Mobile Choice Blog

HTC Touch reaches the magic million sales mark

It's not all iPhone round these parts. We'd like to clap HTC (virtually) on its back for selling a million of its HTC Touch handsets in just five months, showing that Apple's phone isn't the only tempting touchscreen in town.

HTC says it hopes to reach 1.5 or even 1.8 million sales by the end of the year, as punters flock into mobile retailers in the run-up to Christmas. We only hope that the milestone isn't seen as an excuse to pump out several similar models in the coming months to capitalise on the original phone's success. We're looking at you, RAZR...

Bluetooth mobile-controlled skateboard? Yes please!

Forget Bluetooth headsets, wireless photo transfers, or local multiplayer games. The best use for Bluetooth we've ever heard of is a new gadget called GroundSurf. It's... a Bluetooth-enabled skateboard with an electric motor between its front wheels. You accelerate and brake using controls on an application on your phone.

It's not going on sale until next year, and is fraught with worries on our part: for example, if you're zooming down the street on it and somebody calls you, can you control the application and talk at the same time? Or do you end up slamming into a wall due to an inability to brake?

Still, we're intrigued nevertheless, and would love to have a go on one. Watch this space (or our local hospital) for news of whether we manage it.

(via The Cell Freak)

Where are all the mobile micro-video-blogging services?

Admittedly, there aren't thousands of people asking this burning question, but we certainly are. We read a post on the excellent SMS Text News blog about Hictu, a startup company that lets you 'video microblog' (film short video clips of yourself waffling, then share them online). It looks pretty cool, but as far as we can see, there's no mobile angle.

And that made us think, wouldn't this be the perfect application to get people using their phone's videocalling function? They sure aren't using it to call each other, so why not provide different and innovative uses? So, you'd be able to videocall a shortcode, say your rant, and then it would be automatically uploaded to a website - Hictu or something else - for the world to see.

We'd do it, but are any companies making it possible? Post comments if you know of any!

Mobile gambling to top $5 billion by 2012 says analyst

At the moment, mobile gambling isn't very high-profile, but it seems that may change in the coming years. Mobile industry analyst Juniper Research claims that mobile users will be wagering more than $5 billion (£2.4 million) on mobile casinos by 2012.

It includes services like mobile slot machine games and multiplayer gambling, rather than the traditional betting formats. Even more interesting is Juniper's claim that the UK currently accounts for more than 60% of mobile casino spending, which is due to the fact that several operators have promoted these services (with the appropriate age-verification controls, obviously."

The report also suggests that the average monthly spending on mobile casinos has topped $100 (about £50) in some countries. Juniper says that there's already a proven demand for these services, which will only increase as the quality and number improve in the years ahead.

Zumobi offers a new interface for Windows Mobile phones

News that a Microsoft spin-off called ZenZui has changed its name to Zumobi and announced a public beta programme might not sound too exciting, but trust us, the product it's offering is.

Zumobi is a new kind of user interface for Windows Mobile handsets, based on a series of on-screen 'tiles' providing access to different information, services and applications. And it's all customisable, so you can mix and match the tiles you want according to your interests. Advertising is also involved, as well as advanced cacheing technology to reduce the lag between selecting an option, and accessing the information or service.

It all sounds very interesting, so keen Windows Mobile users would be advised to sign up for the public beta programme when it begins on 14th December. Details will be revealed on the company's website.

Zumobi website

Cre8txt SMS-inspired keyboard plugs into your PC

We wouldn't be surprised to hear that kids nowadays can text on a mobile phone as fast as they can type on a traditional keyboard. Perhaps anticipating such a trend, someone's designed a USB keyboard for PCs that's structured like a mobile keypad, to give free rein to all those nimble-fingered young pups.

It's called the Cr8txt keyboard, which works with PCs, Macs and Xbox 360 consoles, and comes with a dictionary and SMS slang translator, which will help us old fuddie-duddies get to grips with 21st century text-speak.

It's available to buy now, and costs £49.99. You might not think it's worth that much money, but if you have a teenager, chances are it'll (possibly) double their essay-writing speed.

Cr8txt keyboard website (via MobHappy)

Brits to junk two million mobiles this Christmas

Excited about getting a new phone this Christmas? Join the club. But what will you do with your old one? According to a new survey conducted by Tesco Mobile, two million of us will simply throw our poor old handsets away during the festive season - even if they're working perfectly. That's 20% of all the Brits who are getting a new mobile phone.

The problem appears to be that we don't know what options we have to recycle our mobiles. Only 18% of us do recycle. What about the 62% who don't throw them out or recycle? We just leave them lying round at home, of course.

You might have guessed that there's a Tesco tie-in coming at the end of this story. The company has set up a dedicated recycling service, with rewards of gift vouchers or Tesco Mobile airtime. Of course, an alternative is the Children In Need phones appeal...

Get set for multi-layer LCD mobile screens

Multi what? Multi-Layer Display, that's what. MLD if you're being informal. It's a technology developed by a company called PureDepth, which involves layering multiple LCD screens on top of each other in a mobile phone or PDA. You might have guessed that from the name.

PureDepth has just signed a 'Prototype and Evaluation agreement' with Samsung, with the two companies planning to see exactly what benefits MLDs could bring to phones. According to PureDepth, its big benefit is that it lets people view two separate data fields on one screen. Or, as the slightly confusing story on Cellular News puts it:

"By overlaying two more separate image planes within a single monitor, PureDepth technology provides true depth of vision that significantly enhances the visual experience with faster response to time-critical data and better assimilation and comprehension of data of any kind."

We're still a bit confused, to be honest. But the explanatory diagram (above) has a big dinosaur in it, so we're quite excited.

(via Cellular News)

Opera Mini 4 browser promises faster mobile web surfing

A lot of mobile users don't realise that they're not stuck with their handset's default web browser if they're planning a spot of mobile surfing. One of the best alternatives is the Opera Mini browser, which you can download to your phone and use like any other application or game.

The latest version came out late last week: Opera Mini 4. It lets you look at proper websites rather than just WAP sites (in fairness, many built-in mobile browsers are now capable of this too), but the real selling point is that it automatically reduces the size of pages before you access them - which is faster, and saves you on those pricey data charges.

New features include whizzy zooming stuff (that's our technical term, you understand) and the ability to synchronise your Opera Mini bookmarks with those on your desktop web browser. Download it via the link below.

Opera Mini website

Is it a pen or a mobile phone? It's both!

We've seen watches that double as mobile phones, but never pens. Check this concept product out, which is so hush-hush, it's not even finished yet. The image was sent to gadget blog Gizmodo by a mystery mole working for the (equally) mystery company producing it.

So, it's a pen that you write with as normal, but has an LED screen on one side, which displays the date, time and number of incoming calls. Everything appears to be controlled by a dial at the top of the pen, and there's even a Micro SD memory card slot squeezed in.

It'll connect wirelessly to a Bluetooth headset, or for people who don't mind looking ridiculous, you'll be able to hold it up to your face and talk into one end, with a speaker at the other. Crazy or genius? We think crazy genius, so we'll keep you posted on any news of it actually going on sale.

(via Gizmodo)