The "MegaPhone" by SysOpen Digia is a beast from the east is a 5'7" fully functional handset with real buttons as big as a fist (we think, anyway) and a very, very large color screen, although the rez may be a little blocky. This unit appears to have S60 inside it for use by customers who no doubt will be drawn to a life-size handset that actually works as a functional prop.

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It looks like RIM co-founder Jim Balsille is out as the company's chairman of the board, although he will remain on with RIM as co-CEO. The crackberry BlackBerry maker has had a little of a black eye recently (like many tech companies) with its handling of stock option accounting, which dates all the way back to 2004. As a result, RIM will have to lower its earnings by what seems like a nice chunk of change -- $250 million.

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With the rise in importance of text messaging and mobile email access, the integration of a full, QWERTY keyboard into cell phones has become an valued feature in phone technology. The LG enV brings Verizon into this market and offers new competition for the old standard. In addition to its keyboard and accompanying large internal screen, the enV also offers a 2.0-megapixel digital camera, as well as standard phone service. combines three devices—a phone, camera, and internal "laptop-esque" setup, featuring keyboard and screen. The phone's camera, operating horizontally on the "back" of the phone, also gives the feel of a standalone device. The "front" of the enV features a trim, block-style phone, including a full-color front screen ..... Click on Heading to Continue

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According to Mobile Today, the LG Prada phone, model KE850, will hope to see itself on the store shelves on the 22nd of March 2007. The fully touch screen capable camera and MP3 player phone will be arriving a few months before the Apple iPhone, which may cause a shift in Apple’s predicted sales percentage. A few dealers are also saying that they are seeing the LG Prada phone as a successor to the previous successful LG phones, the Chocolate Phone and The Shine. The expected price of the LG Prada phone is said to be £390.

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A teacher in northern Russia could face up to three years in prison after being captured on a mobile phone camera beating a student in front of his classmates, a law-enforcement official said. A shaky video taken by one of Tolya Ivanov's classmates shows his teacher holding him up against the blackboard striking him on the head repeatedly and throwing him across the room.

After several days in hospital, the 11-year-old student told the Rossiya television network on Friday that he was afraid to return to his school in the northern town of Olenegorsk. "I have a bruise here from when she hit me against the blackboard," he told the station, pointing to his left arm. He said the school's reaction to the beating was to approach the student who took the video to ask him to delete it. An investigation has been opened into the incident with the teacher facing up to three years in prison if found guilty, prosecutor Yelena Smirnova told the television.

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Don't you ever send an email or text message that you would not want to defend in court. Apparently, that imaginary legal and mental procedure was lost on an Oklahoma resident last year and now a Kentucky middle school teacher has similarly mis-texted. Ann Greenfield, 34, wanted to get her paws on some Mary Jane but sent a text message not to her dealer -- but to a Kentucky state trooper by accident. A mass o' cops was waiting for her when when arrived to meet up with her "dealer." We suspect this middle school teacher will probably set up a phone contact in her cellphone next time to avoid a rather embarrassing mistake -- or maybe she'll ditch the habit entirely.

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Samsung new model serves up Bluetooth, 136MB of internal memory (though no external -- advantage Drift), 1.3 megapixel cam, Helio Music compatibility, and the full suite of GPS goodies including Google Maps and Helio's "Buddy Beacon" service atop a 2-inch QVGA display. Look for the Heat to go on sale today for $150 in your choice of Gold and the always-fashionable "Onyx" (alias "black"). Follow the break for a shot of the Heat doing its slide thing in both shades!

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Sure, the Moto mainstay holds a dear place in many of our hearts, and even the short-lived 2004 edition was appreciated for its nostalgic flair, but the 3.2-ounce StarTac III MS900 just seems a bit too vintage to actually enjoy in this millennium. Aside from such glaring omissions as a basic camera and external LCD, it does sport a very pocket-friendly design, simplistic style, MP3 playback, an electronic dictionary, questionable e-book functionality, GPS, and 128MB of built-in memory. Additionally, you'll find a two-inch QVGA display, mobile banking abilities, 160 minutes of talk time (300 hours in standby), and a mysterious "biorhythm" function to boot.

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German GSMK offers mobile phones from HTC that run a special software that encrypts calls with 4096 bit Diffie-Hellman key exchange and with SHA256 hash function AES 256 and Twofish between Cryptophones.
Security does not come cheap. The Cryptophone G10i sells for about $2080. The clamshell phone is a quad-band GSM phone with EDGE and GPRS support.

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The F@rmphone comes with WM5, 400MHz CPU, 128MB ROM and 64MB RAM, obligatory 320x240 screen and microSD expansion. Landing out the wireless details are 802.11g, GSM quad and GPRS/EDGE -- no 3G here. But the glam is in the software for tracking, well anything (like runaway tractors perhaps.) PocketArea, PocketNav and Trackomat are included here, which are all designed for the farm environment for navigation and remote monitoring and control.

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Straighten your ties and button your suit jackets, RIM's promiscuous debutante -- the Blackberry 8800 -- is up and dancin' on on Cingular's website. $500 list, or $300 after $50 mail-in rebate and 2-year contract, the 8800 brings everything we expected: quad-band EDGE, GPS, microSD expansion, Bluetooth 2.0, push-to-talk suport, and 5-hours talk / 24-days standby in a 0.55-inch device weighing just 4.73-ounces. 3G data? No. WiFi? Not this time.

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BenQ-Siemens somehow still found the time and money to come to Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6 party with the new E72 candybar last week. With data topping out at measly EDGE speeds and an emphasis on VoIP via its WiFi connectivity, the E72 smacks of the also-announced iPAQ 510 Voice Messenger from HP -- and like the 510, it'll also be running the Standard version of the platform atop 64MB of RAM and 128MB of ROM. Where the E72 wins, though, is with its QVGA display (versus 220 x 176 on the 510) and a slightly snappier 260MHz TI OMAP core.

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Though Helio's entire lineup to date has been at least fashion-conscious (with the Hero arguably the notable exception), the A303 might stand to be Helio's first fashion-focused model on account of its magically disappearing touch-sensitive controls. Other features should include a decent 140MB of internal storage and a 1.3 megapixel cam. No word on release, but with all due respect to Samsung, this isn't really the unreleased Helio we're most looking forward to at the moment.

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This week at 3GSM, OmniVision Technologies -- almost a year to the day after announcing a 2 megapixel mobile camera sensor -- announced the details of a 5 megapixel auto-focus camera module for, you guessed it, our beloved mobiles. The new 5 megapixel shooter is a CMOS model that has auto-focus (instead of the normal fixed focus in most cellphone digicams) and it should see the setting of a new standard as customers come to expect better and larger image quality from those tiny cams inside those tiny handsets.

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The Nokia E65 is the first slider phone in Nokias E-series of business phone. This business-slider features built-in WLAN and other typical business needs such as email integration and synchronization of contacts. The phone will be available in stores within the next couple of weeks.

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