We’ve had a great time over the last 3 years, meeting a huge number of awesome people and getting some great insight and feedback on Three’s products and services through trials and events.

Although Three Mobile Buzz will be no more *sob* Three is still keen to hear your feedback and opinion, and the community is very much a part of their plans.

You can get in touch with them via email communityvoice@three.co.uk , on Twitter (@ThreeUKLatest) or on the blog http://blog.three.co.uk/

It was great getting to know you all and everyone here at Three MobileBuzz HQ has really appreciated all of your involvement.

If you have any questions, you can find me over at @michchapman – hopefully tweet you soon : )

I thought I’d leave you with a parting image…anyone remember what this was in aid of?!

And @richardmackney has been updating us on his Three MiFi experience whilst on a caravanning trip in North Devon (the cool kids are calling these staycations!).

#ThreeMiFi Staycation

During his fortnight break Richard used the Three MiFi to stream Formula 1, Skype the office and share videos whilst on the beach (!).

#ThreeMiFi staycation video

Jump over to Richard’s blog for full thoughts on the Three MiFi as a holiday companion.

@Documentally has also just received his loaner Three MiFi and has already reported back on the uploading speeds – keep an eye on his posterous to see how he gets on over the next couple of weeks.

At the launch were Martha Lane Fox, UK Digital Champion, Ed Vaizey, the Minister responsible for libraries and broadband and Three’s CEO Kevin Russell.

Part of Martha’s job as UK Digital Champion (don’t you wish you had the word Champion in your job title?!) is to help get more people connected to the internet. Today there are 10 million adults in the UK who have never been online and Race Online 2012, the campaign spearheaded by Martha, is aiming to change that.

Three is contributing to this effort by aiming to introduce 100,000 people to the internet for the first time and they’re going to use their Mobile Broadband Bus to help them do it!

Kevin talks below about Three’s involvement in Race Online 2012 and the Mobile Broadband bus.

Keep a beady eye on Three’s blog for more info about where the bus is going next and if it’s in your area, why not pop along and say hi!

Do you know anyone who has never been online? We’d be really interested to hear from you if you do.  How do you think they’d benefit from getting online? Leave us a comment below!

@Karamina from tales from the village tells about her weekend, which included a trip to Longleat Safari Park with her family to test the In car Wi-Fi from Three.

So what did she make of using MiFi in the car with the kids? It seemed mostly to be used for information purposes – big green tick from teacher!

They used it to look up facts about places on the way there as well as animal facts on the way around the Safari Park. Pop over to her blog for her thoughts on the In car Wi-Fi.

@Erica from Littlemummy and @LindaSJones from You’ve got your hands full have also been testing out the In car Wi-Fi, so keep an eye out for their thoughts.

@mum_themadhouse has trialled the MiFi and asks the question on her blog as to whether it’s worth it when you have wireless broadband at home. She found it useful to connect her partner’s iPod Touch and her laptop when moving about London as well as on the train to and from the capital, but is it something she’d use everyday?

What do you think? Do you need the internet when out and about? And once you’ve got it, do you realise that you use it for more than you think? We’d love to hear your views.

@adonisdemon has been using his to test Three’s network at the seaside, @liamgh was relying on it at a conference where he used it to follow up on links and store his notes in Dropbox, @richardmackney has taken it on holiday with him to use in his caravan at the beach and @marbelle has explained how he uses it to help him to run his blog Director’s Notes.

So how did MiFi help @Marbelle with his blog?
“I blogged on the bus, on the train and didn’t have to hunt down a Starbucks every time I came to a rest[…]It’s a forgone conclusion that I’ll be adding a MiFi to my on the go set up.”

Of using the MiFi at his conference Liam said:
“The MiFi 2 coped with this task without any issues. I switched on the device and left it in my pocket and connected up to it. The five hour battery life is enough to get you through a typical conference day”

Abul took the MiFi on his trip to The Isle of Sheppy, Maidstone and Southend and reported that:
“I can’t really say I noticed much of any dropped signal nor any poorer speeds around those areas. Even at the beaches and in town. This is down to Three’s recent upgrades across their network nationwide. It’s done a good job”

And Richard has been using his whilst caravanning to keep in touch with people by Skype and FaceTime when he couldn’t get signal on his iPhone and to watch the Grand Prix and upload videos to YouTube

What have you used the #ThreeMiFi for…?

Since its launch it has been possible to buy the iPhone 4 unlocked from Apple and use a Micro-SIM from Three, but from Friday you can do it all in a Three store.

A lot of people have been talking about the price plans that Three have for the iPhone 4.

Ewan at Mobile Industry Review asked the Q:
“Have you been waiting to get an iPhone 4 on 3? I know quite a few people who have been, especially after their rather attractive pricing.”

Three has published a price comparison between their plans and those of Orange, O2 and Vodafone so you can compare them directly.

Stephen from UKGadgeteer also suggested that getting the iPhone 4 on The One Plan would be another good price option for customers.

Gadget Venue, Gaj-IT, and GeekComputers have all discussed the announcement. Gaj-It asked:
“Are you thinking of buying an iPhone 4? What do you think of Three’s pricing? Would it tempt you to move to Three? Or have you already got your iPhone 4?”

Pop over and let them know!

Three’s In car Wi-Fi makes it easy for you to use the MiFi in your car by providing you with a cigarette charger and window attachment to use whilst you’re on the road.

So what do families think of using the MiFi during a car journey?

@clareybabble from The Babbling Mummy used the Nintendo DSi on her car journey with her family to keep the kids entertained:

@cafebebe and @mummymatters have been using the MiFi on car journeys also and found it the most useful to help them keep connected with their online communities whilst they were travelling, so they used it to tweet, check email and blog their way along the motorway.

@MummyMatters: “This is a first for me, I’m blogging on the move as we wind our way home from a lovely weekend away[…]I’m blogging now because I want to escape into a world where all is peaceful”

@cafebebe: “I maintained a strong signal the entire way from Peterborough into London allowing me to be on Twitter, check emails, read blog posts and check on my own blog[…]It’s ideal for trips and would be a welcome companion on summer holidays.”

What do you think is the best use of MiFi?

I have never had a new and cool phone in my life, as if it’s cool to be different (read adverse to technology) But all has changed! I’ve finally got myself a phone where I can do the things that I really should be able to do on the move.

My interests lie in Fashion and I run a blog, so I need to be on twitter for free and need to be able to be notified each time I get an email. I need a big, clear screen to view net pages and I need to be able to text quickly because that’s my main means of communication. Luckily I’ve chosen a phone that not only does that very well but, thank goodness, looks stylish doing it!

The Wildfire boasts a sleek shape (I really wasn’t keen on the earlier legend), has minimal buttons and has a stylish, modern colour scheme. (Not to mention the essential little hole to hang my phone charms. ahem.)

Apart from having to re-learn how to text on a flat surface, remember those days?!, I find the messaging style greatly convenient. You can see all your communications with different people so you won’t forget what you’ve said and there’s no faffing with outbox emptying. Another cool trick is tipping the phone on its side to widen the keyboard so fat fingers can be happy!

Ok, what about the more techy things? The Wildfire allows me to scroll sideways to view my emails, weather, rss feeds, messages and bookmarks. There couldn’t be a much easier way of getting information. From the main page I can access Twitter with a touch as well as other apps which I can get on the Android market.

Starting up the phone was made a breeze too *sigh of relief.* I could Bluetooth all my contacts from old phone to new and if you accessed a tool on the HTC site, your contacts were automatically linked to Facebook and Twitter accounts. The Wildfire features a scrolling button at the bottom but I don’t think to use it. Maybe some people find it useful but for me it’s pointless really.

So downfalls, hmm well there are very few. I still haven’t worked out if I can link my emails to the main hotmail system so that if I view or delete an email at home, it will update that info on my phone. Maybe there’s no way of doing this, in which case that’s terribly annoying. I’ve also had a little difficulty in setting the default phone number for my favourite contacts, but again its probably me.

I’m afraid I don’t get more technical than that, by why would I need to? It does everything I need very easily and I am kindly informed of every touch I make with a gentle and rather comforting vibration. I have as much signal as my old providers and my 3mobile plan is very good value.

So if you’re like me and are only just waking up from real-world-hibernation and are not really sure what phone to get, I would recommend this baby. Dubbed as the ‘cooler version of the iPhone’, but ‘quietly brilliant’, you can’t go wrong.

Lucy Nicholls
www.Snippetsofshinythoughts.blogspot.com
@Shinythoughts

Hayley from ceriselle.org thinks the new version is:

“It’s a lot nicer looking – white plastic only looks good on Apple products – and gives much more information on the screen.”

…and @philcampbell has just received his and I think we can say he was impressed:

“Wow. First impressions are everything.”

Phil’s going to be using the MiFi to upload vimeo videos so keep an eye out for those.

Cate from BitchBuzz is also trying one out and it seems to be becoming a part of her daily routine : )

In other news, the voting closes tomorrow for the T3 Work Gadget of the Year awards…what will you vote for?

And what do you use it with? iPad, laptop, iPod Touch? How about an Android Tablet computer?

Well @ew4n of Mobile Industry Review and @liamgh from greenhughes.com have been doing just that.

Take a look at how they’ve been using the MiFi. Do you use it for / with anything that’s a bit diferent? Let us know!

Karin has already road tested hers prior to the trip on a journey to London today with @MummyMatters and the kids.

At first she seemed surprised that this magical Wi-Fi maker was actually working for her, but then she settled into making the most of it : )

Keep an eye on their tweets over the weekend to find out how they get on with In car Wi-Fi and if you have any questions, don’t be afraid to pop over and ask.

Over the past week or so we’ve had people trialling both the original and now the new Three MiFi.

Starting with the original, @hayles and @zoecorkhill have posted their opinions and although they have enjoyed using it, they are looking forward to the second version of MiFi.

@hayles from ceriselle.org liked the ease of having Wi-Fi wherever she wanted:

“Its been so handy to have it in my bag and to just turn on when I wanted to get online”

…but found the fact that the lights turned off after a while and the three button start up annoying.

@zoecorkhill summarized her feelings on the MiFi in four points:
1. Great to be able to connect whenever she needed
2. It’s a handy size to fit in her pocket
3. She had a few niggles with it, but they have been fixed in MiFi 2
4. Three’s network worked well for her

Have a look at her blog for some of the things she used MiFi for, her iPad was one of them, of which she said:

“I still stand by my conviction that the MiFi unit is a better choice for me than the 3G iPad as we were able to connect several devices to it at a time and this turned out to be really useful”

So @ew4n from MobileIndustryReview has been using the new MiFi for just under a week now and has certainly done his best to tell everyone what he thinks about it! Make sure you check out his various posts about using the MiFi (the most comprehensive post is here) as well as the videos he’s made demonstrating his use of it.

Of all the changes, which has Ewan found most useful?

“My absolute favourite is the WiFi indicator — do you see the number 1 next to it? That indicates you have one device connected. Connect another device and it increments to 2. This is really, really REALLY useful for me.”

He also made another interesting observation:

“A lot of people I speak to still have a built-in negative perspective on 3. That viewpoint is really out of date now. The company has some of the best and fastest data connectivity in the UK.”

Tried the MiFi 2 yet? Let us know what you think of it!

@GadgetVenue and @UKGadgeteer were discussing last week, Three’s launch of two new Android devices, the HTC Wildfire and the Sony Ericsson X10 Mini Pro.

Matthew from @GadgetVenue recommends people who are in need of a new contract to consider these handsets on The One Plan, especially due to the six months free Spotify they come with:

“Three has a decent deal going on with “The One Plan” and is well worth checking out if you are in need of a new contract.”

@UKGadgeteer gives an in-depth overview of both the phones and points out that it is nice to see Three offering more exclusives in the market:

“[Three] are now sufficiently recognised by the manufacturers to at least able to negotiate colour exclusives, and you never know, maybe this time next year, we’ll see a worthy smartphone launch exclusively on 3UK…”

If you’re thinking of getting one of these phones on Three let us know – we’d love to hear what you think!

Firstly, The European Commission has asked UK telecoms regulator, Ofcom, to reconsider its proposed timings for the reduction of Mobile Termination Rates or MTRs.

MTRs are the carrying fee that your operator is charged by another network when you call cross network or call a mobile from a landline. These currently stand at around 4p/min.

Ofcom has proposed that MTRs will be lowered over a four year period to 0.5p, but the EC has called for Ofcom to review its timings and reduce MTRs to 0.5p by the end of 2012, rather than 2014/2015.

To find out more about MTRs, visit the Terminate The Rate site and blog where you can see why Three along with BT, NUS, CarersUK, The FSB, Age Concern among others are supporting the campaign to lower these rates.

Secondly, Ofcom announced this week that they will be halving the time UK operators have to port customers’ mobile numbers to another network.

From 11th April 2011, mobile operators will have one working day, rather than two to port the number.

Three still don’t think this is good enough and yesterday issued the following statement:

“Ofcom’s decision today has failed UK consumers.

“As mergers and consolidation reduce consumer choice, moving to a quicker consumer-friendly system becomes even more important. Three continues to press for a change as it is in best interests of competition and consumer choice, and will lead to better deals across the industry.”

What do you think about these issues? We’d be interested to hear your thougths.

However, two of our recent triallists have shown how a problem for one person can be a mere trifle for another.

@aral has been using the MiFi and as someone very focused on user experience had a very strong view on the design and usability of the device, feeling that it was over complicated to set up and that the display was unclear. You can see his full review here.

Matthew from @gadgetvenue however, did not feel that this was an issue when using the device, describing the MiFi as simple to set up and saying that:

“Previously I had said I wanted more details to be displayed on the screen although when actually using the device I rarely looked at [it].”

Both Aral and Matthew enjoyed using the MiFi on Three and both had a good experience of the network:

Matthew: “It simply worked every time I needed to get online and didn’t complain or have no signal which was nice to see. “

Aral: “I was able to get a good signal in most places I went to in London and Brighton.”

Both also mentioned the new 2nd generation MiFi and look forward to seeing the changes and developments in this new device.

Aral has said however, that he feels there is still room for improvement in the design and is planning on designing his own – we look forward to seeing what it looks like! : )

Have you got your hands on the new MiFi? Let us know what you think!