Men, be careful with the lies your tell your wives. See, there’s this thing called the Internet which is… uh, like series of tubes connecting everybody. On The Internets you’ll find services like Google and places to discuss just about anything imaginable, even the iPhone. So when you tell your wife that there’s a bug in the iPhone that causes photos of your naughty bits to “sometimes automatically attach themselves to an e-mail address and appear in the sent folder, even though no e-mail was ever sent,” well, it won’t take long before she’s on the Apple Discussion forums asking if this is true. Buddy, we hope you get what you deserve.

[Via The Inquirer]

No, the iPhone will not accidentally email photos of your nekkid husband originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 06:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: Thomas Ricker

Feel those little hairs standing up on the back your neck? That’s guarded anticipation son, the kind that comes from a Chinesed iPhone landing Stateside with the impact of a giant set of balls. According to yet another launch-related post in the Meizu forums, Jack Wong has accelerated plans to kick his M8 cellphone into India and China (WiFi-less to meet local restrictions) by November 30th. Then “maybe” he’ll launch in the US, Hong Kong, and Europe by December 24th. Oh sure. Our take? There’s no way in hell that this highest of high-profile clones lands Stateside or on Western European soil without being met by a friendly Apple lawyer holding a court-issued ban on all M8 imports. No matter how much we’re dying to play with it.

[Via Electronista]

Meizu’s M8 ready to rock the US and Europe on an iPhone tribute tour? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 05 Nov 2008 03:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Source: Thomas Ricker

Not to be outdone by Samsung, Lucky Goldstar just launched the LG Renoir, a touchscreen phone running a custom OS. The phone has an 8-megapixel camera with video recording.
The phone, called the Renoir, is Asia-only right now and uses HSDPA and Wi-Fi for Internet connectivity. Incidentally, Renoir was considered a failure before his death.

LG Launches Artistically Inspired Handset, Renoir

Seoul, Korea, October 3, 2008- LG Electronics (LG), a worldwide technology and design leader in mobile communications, announced the official launch of its LG-KC910, a slim yet feature-packed full touchscreen 8 megapixel multimedia phone. This artistic new handset, known as Renoir, goes on sale in Europe in early October and has a large palate of features like Wi-Fi, Dolby® Mobile from Dolby Laboratories, Inc. (NYSE: DLB), and camera capabilities that even surpass those found on standalone digital cameras.

“Renoir is much more than a camera phone. It truly puts everything at your fingertips and provides a multi-sensorial experience through sight, sound and touch,” said Dr. Skott Ahn, President and CEO of LG Electronics Mobile Communications Company. “The 8 megapixel camera is only one aspect of the phone. Its unique combination of features, including a full touchscreen interface, Dolby Mobile for Music and built in support for Wi-Fi and A-GPS, allow Renoir to be used in equally unique ways.”

Focus on Touch-Enhanced High Quality Camera

Renoir takes super-sharp 8 megapixel pictures that can be edited in camera and are instantly ready for sharing online or printing. The phone’s list of features includes some that are usually only found on extremely high-end standalone cameras, such as Schneider-Kreuznach certified optics, a Xenon flash, auto and manual focus, sensitivity up to ISO 1600 and geo-tagging.

Renoir takes the full advantage capabilities as a full touchscreen 8 megapixel phone, with unique touch-enhanced features. One feature, Touch Shot, makes it easy to get the right shot every time by allowing photographers to focus on any object by touching it on screen. The shutter fires automatically when the user’s finger is removed from the screen. Touch Shot, a first for a mobile phone, also reduces camera shake and eliminates the need to search for the shutter release button.

One major advantage Renoir has over standalone digital cameras is its ability to connect to the latest 3G HSDPA networks and Wi-Fi. This eliminates the need to wait to share pictures with the world. They can be instantly and effortlessly uploaded and shared with the world from almost anywhere. Geo-tagging, enabled by Renoir’s A-GPS capabilities, makes it easy to keep track of where pictures were taken and plot them using online mapping websites.

Special shot modes give pictures that special look that usually requires a professional touch. Beauty Shot removes spots and imperfections from people’s faces, while also making them appear brighter and clearer in photos. The feature is smart enough to recognize faces and only apply the effect to the right areas. Art Shot allows users to apply a number of creative preset effects, from common changes like black and white to less common and more nuanced ones like warm or cool tone.

Share in an Unrivalled Multimedia Experience

Renoir delivers a full multimedia experience that stimulates the senses. . Renoir is also the first handset created for the worldwide market to include Dolby Mobile. This integrated suite of audio processing technologies from Dolby Laboratories brings depth and richness as well as clean, powerful bass to deliver a more immersing and engaging listening experience for music.

Renoir records video better than any other mobile phone, with the ability to capture super-high-quality 120 frame per second slow-motion video or to compress longer events using five frame per second time lapse recording. A noise-free microphone ensures that audio is just as crisp as the video it accompanies. Built-in support for DivX and Xvid encoded video means that Renoir can provide hours of entertainment straight out of the box.

Just as with photos, Renoir can upload any user generated content it creates including audio, video or text, over 3G HSDPA networks or Wi-Fi. Renoir is ready for the complete web 2.0 experience, fully able to use web-based applications, including those that require GPS location.

Touch the Intuitive, Customizable Interface

Renoir works just like people think. Its user interface is both intuitive and easily customizable, based around a full touchscreen that provides the perfect canvas for multimedia. When first turned on, the handset greets users with a screen that is home to numerous widgets. These can be selected from a wide range of choices and dragged into place. Standing out among these are Renoir’s online widgets, which use live content from the web to provided up-to-the-second information on things like local weather.

For applications like text messaging, Renoir allows users to choose what kind of input interface they want to use – either an onscreen QWERTY keypad, similar to a computer keyboard, or an alpha-numeric keypad, like what is found on most mobile phones. Another unique feature enabled by Renoir’s touchscreen is its picture-based speed dial, which allows users to quickly scroll through contacts and bring up more detailed information with just the touch of a finger.

LG chose the name Renoir for Viewty’s successor to reflect its personality and level of multimedia sophistication. The handset’s designers drew inspiration from the way the impressionist painter of the same name used light and color to capture scenes that were beautifully rich in meaning.

After making its initial debut in Europe in October of this year, Renoir will come out in Asia, Latin America and CIS in November, the Middle East and Africa in December and China in January of 2009. The 13.95 mm Renoir will be available in titan black and other color options depending on operator.

LG will also launch another 8 megapixel handset in October, its super slim 13.70 mm slider, the LG-KC780. This phone will have a number of built-in features that make it a great on-the-go companion for taking portraits.

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Source: John Biggs

In what can only be described as the fastest and most exhilarating one minute, twenty-two seconds of our lives, RIM and Vodafone have thrown together a promotional video for the upcoming Storm that touches on most of the handset’s high points: mobile music, GPS, desktop-grade browsing, streaming video, expandable memory, and — get this — voice and data (”it can do two things at once,” we’re triumphantly told). Now, bear in mind this is a Vodafone video, not Verizon, so that “two things at once” claim probably isn’t going to hold water when you’re hooked up to Big Red’s EV-DO Rev. A — but the remainder of the factoids in the flashy, seizure-inducing commercial should apply. Follow the break for the covertly-shot material, if your sensitive eyes can take the kind of sensory punishment that only this much primary color and enterprise compatibility can deliver.

[Via CrackBerry]Continue reading BlackBerry Storm shows off in trippy Vodafone promo vid

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Source: Chris Ziegler

Rumors of a Zune phone have floated around forever, but we’ve always thought it would make more sense for Microsoft to start by simply making a Zune player for Windows Mobile — a plan Steve Ballmer casually confirmed today in an interview with CIO Magazine. Sure, Ballmer’s hinted at Zune on WinMo in the past, but those were just hints — not like today’s pronouncement that “the Zune software will also be ported to and be more important not just with the hardware but on the PC, on Windows Mobile devices, etc.” That’s a pretty solid declaration of things to come, if you ask us — too bad he didn’t give a time frame. Now, about that 360 integration.

[Via WM Power User]

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Source: Nilay Patel

If you’ve been enjoying those still pictures of Nokia’s 5800 XpressMusic touchscreen phone, but feel you’re lacking an in-depth experience, we think we can help. A slew of demo and instruction videos have just been slapped up on the Ovi Share site, allowing you to get a better idea of just how the device works, and what it looks like when it’s doing it. Luckily for you, we’ve taken the trouble of including all of the videos after the break for your viewing pleasure, saving you the painful and laborious experience of hitting a read link. Enjoy.

[Via Cellpassion]Continue reading Nokia’s 5800 XpressMusic phone intimately detailed on video

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Source: Joshua Topolsky

Apple’s App Store, with its millions of downloads, is clearly a hit with consumers. But with developers? Not so much. Like a dashing hero to a scorned mistress, Google’s Andy Rubin is pledging a different, more loving and respectful relationship with those who would fill his company’s Android Market with selections — and his pockets with royalties. He indicates that the Market will enable free downloadable trials, something that Apple is stubbornly refusing to add, and that those downloads would not be subject to any arbitrary bandwidth caps. Meanwhile, T-Mobile at least will be levying a $2/month fee on developers of free apps expected to use more than the (somewhat arbitrary) amount of 15MB of data per user per month, though how they’ll be keeping track of that data outside of their own content stack is unclear — our guess is that they can’t.

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Source: Tim Stevens

For those of you who firmly believe that Verizon plus Motorola plus touchscreen equals pure, unadulterated bliss, heads up: we have a bit of information that might be of interest to you. phoneArena has scored a screen shot of what appears to be some promotional material for Moto’s upcoming MING-esque doohickey, the ZN4 Krave — and it looks like we’ll be shelling out about $150 on a two-year contract for the honor of carrying one in our knockoff Louis Vuitton backpacks. Not a bad price for a phone clearly designed to rest toward the upper end of Verizon’s non-smartphone lineup, we suppose, and we’ll admit that it’s looking better in this dolled-up promo shot than it was last time we saw it. Separately, they’ve landed pricing for the Moto VU204, a basic flip that’s probably not going to turn as many heads as the Krave; that one is going to go out the door for $29, and you’ll get three free with the purchase of the first for the ultimate four-pack of mediocrity. We don’t have a solid line on when these are coming to market, but the Krave’s still a possibility for this month.

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Source: Chris Ziegler

The new 5800 doesn’t look much like a tube but it is quite svelte. It’s smaller than the iPhone and even most touchscreen phones we’ve seen in a while. It’s most like the Palm Treo Pro in terms of size but it’s quite light.
Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Source: John Biggs

The 5800 XpressMusic is stealing the lion’s share of the spotlight today, but the first S60 5th Edition handset out there actually isn’t the first to get hooked up with Nokia’s all-you-can-eat Comes With Music service. That honor will instead go to the lowly 5310 XpressMusic candybar, which will get access to about 2 million track downloads when it hits Carphone Warehouse in the UK in prepaid form for £130 (about $228) on October 16, a day earlier than rumored. Other models will have to wait, though Comes With Music versions of the N95 8GB and 5800 are both planned.

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Source: Chris Ziegler