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Mobile News
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Leaps Announces 3 New Cities and Plans For More
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May 18, 2006
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Leap today announced it will begin offering its Cricket flat rate service in Houston and College Station, Texas on June 7. Soon after, service will begin in Cincinnati, Ohio. Leap also recently completed a spectrum swap that will allow the carrier to launch service in Rochester, NY. In addition to new service in currently available spectrum, Leap is raising money to take part in the AWS auction in order to obtain spectrum to launch in more markets.
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W3C Brings CSS To Mobile Devices
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May 18, 2006
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The W3C today announced the first draft of the Device Independent Authoring Language (DIAL). DIAL is designed to ease web development across the wide variety of mobile device display sizes and configurations by integrating desktop web standards like XML and CSS. This should allow developers to create sites and content that works on a wide variety of screen sizes and devices with significantly less effort. It should also allow websites for desktop browsers to be easily reformatted for smaller scr
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Motorola Q Coming Next Week
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May 17, 2006
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Motorola`s Ed Zander today told analysts that he expects to launch the Q next week. The Q is Motorola`s hotly awaited Microsoft Smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard, landscape QVGA screen and EV-DO high speed data. Although Zander did not name what day the Q will launch, he did say that Microsoft, Motorola`s "carrier partner" (which is expected to be Verizon), and a number of enterprise solutions providers will be present.
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Nokia Updates Tablet For Talking
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May 16, 2006
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Nokia today announced a software update for the 770 Internet Tablet. This update provides a number of new communication options as well as some system and interface improvements. Tablet users will now be able to use Google`s GTalk to instant message with Jabber users. They will also be able to use SIP client like Gizmo Project to have VOIP voice chats. The update also includes a new full screen keyboard that will allow users to type with their thumbs instead of by using the stylus on a tiny virt
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Motorola Opens Up To Open Source Community
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May 15, 2006
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Motorola today officially launched their open source software site, which will host a variety of projects the company is working or has worked on. Motorola has released the kernel to the A1200 Ming and A760 Tai Chi devices, which are based on Linux. Motorola has opened up drivers as well as their new MIDP 3 Java engine. Motorola is hoping that by making their MIDP 3 engine and test cases available, it will convince manufacturers to unify their Java implementations, and ease the strain on develop
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Palm OS Comes to Treo 700 Series
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May 15, 2006
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Palm today announced the much-rumored Treo 700p, a new CDMA Treo with Palm OS. The 700p is based on the same hardware as the 700w, including EV-DO high-speed data, a 1.3 megapixel camera, and Bluetooth. The key differences are Palm OS 5.4.9 instead of Windows Mobile, and a sharper 320 x 320 display like the Treo 650. The 700p also supports built-in streaming video, laptop tethering via Bluetooth or USB, support for Outlook, Yahoo!, AOL, and GMail email accounts, built-in support for Word, Excel,
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Samsung Pocket PC Phone Leaked By FCC
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May 11, 2006
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The FCC today approved a new Pocket PC phone from Samsung. The i770 operates on GSM 900/1800/1900 with EDGE data and has Bluetooth. It also appears to have WCDMA 2100. From small pictures in the test documents, it appears that this phone features either a SureType keyboard like on the Samsung T719 and RIM 7100 series or a butterfly keyboard like on the Sony Ericsson M600. One half of the phone`s hinge is also rather large, but it is unclear whether this is a dual pivot hinge to use the phone in
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Google Says MVN-NO
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May 11, 2006
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Google executives yesterday spent the day with the press, introducing new products and answering questions about Google`s strategy. During the questions, Google CEO Eric Schmidt said Google is not interested in launching an MVNO or "Google Phone." Schmidt also announced Google is not participating in the upcoming AWS spectrum auction, but it could acquire some of the spectrum through a partner. Instead of launching a cellular service, Google will continue to launch more mobile applications, bett
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New DoCoMo Features Offer Glimpse Into Future
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May 11, 2006
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NTT DoCoMo today announced ten new 3G phones and with them, new features on the network. Many features DoCoMo pioneered are slowly making their way to the US, it is possible carriers may incorporate one or more of these in the future. Chaku-Moji allows users to transmit a 10 character (2-3 word) message when making a phone call, that will be displayed along with the caller ID on the receiver`s screen. ToruCa extends NFC (called FeliCa in Japan) from mobile payments and ticketing to mobile guide
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Sprint, Alltel Out Of AWS Auction, Leap, Time-Warner In
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May 10, 2006
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The deadline for entering June`s AWS auction was today. Carriers and other interested parties had to file a form by today in order to bid for the 3G spectrum on June 29. Neither Sprint-Nextel nor Alltel will be participating in the AWS auction. Sprint Nextel already has a significant amount of spectrum which it will be able to put to better use as it moves Nextel customers from iDen to CDMA. However Sprint could still acquire more spectrum in this auction through Time-Warner, one of Sprint`s cab
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Nokia Announces Sporty S60 Smartphone
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May 10, 2006
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Nokia today announced a new S60 smartphone designed with the active user in mind. The 5500 Sport is an S60 3rd edition phone with the latest software and features and a durable sports-inspired construction of stainless steel and rubberized surfaces. It is a 900/1800/1900 GSM/GPRS handset with a 208 x 208 screen, 2 megapixel camera, MicroSD memory card slot, text to speech and a gyroscopic sensor for games and to use the phone as a pedometer. The 5500 also features a button to switch the smartpho
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Verizon, Vodafone Still In Talks Over VZW
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May 8, 2006
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Vodafone is still considering offers from Verizon for the purchase of its share of Verizon Wireless. Although neither company will comment, sources have said the two are still talking but that Verizon has not made an offer that meets Vodafone`s expectations. An unconfirmed report has said Verizon most recently offered $38 billion for Vodafone`s stake, but that Vodafone is looking for $50 billion.
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Sprint and Alltel Expand, Extend Roaming Pact
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May 8, 2006
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Sprint and Alltel today extended their roaming agreement another 10 years. In addition to calls, subscribers will be able to send and receive messages as well as get online using EV-DO high speed data while roaming on the other network. This pact will allow Sprint to catch up with Verizon`s EV-DO footprint, which covers a wider area than Sprint`s, without the cost of building out its network. The agreement also reduces roaming charges for subscribers of the two networks. This is Alltel`s first d
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Samsung Continues To Get Skinnier
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May 8, 2006
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Samsung this week will unveil a 6.9 mm thick candybar phone. The X820 is thinner than Samsung`s P300 credit card phone and yet features a number of upgrades over that model. It too is a tri-band GSM/GPRS phone and features a 2 Megapixel camera, Bluetooth, 80 MB memory and even TV Out. It is due out in Europe this week, but has not been announced for the US.
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Compact Clamshell Coming to Alltel
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May 5, 2006
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The FCC today approved a new entry-level Pantech phone for Alltel. The PN-218 is a restyled version of the CDM180 currently sold on Verizon. The PN218 uses the same small clamshell form and has the same features - dual color displays, both horizontal rather than vertical, a VGA camera with flash, and speakerphone.
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Second Smartphone Revealed for Verizon
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May 4, 2006
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The FCC today approved a new Windows Mobile Smartphone for Verizon. The Pantech PN820 or PC-8200N is a clamshell style phone with dual color displays and a traditional numeric keypad. It features a 1.3 Megapixel camera with flash, Mini-SD card slot and Bluetooth. This model will also be Pantech`s first high-end model for Verizon, as to date the carrier has only sold Pantech`s entry level models. Current Pantech models on Verizon use PN- model numbers, however the second PC- model number appeared
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Nokia To Boost Multimedia With ATI Chips
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May 3, 2006
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Nokia and ATI today announced the companies will work together to bring better graphics and audio to Nokia handsets. The two companies will begin holding workshops together in the second half of this year to introduce developers to ATI technologies. Nokia phones using ATI`s hardware aren`t expected until the second half of 2007. This announcement is likely associated with ATI`s purchase of Bitboys yesterday. Bitboys is a European developer of mobile graphics chips that was funded by Nokia Ventur
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Microsoft Tunes Windows Mobile for Qualcomm Chips
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May 3, 2006
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Microsoft and Qualcomm today announced a collaboration to develop a pre-tested version of Windows Mobile 5 for Qualcomm`s 7000-series MSM chipsets. 7000 series MSMs are dual-core chips that integrate both a cellular radio modem (CDMA or WCDMA) and an ARM11 application processor into a single chip, reducing device size, weight, and cost. The new solution will save manufacturers critical development and testing time that was previously required to make Windows Mobile work on Qualcomm chips. Micros
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High Priced MVNO Launches
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May 3, 2006
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Voce today launched a small-scale rollout of its service in the Los Angeles area. This MVNO is targeting wealthy users more interested in talking on their phone than anything else. Subscribers will pay a $1000 membership fee and then pay $400 for unlimited voice service in the US. Additional charges will apply for international calls or calls made while roaming abroad. Because it is an MVNO on Cingular`s network, Voce cannot offer data services with its phones. Membership includes a new phone ev
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Mini BlackBerry With EDGE Coming to GSM Carriers
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May 3, 2006
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The FCC yesterday approved two new GSM BlackBerrys. The 7130e will soon be joined by GSM/EDGE models: the 7130c for Cingular and a 7130g, likely to come to T-Mobile if naming conventions remain the same. Pictures and drawings both show the Cingular logo on one of the devices. The 7130 has a new more-rectangular form factor featuring the hybrid SureType keyboard, quad-band GSM/GPRS with EDGE, mini-USB and Bluetooth 2.0. Neither RIM or any carrier have announced this new Blackberry yet, so pricing
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