferences kicking off, so it could potentially be linked to those. Or it could just be a big pi… ok. 🙂
August 24th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Too bad! That build in slide out laser keyboard would have made my work desk look sooo cool 😆
August 26th, 2008 at 2:14 am
The countdown timer does not work. Load two windows up 5 minutes apart and the second window will be 5 minutes after the first. It’s like it resets per day. 🙄
You could employ a small child to walk infront of you while carrying a book to rest the IRkeyboard on.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Ah HA! So it’s even more fakier than we thought! I just hope that whatever their motivation behind the site that it’s actually something interesting / fun.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:27 am
the blue display’s ‘buttons’ layout look very much like Palm’s style in the Palm OS4.1 setup menu.
the laser projection keypad was an award winner i’ve read somewhere. it’s quite real. but i didn’t expect it to be implemented so soon.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Yes, there have been laser projected keyboards released, however, I believe the unit that generates / reads the keyboard is bigger than this entire phone.
Plus the fact that T3 claim to have “stumbled upon” this site, when it’s clearly their site, means something isn’t on the level.
We’ll just have to wait and see…
August 29th, 2008 at 8:50 am
UPDATE: Although it does seem like there’s some’in funky going on with the countdown timer, it does seem to be counting down in general. It’s now at around 22 days.
September 2nd, 2008 at 9:21 am
Is nobody questioning how T3 supposedly knows the specifications of this phone, when the only details known about this imaginary phone are those on its ‘official’ website?
This is just more evidence of their lies.
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:43 pm
I think a lot of people are questioning it…in fact, I even the few people who thought this was legit at first have since realized that it’s some kind of T3 stunt. Two and a half weeks to go…
September 3rd, 2008 at 6:13 pm
It Is The T-Mobile G-1/ Dream phone to be released in 17 days! Not a fake! But well controlled PR on part of Google T-Mobile and HTC! 🙂
September 4th, 2008 at 3:40 am
Are you sure about that?
http://androidcommunity.com/t-mobile-g1-phone-images-leaked-20080830/
September 4th, 2008 at 7:06 am
Yeah, GuntherS is right, the 01 Phone doesn’t look anything like the HTC Dream.
September 8th, 2008 at 2:56 am
http://www.the02phone.com/
September 8th, 2008 at 8:15 am
Heh. It makes me wonder what the 03 Phone will be like, but if this progression is any indication, I imagine it’ll be a rock with a twig sticking out of it.
September 16th, 2008 at 1:56 am
Take a fresh look at the site.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:39 pm
So we’ve put our money where our mouth is and pushed on wiht the campaign for the ultimate phone. Would love to hear what you make of the latest pictures of the 01 Phone.
These were put together by The Alloy – a renowned set of product designers. Check em out and see if you think this could be an iPhone killer.
http://www.t3.com/news/t3s-01-phone-inches-closer-to-perfection?=37221