Mobile

Third generation (3G) mobile technologies are finally coming of age. Lead equipment vendors for both network infrastructure and 3G mobile devices are in place. The larger national and international carriers are circling regional 3G operators like hawks, assessing the field and identifying potential acquisition targets. New market entrants for the mobile broadband and fourth-generation (4G) services are establishing alliances to compete financially with veteran operators. A reduction in the total number of global network operators is underway. Does this optimization signal a general weakness…

Alcatel-Lucent announced that it has been awarded a contract by Libya Telecom and Technology (LTT), the national Internet Service Provider in Libya, to deploy the first commercial WIMAX network based on the 802.16e-2005 WiMAX standard in the Great Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. LTT plans to launch commercial network services this September. The new network will support voice over IP (VoIP) and high-speed internet access, enabling the delivery of advanced broadband multimedia services, such as video streaming, through a variety of end-user devices including modems and WiMAX…

Juniper Research forecasts that up to 12 percent of the global DSL installed base will be substituted by IEEE 802.16e-2005 (802.16e) subscribers by 2013. The Far East will lead with over one-fifth of the 47m subscribers in 2013. The region by region analysis found that there is a significant opportunity now for WiMAX as a DSL substitute technology. The majority of 802.16e trials and network contracts being announced will commence with fixed wireless broadband services. Mobile usage will develop after the initial demand for fixed and portable services, creating an additional benefit for…

Taiwan’s Institute for Information Industry (III) and Newport Digital Technologies (NDT) announced that it is deploying a WiMAX network in Northern Italy and in Fiji. The first $1 million of the $12 million order of WiMAX IEEE 802.16-2004 base stations started shipping immediately with the balance to be delivered over the next 11 calendar months. III is consulting on the transaction for the base station and will utilize its contributions to 802.16-2004/e-2005/j/m to assist in the capacity as System Integrator and technology contributor for NDT and Gil Technologies, the Taiwan Base…

Solectek Corporation announced the addition of 3.65 GHz WiMAX base stations and subscriber terminals tailored for Wireless Internet Service Providers (WISPs) and municipalities. The recently allocated frequency band in the United States enables non-exclusive licenses for enterprises and network operators to rapidly deploy fixed wireless services. Solectek’s WiMAX Base Station and Indoor Controller feature support for 3.5 and 7 MHz channel bandwidths, a 4U rack-height chassis designed to support one to eight Base Station sectors, and mix-and-match cards or pre-built, pre-tested common…

Filed under: Handsets, Software, Nokia, Symbian, GSM, EDGE It's been a solid tick since the North American N95, also referred to as the N95-3, received a software update. For those clamoring for a little love from Nokia's dev team, listen up: an administrator over at the outfit's forums has admitted that the Software Update crew has a new version in the works. We're told that they've heard the demands for a fresh release, and they're toiling away in order to bring it to N95-3 owners by early June. Unfortunately, we're not told what new features we can expect, and even worse, "early June"…

Filed under: Handsets, LG, Verizon Wireless, EV-DO, CDMA Neither Verizon nor LG have yet revealed the VX8610 slider -- not officially, anyway. Maybe they're waiting to prepare some sort of blockbuster event to unveil it, and with the nifty secret up the musicphone's sleeve, who could really blame 'em? The VX8610 will be the first phone released by a carrier in the US to tote its Bluetooth headset like a backpack, charging as you go so it's always ready for business. The latest rumor has Verizon planning on a June launch, so feel free to treat your current headset like crap in the meantime.

Filed under: Handsets, HTC, Windows Mobile, GSM, EDGE, HSDPA Even though we've seen a couple of US e-tailers offering HTC's latest Advantage, the X7150, up for pre-order, it seems that the handheld won't actually be sold here for at least awhile. According to jkOnTheRun, the X7510 possesses one of those hotly-debated Qualcomm chipsets that cannot be sold on American soil -- presumably due to all those legal issues the firm is currently wading through. Of course, folks that just can't fathom living another quarter without one can cough up the requisite dough to snag one from an importer, but…

Filed under: Handsets, Samsung, Misc We'll be frank -- we really have no idea what Samsung's getting at with its freshest Soul promotional video, but it's certainly a fine piece of eye candy if nothing else. Put simply, the video shows a maniac darting about demonstrating ten optical illusions in just over two minutes, and in case you couldn't guess, the Soul is saved for last. Should we have prefaced that bit with a spoiler warning? Too bad -- vid's still waiting after the jump if you're interested, though. [Thanks, Joel]Continue reading Samsung Soul promo video shows 10 optical illusions in…

Filed under: MotorolaSeriously though, how many are surprised to hear that Motorola's Chief Technology / Strategy Officer Richard Nottenburg is jumping off the sinking ship? Apparently dude "left to return to the New York area to be with his family and pursue other opportunities," which is code for a) he was passed over for CEO of the new mobile devices company, b) he was fired, or c) he finally wised up to the direction the company's taken. Either way, we can't really blame him.Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

In recent years WCDMA subscriptions have grown apace: from 18 million at the end of 2004 to 170 million at the end of 2007. ABI Research forecasts that figure to rise to 740 million by the end of 2013. “WCDMA is on its way towards proven success,” says Jake Saunders, ABI Research vice president, “but there are still challenges and hurdles to overcome. In particular, operators find that expanding WCDMA coverage in the 2100 MHz band into low-density urban and rural areas is very costly in the current competitive environment.” Spectrum refarming poses challenges for operators and…

Research In Motion (RIM) introduced the BlackBerry Bold smartphone. The BlackBerry Bold is designed to give business professionals and power users functionality and performance in an intuitive BlackBerry smartphone. It is the first BlackBerry smartphone to support tri-band HSDPA high-speed networks around the world and comes with integrated GPS and Wi-Fi, as well as a rich set of multimedia capabilities. The BlackBerry Bold smartphone’s support for tri-band HSDPA and enterprise-grade Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g) networks and its next-generation 624 MHz mobile processor make short work of…

Mio, a provider of broadband mobile communication services in the Caribbean Islands, announced that it will soon be launching mobile voice, broadband Internet access and WiMAX services in Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao. Mio will be the first in the Caribbean to offer affordable unlimited wireless broadband Internet access and voice plans that include voicemail and unlimited texting. In addition, Mio will also offer the fastest wireless Internet connectivity available through its wireless broadband service. WiMAX, Mio’s business offering, primarily targets the growing needs of the business…

mobilkom austria has demonstrated the world’s fastest data call with a mobile device using the pioneering Internet High Speed Packet Access (I-HSPA) solution from Nokia Siemens Networks. During the trial, the data transmission downlink speed reached up to 10.1 Mbps. The I-HSPA trial with mobilkom austria marks a milestone for Nokia Siemens Networks. The I-HSPA functionality is designed for heavy data and rich multimedia usage over the wireless network. Thanks to its simplified flat architecture, the network is ready to offer the end user a full mobility of data services, improved…

Tele2 is one of the winners when the auction for next-generation mobile network in Sweden concluded this last week. With the frequencies for 4G that Tele2 in Sweden now has been awarded, Tele2 will be able to build the next generation mobile network offering access speeds of more than 10 times faster than today’s network. “With the four frequencies we secure the next generations mobile broadband and will be able to offer our customers a significant higher access speed, which we are pleased about,” says Niclas Palmstierna CEO Tele2 Sweden. The frequencies for 4G that Tele2…

Android vs LiMo: What’s the difference? A look at TwitterFone’s accuracy (and we’re giving away beta keys!) Car vs iPhone: Who shall win? Schmap launches city guide web app for iPhone and iPod Touch Eye-Fi adds two new wireless memory cards to their product line-up South Koreans Save on Paper with their Cell Phones Talk about the world around you with GeoGraffiti

If I’ve learned one thing from the internet, it’s that unsolicited offers of free stuff are, more often than not, bad news. Believe it or not, Nigerian princes do not actually want to give you 12 million dollars. Nor do any of those obnoxious advertisers actually want to give you a bunch of free stuff for your cell phone. Sure, you may get a free Flo-Rida ringtone, but chances are you just signed yourself up for some ridiculous contract which states you have to send them $30 dollars per month tucked inside a box of hair. The Inquirer is reporting on a ringtone scam going on in the…

In the above screenshot of this help page, T-mobile is kindly helping visitors figure out how to navigate through their Sidekick LX’s menus to determine how much memory is available for pictures and videos. Thing is, the Sidekick LX doesn’t support videos at this point. Nor does the Sidekick Slide, which now has a similar mention of video on its help page. While it could well be a mistake, video recording, playback, and messaging are oft-requested features of the Sidekick/Hiptop community, and the device does have over-the-air update support. With video features being pretty much…

With TwitterFone rolling out local numbers for a bunch of countries yesterday, the service seems to be quickly moving toward the end of its private beta phase. I figured it was about time to put TwitterFone’s voice-to-text tweet abilities to the test. To test it out, I put TwitterFone through a handful of situations it might be used in regularly and compared what I said to what TwitterFone transcribed. The tests definitely weren’t scientific by any means, but they still go to show whether or not TwitterFone’s voice transcription services are up to par for day to day use. I…

On Wednesday of this week, AT&T issued a sales restriction of one iPhone per customer. By Thursday the restriction was lifted. The carrier has gone back to its old policy of selling up to three iPhones per customers. Yesterday, AT&T made a statement explaining the reversal: “Our No. 1 concern is to make sure that every customer who wants an iPhone gets one,” an AT&T spokesman said. “We thought yesterday that the fairest way to do that was to limit customers to one iPhone. Then we realized that we have sufficient inventory to go back to our original…

Qualcomm today announced that it has acquired 40 MHz (1452-1492 MHz) of L-Band radio spectrum recently auctioned by UK communications regulator Ofcom, at a cost of GPB 8,334,000 ($16.3 million). The company will look at how peer-to-peer networking can be used in mobile networks, how capacity and in-building coverage can be improved, as well as broadcasting, according to Andrew Gilbert, executive vice president at Qualcomm Europe. The most likely scenario is that it will be used for a MediaFlo based mobile TV service, says EE Times. BSkyB is already a major content provider to UK 3G phones and…

Microsoft expects sales of its Windows Mobile platform products will account for 40% of the global smartphone market in fiscal 2012 (July 2011-June 2012), according to Eddie Wu, managing director of Microsoft ODM embedded devices, Asia, Daniel Shen and Steve Shen report for DigiTimes. “Microsoft currently focuses its efforts on promoting the Windows Mobile 6.1 operating system and the company has no plans to launch Windows Mobile 7 until 2009, Wu stated.” About 20% of mid- to high-end handsets are expected to adopt the Linux OS by 2013, estimates ABI Research. Nearly 84-percent of…

The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) project announced yesterday that Microsoft’s Windows XP operating system will be available on XO laptops in addition to the open source Linux operating system. The Windows-based XO systems will be deployed in upcoming pilot programs next month. According to the press release, the plan is to have both Windows and Linux running on the machines, to let users decide what’s best. Microsoft worked with a variety of partners to develop customized drivers that enable Windows to run on the XO laptop. Windows now supports the laptop’s e-book reading mode,…

MetroFi is trying to sell its citywide Wi-Fi networks in Portland (Oregon), Aurora and Naperville (Illinois) and Santa Clara, Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Foster City and Concord (California), reports Muniwireless and WiFiNetNews. MetroFi founder, Chuck Haas, says he is also exploring the sale of MetroFi itself to a third party. If no buyers emerge, Haas says MetroFi will shut down service. The Portland network was MetroFi’s largest, nearly identical in size to Philadelphia’s 135 square miles, the largest consumer-oriented municipal wireless network in the nation. MetroFi said…

Sprint and Samsung today declared Mobile WiMax ready for commercial service. Sprint plans on launching commercial WiMax in Washington and Baltimore “later this year”. Washington and Baltimore joined Chicago in a “soft rollout”, in which Sprint workers use and test the technology, a Sprint spokesman said last week. A Clearwire Mobile WiMax rollout is also planned, likely later this summer, in Portland, Oregon. Despite today’s announcement about Washington and Baltimore, no commercial rollout projection for Chicago was mentioned. When asked about Chicago, a Sprint…

The big news this week is the impending sale of tech site Ars Technica to Conde Nast for $25 million.  Ars has been one of the top tech sites for years and it's great to see a big company put so much value on what they do.  That said, we are happy to announce that we are on the table for a potential sale too.  Thinking about this big sale has led us to realize that we hold a ton of value to a potential suitor and we're ready to kick off that process.  We bring a lot of value to the table and we're ready to entertain offers from anybody. Why should suitors be…

One thing not in question is how many devices come in and out of Mobile Tech Manor.  It's like there's a revolving door and gadgets come in and go out in a continual stream.  One of the side effects of this endless parade of technology is how my family members often get to play with stuff they normally would never get to play with.  Such is the case with the Lenovo ThinkPad x61 Tablet PC.  You've noticed I haven't mentioned it in a while even though it's a sweet convertible Tablet PC.  That's because a while back my bride wanted to try it out and you guessed it, liked…

If you're running Vista on a computer you use, especially a mobile computer like a notebook, then you've heard the Vista Symphony whether you realized it or not.  The Vista Symphony is that rhythmic melody played by your hard drive that is doing, well, who knows what even if your computer is sitting idle.  Call it the super-fetch, or pre-fetch, or post-fetch, whatever you want to call it but it rolls on no matter what. This morning I decided to turn on all of the computers in Mobile Tech Manor so they could do any housekeeping that Vista likes to do so each one would be ready to go…

Those of you who like me have been following with bated breath the new HTC Advantage 7510 and anxiously awaiting its release here in the US can take a deep breath and get on with your business.  I have confirmed with HTC that the 7510 contains the Qualcomm chipset that is not allowed for sale in the US so the new Advantage will not be sold here.  You'll have to pick up one at considerable cost through an importer if you want one in the US.  Stand down, geeks.  Now we know why Matt Miller has such a big smile on his face since he's sitting in front of three.  :)

With all the cool stuff that comes through Mobile Tech Manor on a regular basis I change gear like some people change socks.  It's a great way to work as I am constantly considering what gadget would make a good difference in my work style and I can easily try out new things.  For that reason it's time for another "Day in the Life" articles that details a typical day I spent recently and what I used to get through it. This particular day my schedule was a bit lighter than most with morning meetings the call of the day and an afternoon devoted to writing.  This is my…

Singapore’s government-backed investment arm Temasek Holdings and its subsidiaries intend to appeal a Jakarta court ruling which adjudged they undertook in monopolistic behaviour, local press reported today. Last Friday the Central Jakarta District Court threw out Temasek’s appeal to have an anti-trust ruling overturned, fined the holding company USD1.6 million and ordered it to sell its stake in either of the country’s largest mobile operators – Telkomsel and Indosat’s Satelindo unit – within a year. However, Temasek's legal representative, Todung Mulya Lubis, said the company…

Greek alternative fixed line and broadband operator Tellas (soon to be Wind Hellas), which was recently acquired by Egyptian group Weather Investments, has announced details of a new business plan including short-term investment of EUR70 million (USD108 million) in developing network infrastructure and full-service telecoms packages combining fixed line and mobile telephony and internet access. The Greek firm also told a press conference that a new commercial strategy and package pricing will be unveiled by next month, and indicated that it plans to expand its offerings abroad in the near…

The third largest US cellular operator, Sprint Nextel, has had another poor quarter, with net losses more than doubling and subscriber numbers declining by almost 1.1 million. The firm has been struggling over recent quarters as users defect to rival networks; 1.07 million of Sprint’s most lucrative customers – those on post-paid contracts – migrated to other carriers in the first three months of this year, while 200,000 pre-paid users also shifted providers. There were minor subscriber gains via the cellco’s wholesale and affiliate operations, but the net result was a loss of 1.087…

Venezuela had a total of 24.4 million mobile subscribers at the end of March 2008, up by 24.5% compared with 19.6 million a year earlier, giving the country a cellular penetration rate of 88.5%, according to telecoms regulator Conatel. The watchdog also reported that total mobile traffic across the networks of the three national cellcos Movilnet, Movistar and Digitel increased by 33.5% year-on-year in the first quarter.

Swedish equipment vendor Ericsson has won a contract from Indonesian mobile operator Telkomsel to supply it with a Mobile Softswitch Solution (MSS), including Ericsson’s new mobile switching centre (MSC) Server Blade Cluster. The deal will enable Telkomsel to provide a common core network platform for both its GSM and W-CDMA networks and boost network capacity, performance and coverage, Ericsson said. Under the three-year agreement Ericsson will also provide services including network deployment and integration. No financial details were disclosed.

Now that all of these networks - EarthLink’s and MetroFi’s - are being sold or shut down, I asked myself last week in San Francisco, over cappuccino at Peet’s Coffee in the Ferry Building, what SF, Philadelphia and other cities could have done. Suddenly the answer came to me. San Francisco could have required cafes to install Wi-Fi networks and also required them to offer Wi-Fi service free of charge to the public. Then, companies such as FON, could have offered these free (or cheap) FON access points. ISPs would have competed for their business or even done very interesting…

Last year, New America Foundation released an in-depth report and analysis of the Wireless Philadelphia Project, “The Philadelphia Story: Learning from a Municipal Wireless Pioneer.” We concluded that the private franchise model was suboptimal and that Philadelphia’s solution was problematic in a number of ways. At the time, we received good press coverage and a helluvalot of blowback from certain constituencies (who continued to assert that everything was on track). Now that we’ve made it to May, 2008, Wireless Philadelphia is on its last legs. While many of us are…

Om Malik, founder of GigaOm, blames the FCC under Kevin Martin for failing to create a more competitive broadband environment in the United States. The ISPs’ behavior - traffic shaping, blocking applications - points to a market that is controlled by a few large service providers who feel they can get away with anything (and often do because the FCC does nothing against them). Om says: But this whole problem is the FCC’s making. The org, under Chairman Kevin Martin and others, has systematically dismantled broadband competition and paved the way for a duopoly (of cable and phone…

MetroFi is trying to sell its citywide Wi-Fi networks in Portland (Oregon), Aurora and Naperville (Illinois) and Santa Clara, Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Foster City and Concord (California). MetroFi founder, Chuck Haas, says he is also exploring the sale of MetroFi itself to a third party. MetroFi is the latest service provider to exit the municipal wireless business. EarthLink has decided to shut down its network in Philadelphia and to stop the rollout of its network in Houston; Kite Networks, which had deployments in a number of municipalities, has gone bankrupt. MetroFi had told Portland, its…

After writing rules that all but guaranteed failure for the auction of the “D” block of the 700 MHz spectrum lotto, the FCC is now starting on its second attempt to reach spectral nirvana — as in getting money through auction while also getting someone, somehow, to build a public/private network whose prime beneficiary is public safety. Watching people like Morgan O’Brien make sausage out of the first attempt has left a bad taste in the mouths of many who would have liked to have seen the original auction, and perhaps the ambitious plans of Frontline Wireless succeed.

Most of the commentary I see about fixed-mobile substitution tends to be highly partisan - usually sponsored by companies with something to prove. So it's quite refreshing to see a genuinely independent piece of research from an unlike source - the US Center for Disease Control, which asked about phone use in its ongoing health surveys, I guess primarily to ensure that emergency calls can be dealt with appropriately.16% of US homes are mobile-only (but this being the US, cable connections are usually considered separately and not considered 'fixed' lines). This number has been increasing…

I'm at Ericsson's Capital Markets & Analyst event in Stockholm today. There's been a huge amount of discussion about mobile broadband, in terms of traffic growth, moves towards HSPA and LTE, and the demand for backhaul capacity.The CEO of Mobilkom in Austria spoke about that country's huge shift towards HSPA, to the extent that it's starting to catch up with ADSL use in terms of susbcriptions (dongles again...). Austria is a bit of an outlier in adoption of HSPA, with data traffic apparently now 20x outweighing voice on the network, but it's an interesting indicator of what's coming down…

I've been consistently negative about the prospects for metro WiFi. It's been doomed to failure from the start, usually championed by bored local-government IT drones looking for a new bandwagon to waste taxpayers money on.There's a long list of negatives, but chief among them is that outdoor WiFi doesn't work indoors. It's useless. It's just wireless for traffic wardens.So the demise of the Philadelphia poster-child network comes as little surprise to me.I'm a little more open-minded about metro WiMAX (or maybe 3G), but I'm not holding my breath about that either, especially if it's at…

I've seen quite a lot of large numbers and hockey-stick curves recently, all indicating an imminent huge explosion in femto shipments in the next few years.ip.access' very good femto blog has links to quite a lot of the studies, some of which suggest shipments are going to hit 10's of millions of units as early as 2010-2012. I haven't got copies of my competitors' studies, so I don't know exactly what assumptions, methodologies and caveats they are using.My current view is rather more pessimistic. We're already in the middle of 2008, with various trials ongoing. I'm expecting to see lots more…

I went to a launch event for BT's new upgraded version of its Total Broadband service yesterday. This is a package the company has offered for some time, which bundles assorted additional capabilities along with the basic (and fairly slow - just 8Mbit/s) ADSL Internet connectivity - online backups, access to BT OpenZone WiFi hotspots, BT Broadband Talk VoIP service and so on. It's centred on BT's Home Hub gateway which also provides WiFi, a DECT handset and remote management.In the past, the Home Hub also acted as the centrepiece of BT's ill-fated Fusion dual-mode UMA service, which has been…

Okay, I'll admit in advance that this is going to be a pretty snarky post, but it never ceases to amaze me how badly Nokia handles itself in the US market. In Europe and most of the rest of the world, Nokia operates like a fighter jet, incredibly nimble and powerful. But in the US, it's more like a biplane. An old biplane. With holes in the wings. Nokia's market share in the US has dropped from 20% to 7% in the last two years (link), and sometimes I wonder if it's trying for 1%.Case in point: Nokia's "Open to Anything" ad campaign featuring people who have created software for Nokia N95…

A strangely cryptic article in the New York Times today announced that several companies had banded together "to build the first of a new generation of nationwide wireless data networks" in the US (link). I read it and thought to myself: what, another new vaporware wireless technology? I couldn't make sense of the article, so I went to the websites of some of the companies involved. It turns out the announcement isn't a new vaporware wireless technology, it's my favorite old vaporware wireless technology, WiMax (link). Sprint finally figured out what to do with it.The announcement was both…

Today Adobe announced a series of changes to its emerging web applications platform. The changes include:--The next version of the mobile Flash runtime will be free of license fees. Adobe also confirmed that the mobile version of the Air runtime will be free. --Adobe changed its licensing terms and released additional technical information that will make it easier for companies to create their own Flash-compatible products.--The company announced a new consortium called Open Screen supporting the more open versions of Flash and Air. Members of the new group include the five leading handset…

Microsoft announced last week that it's discontinuing its Spot data watch program.The trouble with predicting the future is that it's always easy to do in retrospect. Looking back, it's obvious that Microsoft's Spot products were a dumb idea. The concept was that Microsoft would send small bits of wireless data -- weather forecasts, stock prices, etc -- to specially-equipped watches and other small devices like refrigerator magnets, which would display the information. On the face of that, it sounds kind of appealing. There are definitely people who want information like that when they're on…

Earlier today I told you about the survey of US iPhone users that Rubicon Consulting just conducted (link). When you publish a big study like this, there are always a few secondary data points that don't fit into the whitepaper -- kind of like outtakes in a movie.I thought you might be interested in seeing the outtakes. So, here are some other interesting factoids about iPhone users...How do you carry your iPhone?To me, one of the most interesting findings of the study was that half of iPhone users are under age 30. I had expected them to be older, because PDA and smartphone users have…

Russel Batty*, the man the mobile web doesn't believe in, has just cleared his debts selling his Mowser project on to .mobi, surely the spiritual home of badly thought out mobile web ideas (try typing .mobi on a phone's numeric keypad, and compare it even to .com. 'Nuff said).Congratulations are certainly in order - we would never wish a struggling entrepreneur into debt, it's a nasty place to be - but it doesn't make the Mowser idea very good. The future of mobile services will be things you actually need on the move, delivered in the most pain free way possible, and that doesn't necessarily…

"My view is that if we can bake a bigger cake together, and that cake has smaller pieces of it, but net-net we still have more cake, that's O.K. with me."A lovely piece of doublethink there from Vodafone's top man, directly contradicting the actual reality on the ground for any Vodafone "partner" trying to scrape out a living.

He said no-one needed 3G, it was just a waste of battery and EDGE was fast enough for everyone. We laughed. But figures from Apple's favourite UK network, O2, show he was right all along - EDGE is actually faster than 3.5G HSDPA, let alone 3G!Steve, we're sorry. You were right. People should stop being nerdy, and just suck in whatever the slick PR machine of O2 and Apple gives us.

This could in theory be about the ongoing Moto fiasco, but I think I've said enough about that.However I just spotted the latest Sharp GSM effort - the GX18. It's a lot like 2004's GX15 except bigger and uglier - in fact very close in specs to 2002's GX10 apart from the camera res (QCIF vs VGA is not a fight worth watching - they're both useless). Looking at it you'd never know that the handset market has become increasingly fashion concious and specs have moved on from 128x160 screens and VGA cameras.Why does this matter? Well it doesn't any more, really, because Japanese manufacturers have…

...though maybe less funny for Engadget.When you've locked down every API you can find and come up with a satisfactory reason not to roll out 3G this month, what better thing could you do with your time then try to sue someone for using roughly the same colour than you in their logo?Engadget promise this is not an April Fool's joke, maybe T-Mobile's legal attack bots were doing it for fun though?

WidSets is a company that provides simple widgets that are designed to pull your favorite content online to your mobile device in an easily updated, and easily readable form. It allows you to organize your content, and even create new widgets based on the information or apps that are important to you. They currently offer over 4000 pre-configured widgets in over 56 languages, and is currently accessible on over 300 phone models. As WidSets themselves explains it; “…With WidSets you can get your favorite web content straight to your mobile phone. Find news and information, stay in…

Where I live, there’s a service that distributes coupon advertisements door to door on a monthly basis.  The coupons are usually for local restaurants and bars, and others are simply announcements and other traditional advertising.  The service has been around forever it seems, and people anticipate receiving their packs of coupons on their doorknob every month, waiting to use the savings at their favorite places.  The ads are distributed to every doorknob in town, so the circulation is beyond that of newspapers, magazines, and pretty much any other type of advertising.  I…

We’ve seen barcode and image recognition on mobile devices for some time now, but it’s never enjoyed mainstream success due to limitations such as having to download a special app, or use a technology that most devices don’t have currently.  With the introduction of “Mobile Visual Search” technology via mobile devices with camera phones, widespread deployment might now be possible. A company called 23half, which develops contextual information services for mobile phones, has launched Thrrum MMS Search.  It’s a service that allows user’s to snap a…

Jeffrey Sharkey has won the Google Developer’s challenge, and $25,000 for his “Scan” Android application. The main purpose of the app is to find pricing and metadata info from anything with a barcode, such as CD’s, books, and other products. We’ve seen this technology in the past, but nothing that uses the power of Android to accomplish it. The features are quite impressive, and as I’ve always said, it took a platform like Android to really open up the feature-set to make barcode-recognition a mainstream possibility. Here’s some of the features of the…

I came across a company I’d never heard of today, called AdvaTEX, that’s yet another player in the proximity marketing industry. Most of the time, these companies are located overseas, in places like the U.K and other European countries, only because the technology is more prevalent there, but AdvaTEX looks to be a US-based company, which is surprising. Their offerings are similar to all proximity marketing providers, with both a software only version, and software and hardware combined version. The software-only version, or AdvaTEX Soft as they call it, is a bit unique when…

Just bag up the whole lot for me, please US technology company Qualcomm has scooped all 17 chunks of UK-L-Band spectrum, auctioned over the last week, for a total of £8,334,000 - so you can expect MediaFLO announcements from UK operators any day now.…

Jesus Phone coverage spreads France Telecom's Orange offshoot has formally joined the roster of cellcos that will offer Apple's iPhone in multiple territories.…

LG and Samsung have just what you need LG and Samsung have teamed up to have their respective technologies accepted as the American standard for mobile TV, just as Dish starts casting around for someone to help them build such a network.…

'Google don't know open' Sometime next year, Verizon will roll out a Linux OS as the "preferred operating system" for phones on its US wireless network. And that Linux OS is not Google Android.…

Ofcom launches investigation Responding to a "large number of complaints from consumers", Ofcom has opened an investigation into high-street retailer Phones 4u's selling practices to make sure it's playing by the book.…

The big news this week is the impending sale of tech site Ars Technica to Conde Nast for $25 million.  Ars has been one of the top tech sites for years and it's great to see a big company put so much value on what they do.  That said, we are happy to announce that we are on the table for a potential sale too.  Thinking about this big sale has led us to realize that we hold a ton of value to a potential suitor and we're ready to kick off that process.  We bring a lot of value to the table and we're ready to entertain offers from anybody. Why should suitors be…

One thing not in question is how many devices come in and out of Mobile Tech Manor.  It's like there's a revolving door and gadgets come in and go out in a continual stream.  One of the side effects of this endless parade of technology is how my family members often get to play with stuff they normally would never get to play with.  Such is the case with the Lenovo ThinkPad x61 Tablet PC.  You've noticed I haven't mentioned it in a while even though it's a sweet convertible Tablet PC.  That's because a while back my bride wanted to try it out and you guessed it, liked…

If you're running Vista on a computer you use, especially a mobile computer like a notebook, then you've heard the Vista Symphony whether you realized it or not.  The Vista Symphony is that rhythmic melody played by your hard drive that is doing, well, who knows what even if your computer is sitting idle.  Call it the super-fetch, or pre-fetch, or post-fetch, whatever you want to call it but it rolls on no matter what. This morning I decided to turn on all of the computers in Mobile Tech Manor so they could do any housekeeping that Vista likes to do so each one would be ready to go…

Those of you who like me have been following with bated breath the new HTC Advantage 7510 and anxiously awaiting its release here in the US can take a deep breath and get on with your business.  I have confirmed with HTC that the 7510 contains the Qualcomm chipset that is not allowed for sale in the US so the new Advantage will not be sold here.  You'll have to pick up one at considerable cost through an importer if you want one in the US.  Stand down, geeks.  Now we know why Matt Miller has such a big smile on his face since he's sitting in front of three.  :)

With all the cool stuff that comes through Mobile Tech Manor on a regular basis I change gear like some people change socks.  It's a great way to work as I am constantly considering what gadget would make a good difference in my work style and I can easily try out new things.  For that reason it's time for another "Day in the Life" articles that details a typical day I spent recently and what I used to get through it. This particular day my schedule was a bit lighter than most with morning meetings the call of the day and an afternoon devoted to writing.  This is my…

Earlier this year, I talked to many mobile game publishers and was trying to convince them on activity regarding the mobile game industry not being well aware of illegal mobile game downloads. I stated clearly that this is an issue that has to be taken care of.Let us tell each other openly and honestly: Can we ignore ~90% of all games being downloaded illegally? How did I get to that number? Germany has hundreds of thousands game downloads per month. How many illegal games do you think there are? I would assume millions! Czech Republic - slightly over 200,000 paid game downloads each month,…

Last week I wrote an article about Mobile Games - Using brands that aren't brands. The article had quite a few reactions, and there was more then that to write about - so I decided to write another article. This time not about using brands that aren't brands, but getting close to them. This means you make something really close to the original brand that people can associate with the actual game.Getting close to the brand means, that a person enters thin ice, and either he is smart enough to move quick, or he falls in and the game dies.Games that are live - got around"Carjack City" to be…

I have started writing this blog because I would like to inform people from the mobile entertainment and services industry about how I see things. It turned out to be great writing for everyone, people have been very supportive and writing great feedback to the article. Thank a lot!I have a request from many people to start sending a two weekly newsletter, so I decided I would take an hour over the weekend to get this prepared, and I will be sending out two newsletters - 1. Mobile Games newsletter, 2. Mobile Services / Advertising / Applications newsletter. Both of them will be a combination…

Some companies have to pay huge license fees to be able to mobilize games for brands like Iron Man, Tom Clancy, Spiderman, Guitar Hero, Rayman, and more, but some simply just don't and use an easiy option - use public domain (check wiki definition). There are brands in the world, that are public domain and just don't require the brand ownership, and the $100,000 - $1 mil. in the bank for just that.We can see several examples:Titanic (Astraware)Da Vinci Flight (BreakPoint Games)Sudoku (hundreds of them) - thanks to the great newspaper supportSolitaire (tens of them) - thanks to the great…

I recently came across one same dicsussion several times - are Mobile websites (WAP sites) the best choice for users to browse information content and use services, or is it different variations of Mobile Applications / On device portals (applications that stay on the phone). Well it really depends on what purposes it is for. Advantages vs. Disadvantages An application resides as an icon on the phone - big marketing advantage An application can transfer a lower ammount of data, and can also be thus faster An application can solve phone specific problemsAn application is more comfortable to…

You've read about what we do and by now you should have a sense of where we're coming from. Maybe its time to join our team? The good news is that we're expanding - with 6 positions opening up for a few talented individuals in our Services and User Interface Design team to be precise. To see what's on offer and apply you need to head to the job search page and enter the following job codes. In Palo Alto the positions are for two Interactions Designers [Job code: SAN000000BQ, SAN000000BP] and a Communications Designer [SAN000000BV]. Whilst in Espoo we're looking to hire two Interaction…

One of the slides from last week’s Behind the Scenes event showed one of Chongqing participants (above) seemingly in a moment of domestic bliss - brushing his teeth. Whilst on occasion we have collected this kind of data through shadowing (stalking with permission) or self documentation this particular photo is staged - part of a data collection method we've been experimenting with called a Simulated Day in the Life. (Given the intimacy implied by this photo, its worth noting that we have the rights to use it to publicise the research). The process can take a day from start to finish,…

This research malarkey is becoming geekier by the minute. Collecting audio samples this week the sounds of a train platform in Tokyo above and ambient hotel corridor noise Helsinki below. Feels weird standing still for three minutes in a hotel corridor - them being transient spaces n' all. At 5am not a lot of stirring from within the rooms fortunately, but enough ambient noise to populate a scene from eraserhead or half life. Tokyo boarding.

Frankfurt airport - laptop user's tastefully segregated from genpop.

It will be a 3G device on Rogers HSDPA network It will continue to have mediocre battery life (Though Jobs will make some claims to the contrary) The entry price will be $50 or $100 higher than whatever ATT&T or the Apple US store charges for the same model. Currency parity? never heard of it. It will come with a 3 year contract. Standard for Canada, but one year longer than any other jurisdiciton on the planet. It will come in June It will have a 1GB data cap Pricing packages including voice minutes, data, messaging & system access fee will start at a minimum of $80CAD a month…

Mobile Computing may force us to rethink our operating definition of a web browser. For a while folks have been wrestling with the debate of browsers vs native apps for mobile. Browsers are wonderful because they make few assumptions about the underlying hardware (aside from guessing at screen resolution and which browsers a handset may support). The trouble with browsers is that they miss out on all of the rich hardware and other physical features a mobile device is capable of. What we need are common application layers/frameworks (basically an uber-browser) that can do both. You…

A stay-the-course quarter for Telus’ wireless division, which announced (audio | transcript) a 10% increase in overall revenue on slightly lower net additions (88,000 as opposed to 91,000 in first quarter 2007), offset by a stronger share of post-paid additions (82% vs. 67% in the quarter) and a 53% surge in wireless data revenue. The net result of all this was essentially flat ARPU in the quarter at $61.88, down slightly from $62.03 in the first quarter last year. Capital expenditures were also down 42% on the year, perhaps reflecting President and CEO Darren Entwhistle’s preference,…

Jevon has been following this one for a week or two and has all the news over at StartupNorth.ca New $150 million Blackberry Fund, based in Canada. These are exciting times for mobile developers in canda. Between this fund, other VC and Angels in the mobile space, and a number of Federal and Provincial funds/programs out there, there is a lot of backing available for mobile developers. What do you want to build? or what’s the killer blackberry app you’ve been waiting for? ShareThis

No earnings call on Wednesday for BCE. In the leadup to the upcoming leveraged buy-out by a consortium headed by the Ontario Teachers Pension Plan, execs at Canada’s incumbent integrated telco decided after Q2 2007 to forego the traditional quarterly analyst call, sticking instead to a media release/shareholder report combo. On the wireless side, a few salient points: Net activations for the quarter (gross activations minus churn) at 34,000 were roughly triple the number reported last year at the end of the same quarter, with 82% of net adds opting for post-paid rate plans. Blended ARPU…

WMWifiRouter turns a Windows Mobile Pro smartphone into a portable wireless router. Ed Hardy has tested this utility out and says its definitely worth while for those who frequently travel with both a smartphone and a laptop.

Phillips has announced a new touchscreen-oriented Windows Mobile phone, with features and design similar to the upcoming 3G iPhone.

Palm to Present at JPMorgan Technology Conference WorldMate Live now includes GPS Eduardo Cachucho wins 2008 Nokia Mobile Filmmaking Awards OtterBox 1990 for Samsung Q1 Ultra and Q1 Ultra Premium UMPCs

In what could almost be described as a steal, eXpansys is selling the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet for a very low price for a very limited time.

Although HTC Touch Diamond is not yet available, Ed Hardy has been been given a preview of it by HTC, and brings us his first impressions.

Shape Services has released an update to their Palm OS multi-service instant messaging application. IM+ All-in-One Mobile Messenger combines six IM service providers in one application. It supports AOL IM, Yahoo, Google Talk, MSN Live/Messenger, ICQ and Jabber based systems. Key features include SSL support, full presence status support, groups, detailed contact info, configurable sound and vibration notifications and background operation for use while in other apps. This update incorporates some changes and fixes from user feedback and adds vibration support on the Centro. IM+ All-in-One…

Longtime Palm OS ROM hacker Shadowmite has posted what appears to be one of the first shots of an Treo 800 / Palm Zeppelin prototype device. The picture matches up with most of the earlier leaked renderings and presents a clear view of the long awaited new Palm smartphone. Unfortunately there are no major new details or confirmation of existing rumored specs along with the picture. The little tidbit the source does confirm is that the device uses a new micro USB connector. Read on for the full sized pic. Updated with side view.

TreoSpot is an interesting, yet oddly named, application for GSM Palm OS smartphones. Odd in that it only works on the GSM Centro. The developer describes it as a Location Based Reminder and Phone Profile Settings utility. Once you set up the TreoSpot location database (from the cellular tower ID's I presume), you can enable alerts and phone profiles when you are in a specific area. It's quite an impressive piece of work for a device without any native GPS capabilities. TreoSpot v2.4 is available as freeware with donations accepted. It is developed by TreoTown, makers of the "iPhone-ish"…

In Palm stock market news today, UBS analyst Maynard Um cut his rating on Palm to Sell from Neutral, with an unchanged $5 price target. Palm's stock closed today down 12 cents (~2%) at $5.82. In his research note Um notes that Palm is on track for some new Treo products in the August and November quarters (?), and cites the ever increasingly competitive mobile landscape including the 3G iPhone and new BlackBerry Bold. He also states that a Palm turnaround still relies on the success or failure of its new Linux product, which he says won't be launched before the first half of 2009 "at the…

Electric Pocket's popular Ringo Pro ringtone manager for Palm OS and Windows Mobile software has been updated. Ringo is a enhanced ringtone manager that allows you to easily setup and define ringtones, photo ID's, and sms alerts for individuals and groups on your smartphone. Electric Pocket has recently issued a new collection of fun SMS alerts for free and now includes free access to over 50 free mp3 ringtones to get you started. Pricing for Ringo Mobile starts at $24.95. It is available for both Palm OS and Windows Mobile Treos. A seven day free trial period is included.

The dotMobi marketing arm - mobiThinking has just launched a free eBook called Ten Mistakes in Mobile Web Marketing. Even though the title of the eBook is clearly aimed at marketeers it is worth a read for everyone. The ideas behind good mobile web sites are simple but the execution isn't always so easy. Many of us are still thinking of mobile web sites as small versions of their PC-counterparts. That's simply the wrong approach. This and other pitfalls in mobile web marketing have been reviewed to produce this new, free eBook - Ten Mistakes in Mobile Web Marketing. read more

What a week at dotMobi and we are still not done with the updates. In fact we just completed the update of DeviceAtlas to version 1.2 and there are quite a few changes. read more

We pushed out our first update to ready.mobi for some time last weekend. Well, you can stop salivating for now, as there are no new features to announce just yet; this release has focused on bug-fixes and such. Most notably version 2.1 includes:read more

We always thought of DeviceAtlas as being more about device 'intelligence' than merely device 'data'. Being able to see and interpret patterns in the data helps developers make really smart design decisions, rather than just react, at run-time, to whatever turns up at their site. So we've been putting a lot of effort into the analytics features of the platform. Currently we're trying out one- and two-dimensional analysis of device model populations. read more

We've decided to try an experiment on find.mobi: server-side T9: if you type in a purely numeric query we will try to see if it maps to any common words in the English language, and offer you a link to the search. Thus searching for 46835 will ask you if you meant "hotel" and "7464 8663 " will suggest "ring tone".read more

The Carnival of Mobilists (CoM) makes it’s stop this week at Xelluar Identity.  Xen does a great job of collecting a robust group of posts into topic areas including mobile advertising, payments, the future, content and applications, handsets and just fun. Check out the CoM this week for the best resource on media about mobile in the blogosphere.   Also, check with the schedule to find the lastest host locations of the carnival.  Great job, Xen!  And see you at next week’s show. Share This

Tomorrow is the Democratic Primary in North Carolina. I plan to visit the Obama HQ in Wilmington in the morning along with a polling location or two, and then on to Raleigh Obama HQ and polls. Watch for live coverage here. If you have questions you’d like addressed by campaign staff or voters leave a comment here. Or participate live by watching at http://www.qik.com/mojo/ and using the chat feature while I’m broadcasting. Share This

Following my experience at CTIA Wireless 2008 with streaming video from a Nokia N95, I’ve sought a solution to adding an external microphone. The N95 has an input that is designed for making phone calls and adding a headset for this same purpose. It includes noise-cancelling automatic gain adjustment to make phone calls using the phone’s built-in microphone appropriately loud or soft depending upon the speaker’s voice level. The noise-canceling properties of automatic gain adjustment built into the N95’s microphone improves audio quality for phone calls by separating…

Nokia Conversations goes live April 21st, 2008, led by Nokia’s social media expert, Charlie Schick. As a member of the newly minted Social Media Communications group inside Nokia, Charlie has built what he refers to as a “mud hut,” and which he plans to transform into a blogosphere palace. Mark Squires describes the project briefly in my video interview with him at CTIA. Many people will recall Charlie from his early work with Nokia’s first blogger outreach project promoting the use of Lifeblog. But for those who don’t remember. Lifeblog was a three-way (mobile,…

    Supervising Producer for MTV, Michael Scogin discusses the network’s Choose or Lose social media project, the live video streams from Super Tuesday. We also hear what MTV sees as the future of its citizen journalism efforts. Share This

Yesterday, a federal grand jury indicted a woman who allegedly caused the death of teenager Megan Meier by harassing her on MySpace. Now, I want to make clear that the girl’s death is no frivolous matter, and that I myself was horrified when I first heard the allegations. However I do think that marketers need [...]

Law enforcement agencies should do everything they can to entice the average citizen’s cooperation in fighting crime. In this respect, they’re following the lead of savvy marketers—by using proactive SMS campaigns. A recent story from the San Jose Mercury News shows that text-messaging is so ubiquitous, so natural of an activity, that it can be applied [...]

We’ve already talked about the video marketing and even video seo before, so now I want to look at the major video-sharing sites a bit closer and actually share with my experience submitting content to them. What I love about all the major video sites is that the upload/submit button is well-seen from any page or [...]

Remember how, before the writers’ strike, top TV shows would go on hiatus for months at a time while their scribes toiled over ways to make their programs better than ever? Um, yeah, that’s what’s happening with mobileStorm’s Outside The Inbox: Video Edition. To that end, this week we’re offering new viewers the perfect way to [...]

In the novel 1984, novelist George Orwell predicted a future where the government had complete control over the populace, monitoring their every move through technology. An enduring classic, the book introduced the concept that “Big Brother is watching you.” In fact, it proved to be such a seminal work that the term “Orwellian” [...]

French telecom Orange has inked a deal with Apple for iPhone carriage in countries throughout the Middle East, Africa and a number of European countries. The carrier issued a one sentence press Read more...

Sprint Nextel and Samsung Electronics announced that WiMAX services in Washington D.C. and Baltimore have completed the testing phase successfully and are now ready to launch commercially. The Read more...

According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, BlackBerry's long-rumored 3G touchscreen, Thunder, will roll out during the third quarter of this year. The handset is set for exclusive carriage Read more...

During its first quarter conference call with investors, Alltel announced that it was committed to evolving its network to LTE over the next five years. The move makes Alltel the second biggest CDMA Read more...

Three years ago I read my first wireless industry white paper, Why Max?, which Qualcomm's marketing department put out. The paper is still a classic in my book--one that captured the spirit of Read more...

Verizon Communications' service performance in the six west-central Florida counties in which it provides voice, data and video services has been less than stellar, and it could end up costing the Read more...

Deutsche Telekom has been one busy telco of late, taking over a 25 percent chunk of Greek carrier OTE and now, according to some reports, eyeing France Telecom as a, uh, partner. Germany's Finance Read more...

Cox said it recorded double-digit, year-over-year growth in residential phone, high-speed Internet and digital cable service in its first quarter despite what Cox President Pat Esser described as Read more...

Cable operators added more new broadband subscribers than telcos for the first time since the third quarter of 2004, reports the Leichtman Research Group in a new study of 19 cable and telephone Read more...

ISPs in Canada who use Bell Canada's network lost a battle to stop the telco from throttling P2P traffic. The Canadian Radio and Telecommunications Commission for now denied a request from the Read more...

Another high-flying Motorola executive has left the company...Rich Nottenburg, chief strategy and technology officer, has "left to return to the New York area to be with his family and pursue other opportunities" reports Reuters. Nottenburg took over the role of CTO last December. His departure comes after a rearrangement last month has Motorola restructured its struggling device unit, and a flurry of top-level departures including Treasurer Steve Strobel and head of EMEA Mike Fenger, head of mobile Stu Reed, CMO Kenneth Keller, and of course ex-CEO Ed Zander.

Strange are the ways: Danish mobile aps and networking company Zyb just announced its acquisitions of local mobile social networking service Imity last month. And now Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) announced today that it is ZYB for 31.5 million euros ($48.7 million) in cash. The network operator said the acquisition would help advance its "Total Communications" strategy, which is trying to boost revenues through mobile web and PC offerings, among other services. Though ZYB allows its users to share information and messages with contacts held in their mobile phone address book, it also has an online…

Craig McCaw has a lot to prove. His last two mega-million projects fizzled out, and now he's starting another: a $14.5 billion joint venture between Clearwire (NSDQ: CLWR) and Sprint (NYSE: S) Nextel with funding coming from Intel (NSDQ: INTC), Google (NSDQ: GOOG), Comcast (NSDQ: CMCSA), Time Warner (NYSE: TWX) Cable, Bright House Cable, and Trilogy's John Stanton. During his career, he's perhaps best known for starting McCaw Cellular Communications, which he sold to AT&T (NYSE: T) for $11.5 billion, but he also has two big failures:  XO Communications, a landline phone company, filed…

France Telecom's Orange has reached an agreement with Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) to take the iPhone to Austria, Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Jordan, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Switzerland and its African markets later this year, the company said in a terse, one-line statement today. Though Orange exclusively sells the iPhone in France—and will do so for another two and half years, their new deal is most likely a non-exclusive one. Vodafone (NYSE: VOD) announced last week that it will sell the phone in Egypt and Portugal, while T-Mobile will also sell the device in Austria…

Douglas Edwards, the co-founder of Handmark, has been named CEO of uclick, a provider of digital content, including comics and games on the Web and mobile phone. Uclick is owned by Andrews McMeel Universal, a large publishing company. Edwards, who co-founded Handmark in 2000, was one of the the chief architects behind the creation of the company's flagship mobile news and search service called Pocket Express, which launched in 2004. Edwards will join uclick on June 2.  Related Industry Moves: Reddick Takes Over As CEO of Handmark

Eager to get your hands on the newly revamped HTC Advantage 7510? You’re going to have to resort to the gray market, at least for the time being. HTC has decided not to distribute the new “handset” in America. So sad. Truth be told, we’re not entirely sold on the redesign, with an altered keyboard design that appears to leave a little to be desired in the ergonomics department. The reason for the ban is that the handset runs off of the Qualcomm chipset that has been banned in the US pending litigation. As there hasn’t been much progress on the chipset ban, we…

Time to drool-guard your keyboard. Two of the most highly-anticipated handsets of 2008 were found mingling side by side and CNMO scored some shots. Granted, they’re not the best quality or lighting, but you get the idea. The Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 pictured above to the left, is Sony’s eventual first entry into its high-end XPERIA line. We hear that at some point, Sony Ericsson is actually going to make it available to consumers. To the right is the HTC Diamond, the ultra-sleek touch-only gem that was announced recently. If we had to chose only one… Well, luckily we…

There’s been a flood of news over the past couple weeks regarding the iPhone and carrier partnerships. Almost every single major carrier across the globe has chimed in, telling us what markets they’re going to bring the iPhone to. It’s actually gotten to the point we’re we feel we should list the announced markets up to today. Remember asking your best friend to pickup 10 iPhones during his trip to the U.S.? No more, people. No more. Here’s the complete list as of 05/16/08: Australia Austria Belgium Canada Czech Republic Dominican Republic Egypt France Germany…

Just as we predicted, a special red version of the Sidekick Slide has hit the streets. The Sidekick Slide Crimson is functionally identical to its purple brother, sporting EDGE, 1.3 megapixel camera, slide out QWERTY keyboard, Danger’s stellar AIM client, and a bit more. It’s not going to win any awards for "Innovation of the Year", but for the Sidekick faithful, this should do the trick. Expect it to run you $199 on a two-year agreement, available immediately from all of T-Mobile’s retail channels. Read Share / E-mail This

We had heard from our own sources that the firmware update would be available by the end of this month but since this statement was issued publicly, we’ll run with it. According to a Nokia support forum administrator, N95 NAM (N95-3) owners will soon be able to wipe those tears off of their tired faces. The long-awaited and highly anticipated firmware update is finally going to be issued by Nokia in early June. The following statement is from the Nokia Software Update team: Nokia is aware of consumers’ demand for a new software release, and our development teams are working to…