11:39 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Slashdot brings the story that the US Justice Department has filed a legal brief in RIM's patent dispute with NTP, asking a federal court to delay any immediate shutdown of the popular wireless e-mail system to ensure that state and federal workers can continue to use their devices. The WSJ has more details:

NTP has said any injunction wouldn't apply to U.S. federal, state and local governments. But the filing, submitted by Paul J. McNulty, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, said that is easier said than done. "The U.S. government is a major user of BlackBerry devices and technology," the filing said. If there is an injunction "it is imperative that some mechanism be incorporated that permits continuity of the federal government's use of BlackBerry devices," it said. One possibility, the government said, would be to create a "whitelist" of devices used by the federal government and others exempted from an injunction.

Let's only hope this whitelist doesn't become a "blacklist" in the hands of the wrong people.

11:27 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Microsoft Watch dug up some details about Microsoft's long-awaited Office 12 beta 1 program. Supposedly it'll also include a new version of the company's mobile office suite:

Tentatively called "Office 12 for Windows Mobile," the product will consist of viewers for Word, Excel and PowerPoint (along with some very limited editing capabilities for Word and Excel) — plus a new "OneNote Mobile" version of Microsoft's OneNote note-taking application. The mobile Office 12 suite is being designed to run on smart phones and PDAs, sources said... OneNote Mobile is set to include note taking and viewing capabilities. And because it will be phone-based, it will be able to take advantage of built-in camera phones, allowing users to snap photos of whiteboards, documents or other source information, and then annotate and share that information from a smart phone or PDA, sources said.

Meanwhile you can switch over to Palm and use the excellent Documents To Go Suite.

11:12 AM by Alexander Turcic in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

Ever since I flew on an airplane equipped with Connexion by Boeing, I am getting promotional e-mails with discounts and questionnaires. The following promotion code is good through December 31, 2005: To save $10 off the regular price, simply sign in with the promotion code " P-OCTNEWS25" the next time you fly.

For service availability, you can check out their website.

02:15 PM by Bob Russell in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Today we're asking you to tell us what three things you use your mobile device for the most.

According to the Daily Press, "One reason most people don't understand or 'get' PDAs is because they are still marketed as business devices. Sure, you can use them to keep up with your schedule and contacts when you are away from the office. But that's bland and boring for the young and hip crowd (and those who still want to be young and hip). People just don't see them as being fun."

The top three uses for my Treo 650 are:
1) Organization/PIM
2) Ebook reader
3) Phone

Close runner-ups are audiobooks, music, podcasts, old time radio broadcasts and reading web clippings.

How about you?

02:02 PM by Bob Russell in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

I bet when you saw TT, you probably had the same thought that I did... this must be some kind of modified PalmOS Tungsten T device. Well, you would be wrong. It's actually a Peditron ToeTapper 2340TZ.

We're always on the lookout at MobileRead for creative new form factors in mobile devices, and this one is about as unusual as they get, other than the skin display we reported on a while ago.

MobileMag reports that "It is about twice the size of leading handhelds and has large, inverted buttons on the touch screen display. It gets strapped to your ankle for portability by way of a 'Dankle', and can be concealed comfortably under your pant leg. All typing is done, you guessed it, with your toes."

They also provide a sample real-life situation described by a user. "Sure, at first the guys at work looked at me kind of strange when I removed my shoes and socks and then took it out of the Dankle to send my regular 'Sell! Sell! Sell! morningvational email to my team, but once they found out that this baby not only has 128MB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage, it has a built-in Satellite DMB with High-def and recording capabilities --- They were lining up outside my cubicle, shoes in hand. If I’m waiting for a meeting or for a client to show up, I just whip up my pant leg and can start watching sports. The 'auto-off' light sensing capability knows when I put my pant leg down, and goes right into sleep mode. Brad from Marketing said he was going over to Best Buy at lunch to order one.'"

Rumor has it that Textware Solutions will be producing a toe-based version of Fitaly especially for the device. Technical specifications of the device will be released after the first million units are sold.

09:09 PM by Brian in Archive | Portable Audio/Video

According to an article at Yahoo! News titled Consumers Warm to Internet TV on Mobile Phones, more consumers are watching TV programming over the internet and on mobile devices. Recent developments like the availability of TV shows for the new iPod with video capabilities, services like MobiTV, and the preference by younger consumers to watch short-format video content like Mobisodes and music videos are being validated by recent studies and surveys.

Read the full article here.

Related: Mobile video about to explode, Mobisodes: Mobile Episodes of your favorite TV shows, MobiTV to offer live TV on Treo phones

[via PDA247]

09:41 AM by Colin Dunstan in Archive | Handhelds and Smartphones

In an article called How Palm Inc's CEO shot himself in the foot Fernando Cassia expresses his great dismay at how in recent days, Palm's chief Ed Colligan has managed to frustrate and alienate most of the company's loyal followers. I could wax poetic here about whether he is right or wrong, but I will not waste my breath nor your time. Only the future number of sold Treos will tell us if Colligan was right by embracing the "dark side", urm... I mean Windows Mobile.

08:42 AM by Colin Dunstan in Miscellaneous | Lounge

Mobile phones are getting more powerful and universally applicable by every day. As for the battery life... well, you'll want to keep your charger handy. Motorola sees a chance to break this habit by investing in Tekion, a Canadian micro fuel cell developer, whose Formira Power Pack doesn't use common hydrogen, but formic acid (the stuff used by ants to poison their victims) to power the cells. Advantage: formic acid isn't flammable. The technology grew out of DARPA-funded research done at the University of Illinois.

Motorola press release