Smartphones are becoming more and more a part of our everyday lives. In fact, some people, when asked if there was one thing they could live without, say their phone. Over the years, cell phones got smaller and smaller.

Now, instead of carrying around a bulky brick that can only make phone calls and do a few other things, we can have something immensely more power, smaller, and with a wider range of functions.

Being that we have mobile Internet access, it seems that a lot of people used their phone to help with holiday shopping in 2011, a trend that’s likely to rise, especially with the likes of Amazon’s price checker app that allows you to scan an item in stores and see if it’s cheaper online.

Via Mashable:

“Research from the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that about half of consumers (52%) used their phones in stores during the holidays. Of this group, about 38% said they called friends for advice and 24% said they looked up product reviews. Meanwhile, about 25% looked up product prices online to see if they could find a cheaper price at other retailers.”

“The study was conducted among 1,000 U.S. adults over the age of 18 who were asked questions about how they shopped 30 days before and after Christmas.”

Also in the report, they found that those between the ages of 18 and 49 are more likely to use their phones for online product reviews than those over the age of 50 and minorities are more likely to look up online product reviews than caucasians.

Do you use your phone to look up prices and reviews?

52% Of People Used Their Phone To Help With Holiday Shopping is a post from: The Inquisitr

Are you addicted to your cell phone so much that you can’t even put it down when eating with your friends and/or family? The latest phone stacking game craze just might be the thing to help you kick your habit, and maybe even spark a good conversation in the process.

The object of the game is simple enough. If you’re at, say, a restaurant with your friends, or at a dinner party and so on, participants simply stack their cell phones at the center of the table.

The idea is that it will be difficult for mobile-addicted participants to resist picking up their cell phone for fear of missing out on tweets, the latest in adorable kitten videos and, well, you get the idea. Should you lose at the “phone stacking” game by picking it back up, you’ll be faced with having to pay the bill for the entire party.

The phone stacking craze all started with Brian Perez, a Tumblr blogger who goes by the name “Lil b”. The blogger says he came up with the game as a ” fun concept in this new age high tech life of ours,” rightfully adding that “Conversation is the spice of life.”

Here’s the full list of rules, straight from Lil b:

Rules:

1) The game starts after everyone has ordered.

2) Everybody places their phone on the table face down.

3) The first person to flip over their phone loses the game.

4) Loser of the game pays for the bill.

5) If the bill comes before anyone has flipped over their phone everybody is declared a winner and pays for their own meal.

Variations/house rules:

-Starting the game after everyone is seated.

-In the rare event that multiple people flip their phones simultaneously, the bill is split between said players.

- Feel free to invoke penalties/strikes systems.

Notes:

- No touching or messing with anybody else’s phones.

- You don’t have to stack the phones. This was done for picture taking purposes.

Is it just me, or is it sad that the phone stacking game has to exist in order for people to put down their cell phones and actually chat with their friends?

Phone Stacking Game Goes Viral, Forces Dinner Conversations is a post from: The Inquisitr

As much as many drivers don’t want to admit it, cell phones and mobile devices are, in fact, a distraction – but do state bans on cell phones while driving actually work? Apparently not, according to a study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

The institute studied data from states that had a ban on cell phones while driving and those that did not and, surprisingly, it turned out that crash rates were not decreasing in states that have imposed a ban on cell phones. In fact, IIHS says that cell phones aren’t even the problem.

IIHS spokesman Russ Rader told CNN Money: “Part of it is that distracted driving is much bigger than just phones,” he said “so focusing on phones doesn’t deal with the full spectrum of things that distract.”

That isn’t to say that IIHS doesn’t think that driving while using your cell phone isn’t dangerous, however; the group cited a NHTSA study that indicated car crashes as a result of distracted driving – people chatting on cell phones, texting, etc. – caused 3,000 fatalities last year.

“What we know is that the best course of action is a three pronged approach — strong laws, strong education and strong enforcement,” NTSB spokeswoman Kelly Nantel told CNN Money.

Source: CNN Money

[Image credit: Shutterstock]

Insurance group: Cell phone bans not effective in reducing crashes is a post from: The Inquisitr

Thanks to its recent success in the Google Android Smartphone market electronics manufacturer Samsung has announced the sale of more than 300 million cell phones in 2011. According to the company they surpassed that milestone by the end of November.

If those numbers hold up that would mean that the company has easily surpassed their 2010 milestone of 280 million units sold.

Speaking of their successes the company pointed to the Samsung Galaxy S II which offers a dual-core processor on a 4.3-inch display with a Google Android powered OS. The Galaxy S II managed to sell more than 10 million Smartphones in the first five months on the market.

Feeling confident about the company’s successes mobile group president JK Shin said they hoped on “extending this success” in 2012. Samsung could meet his expectations once the faster and more robust Samsung Galaxy S III is revealed.

In the meantime a recent breakdown of smartphone sales in the United States shows Apple and Samsung in a near dead heat although those numbers could change once Apple reveals overall sales numbers for the iPhone 4S.

Are you a fan of the Samsung Galaxy line of devices or do you think Apple wins the Smartphone battle hands down?

Samsung Cell Phone Sales Reach Higher Than 300 Million Units In 2011 is a post from: The Inquisitr

Last year the FCC, after much public pressure, agreed to look into the billing practices of the wireless carriers after people complained about unexpected overages and the astronomical fees charged by the carriers on those overages.

Well today the FCC, the Consumers Union, and the major wireless carriers announced that they have come up with some guidelines to help consumers avoid those overages, and the resulting “bill shock”.

Guess what the guideline is … come on … guess….

Free alerts.

Yup that’s it folks. You now get a free alert when you get close to your data and minute caps to let you know that you are headed into overage territory; and get this – you don’t need to sign up for them, they’ll head your way free of charge without you having to sign up for them.

Needless to say the carriers are all patting themselves on the back saying how they came to this solution without the government agency having to get tough with them, and of course the FCC has said that they are going to take a “trust, but verify” approach when it comes to monitoring the carriers.

Of course they won’t have much monitoring to do until October 2012 because these free alerts won’t be available until then at which point only two of the four alerts for data, voice, text and international roaming will be in place. The remaining two alerts won’t be available until April 2013.

So until then folks I guess you’ll have to go back to keeping an eye on your bills and hoping you don’t go over.

via TechFlash

Wireless carriers think that free alerts will help with “bill shock” is a post from: The Inquisitr

In our world of heightened cleanliness we all like to claim that we are so clean and in love with our travel bottles of Purcell but it seems that when it comes to our cell phones some of us are not telling the truth about our cleanliness habits.

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, along with the University of London, have been carrying out a study that is designed to promote something called Global Handwashing Day to find out how clean our cell phones are.

Turns out that 95% of those included in the study claimed that they always wash their hands after using the toilet, with soap wherever possible. Except that wasn’t what the researchers found out.

It seems that 82% of the people surveyed had bacteria, the kinds that can be killed by soap, on their hands and 92% had bacteria on their cell phones.

Even worse it turns out that 16 percent of the people and 16 percent of the phones had E. coli bacteria on them, which the scientists referred to as bacteria of faecal origin.

It turns out that cell phones are the perfect habitat for bacteria since the surfaces are regularly heated up when the phone is in use and it is also very difficult to properly clean the surface of cell phones. Scientists also noted that we constantly provide bacteria with a source of protein to feed off of when we talk and do the old “say it, don’t spray it” routine.

via Geeks are Sexy

Researchers discover poopy lies about cell phone cleanliness is a post from: The Inquisitr

For many on the East Coast, Hurricane Irene blew through and did very little damage save for fallen branches and intermittent loss of power.

Others experienced extensive flooding and many areas remain in the dark due to storm damage. Hurricane Irene was an interesting exercise in the impact of storms on modern communications, however, because in the past, reaching out after a loss of electricity or when inundated by floodwaters was far more challenging than it is today- as demonstrated by the use of social networks throughout the event.

Luckily for people in storm ravaged areas, cell phone service stayed mostly consistent while the storm either raged or weakened, depending on the region. More than 130,000 residents in Virginia and South Carolina were affected by disruptions to landline service, but cell phone service providers reported fewer sweeping outages as damaged towers were supported by backup service.

The New York Times spoke to service spokespersons for wireless networks, who confirmed intermittent outages in affected areas, but say that the paradigm surrounding the use of landlines versus cell phones during disasters has begun to shift:

But the evolution of the landline — which first saw cordless phones (that do not work in blackouts) and Internet-based telephony (which requires a battery backup in case of blackouts) — has led to a decrease in its reliability. That hole has been filled, to some degree, by wireless voice and data networks.

Nationwide, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) said no outages of 911 service were reported in any of the areas affected by Hurricane Irene, and that no centers were without service during the potential disaster. A spokesman for AT&T confirmed remaining cell phone service disruptions in some areas, and said crews are working to assess the damage and determine when damaged equipment can safely be restored.

Cell Phone Service Stayed Mostly Steady During Irene, Landlines Affected is a post from: The Inquisitr

Smartphone manufacturers are making a big push into digital wallets but the cost to consumers and merchants could lead to higher prices at the register and less protection for consumers.

Services currently offering or preparing to offer digital wallet products include Google, PayPal, OboPay, Square and FaceCash among others and while most of those services do not directly charge customers (other than Obopay) they do bring extra costs to merchants.

In some cases the cost of doing business increases when digital wallets are used, for example PayPal and Square charge merchants up to  2.75 and 2.9 percent per transaction, far more than charged by the average bank card. As more merchants begin to offer payment processing from those company’s the margin typically found in items may need to be increased to make up for profit loss, causing the cost of items to increase.

In other cases customers could pay out of pocket, for example Obopay charges consumers a flat fee of 50-cents for payments over $10 that are taken directly from their Obopay account, while a fee of 1.5 percent is charged if an Obopay customer has directly linked their credit or debit card to their Obopay account.

One in four Americans in a recent survey say they have found unauthorized charges, billing errors and other issues on their credit and debit cards, issues that may be harder to resolve as our smartphones become a commonplace form of payment transactions.

Consumers could also face issues with direct-to-phone bill charges since rights for that area of credit are not defined at this time by lenders and are controlled solely by wireless carrier contracts, according to a new study no wireless carrier provides protections for mobile payment transactions that are as strong as laws regarding direct credit card or debit card purchases.

It’s important for Smartphone users to realize that their protections under Digital Wallet agreements may fall far short of their current card purchases using the traditional credit card method and therefore it’s important that terms of service agreements are fully studied before users take advantage of digital wallet products.

Smartphone Warning: Digital Wallets Could Increase Prices, Leave Consumers Without Basic Protections is a post from: The Inquisitr

Leonardo DiCaprio made $5 million this month for one day worth of work. The actor, who often makes upwards of $20 million per movie, plus a cut of the gross, starred in a Chinese cell phone commercial which paid the big bucks.

The salary news was broken by E! News who says that the Guangdong OPPO Mobile Telecommunications Corporation handed over the cash to one of the world’s biggest stars for a single ad spot appearance that will broadcast throughout Asia.

It’s also apparently not the only deal Leonardo has in the works, he also hold sendorsement deals with high end watch manufacturer Tag Heuer and Suzuki.

Celebrities in the United States often appear in overseas commercials to endorse products, unfortunately most of those oftentimes silly commercials never make it stateside, here’s hoping to a YouTube appearance for this DiCaprio gem.

Leonardo DiCaprio Makes $5 Million For One Commercial is a post from: The Inquisitr

Around 5,000 people, according to Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, die every years due to using cell phones while driving. He feels it is so bad that the government may have to step in and required the installation of devices to disable cell phones while the car is in motion.

In an interview on MSNBC’s Morning Joe show LaHood had this to say

“I think it will be done,” said LaHood. “I think the technology is there and I think you’re going to see the technology become adaptable in automobiles to disable these cell phones. We need to do a lot more if were going to save lives.”

via Daily Caller

These statements are in tandem with a new program being launched by the transportation department’s Faces of Distracted Driving which is an online campaign meant to scaring drivers away from using cell phones while driving.

Sec. of Transportation on rampage, could include disabling cell phones in vehicles is a post from: The Inquisitr

I must admit, I’ve always thought people who complain about cell users in public were just being whiny.

As it turns out, researchers have found that hearing half of a conversation had by others on their cell phones is more irritating than just listening to other people’s banal in-person conversations. The researchers at Cornell have even come up with an annoying portmanteau to describe the irritation, dubbing them “halfalogues.” Here comes the science:

“When you hear half of a conversation, you get less information and you can’t predict as well,” Lauren Emberson, a co-author of the study, said in an interview with Reuters. “It requires more attention.

“Since halfalogues really are more distracting and you can’t tune them out, this could explain why people are irritated,” she said.

The researchers studied students who tried to perform basic tasks while other people yapped. Conversations and monologues (like one person recounting an earlier conversation) didn’t hamper their concentration significantly. Half a conversation, however, jacked up the number of errors students made while doing tasks.

The findings initially surprised researchers, because one might think that less sound distraction overall (as overheard in a one-sided conversation) would be less distracting. But it actually counters the processes we’ve evolved to process information. University of York Psychology professor Gerry Altman explains:

“There is increasing research in a whole range of areas to do with human behavior that shows our ability to predict what’s going to come next is fundamental to both our mental and physical functioning,” Altmann said. “Much of the behavior we engage in is, in fact, very predictable.”

Altman likened hearing half a phone conversation to the difference between walking on a smooth sidewalk to an uneven, rock-strewn path. One doesn’t require much attention. The other, which is unpredictable, requires more attention. An overheard cell phone conversation is different in that much of the process is subconscious, he added.

“With half a phone conversation, you’re only getting a snapshot, so you can’t predict the future, which is what the brain has evolved to do,” Altmann said.

The study recommends similar research be done on the impact of other people’s cell phone conversations on drivers.

Why other people’s cell conversations make you stabby is a post from: The Inquisitr

Have you ever logged onto your cell phone’s account to discover a massive amount of charges you had no idea you were ringing up?

The average American consumer may often struggle to understand the manner in which certain services are billed, and if I’m being overly courteous to those who design the billing, deciphering when where and how you may incur such charges is… not the clearest process in the world. The FCC is calling it “bill shock,” the feeling you get when opening a cell phone bill kicks you in the nuts. And they’re initiating a public dialog about how exactly to notify consumers before a billing cycle’s worth of exorbitant charges has been incurred.

The FCC’s Consumer Task Force Chair Joel Gurin addressed the issue in a statement posted on the FCC’s website:

”We are hearing from consumers about unpleasant surprises on their bills,” said Gurin. “We’ve gotten hundreds of complaints about bill shock. But this is an avoidable problem. Avoiding bill shock is good for consumers and ultimately good business for wireless carriers as well.”

Gurin referred to similar protections afforded to wireless customers in the European Union:

“We’re issuing a public notice to see if there’s any reason that American carriers can’t use similar automatic alerts to inform consumers when they are at risk of running up a high bill.”

If you’ve got something to say about high cell phone bills or you’ve been hit with a much higher than expected cell phone bill, you can comment to the FCC for the next 45 days on the issue. It’s not exactly clear that the FCC will actually change anything regarding dubious cell phone billing practices, but hopefully this is a step in the right direction on that front.

[FCC.gov, Image]

FCC wants your feedback on deceptive cellular billing is a post from: The Inquisitr

2009 was a great year to be a cell phone user. From the iPhone 3GS to WebOS and Google Android devices, there were literally hundreds of phones to choose from. Here’s our list of the top 20 cell phones for 2009.

1. iPhone 3GS – Not that this device should surprise anyone, the 3GS took high speed data to a whole new level, while proving 16GB or 32GB flash drive models, better email support, increased speeds and a 3.5-inch (diagonal) widescreen Multi-Touch display that is still unrivaled throughout the mobile phone industry.

2. Motorola Droid – The Droid helped introduce Google Android 2.0 to the world, while also featuring some excellent hardware that includes a 3.7 inch touchscreen, full QWERTY keyboard, 5MP camera, WiFi, 3G and an Arm Cortex A8 CPU (a 600MHz, OMAP3430 chip downclocked to 550MHz). If you want power, easy access to apps and text messaging and other great features on a Verizon Wireless phone, this is a must have phone from 2009.

3. HTC HD2 – This is one of the few Windows Mobile 6.5 devices to make the cut in 2009. Featuring a massive 4.3 inch capacitive WVGA touchscreen with a 5MP camera, built-in GPS and a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU, the HD2 is one of the most powerful smartphones to debut in ’09.

4. Toshiba TG01 – As the first device to feature the Qualcomm 1GHz Snapdragon processor the TG01 impressed us, even if it didn’t make a huge splash on the market. The devices 4.1 touchscreen display was unfortunatley resistive, however the unit made up for that fact with HSDPA (3G) data, WiFi and a built-in GPS receiver. Toshiba also added their own UI to mask the Windows 6.1 interface and while not perfect, at least it wasn’t WinMo 6.1

5. Palm Pre – WebOS made a huge splash thanks to the ability to simultaneously run dozens of apps at one time, while also staying connected with 3G, WiFi and a built-in GPS receiver.  The Palm Pre also offers over the air automatic backups and its own app store that continues to grow at a steady pace.

6. Blackberry Tour 9630 – With 3G connectivity, a 3.2MP camera and a full RIM designed QWERTY keyboard business users had reason to celebrate in 2009.  This unit also offered Assisted-GPS and Bluetooth 2.0 + A2DP for “over bluetooth” music playback.

7. Nokia N900 – The first Nokia device to feature their new Maemo 5 operating system, the N900 is also fast with its included ARM Cortex-A8 600 MHz  processor. The unit also features a 3.5 inch touchscreen display and runs the internet with ease thanks to the inclusion of Mozilla powered technology with full flash 9.4 and AJAX support. The N900 also features a 5MP camera with dual LED, WiFi and 3G.

8. HTC Droid Eris – I couldn’t complete a list of top 20 phones without including some amazing bargain offered. The Droid Eris, offered by Verizon Wireless only costs $79.99 and includes a virtual qwerty keyboard, WiFi, a 3.2 inch touchscreen display and bluetooth 2.0 + EDR. The phones speeds are also fairly impressive thanks to the included 528MHz Qualcomm® MSM7600™ Processor.

9. LG GD910 3G Touch Watch Phone – Take a designer looking watch, throw in a capacitive touchscreen, a VGA camera and 2GB internal memory and you have the LG Watch Phone. Sure it’s price at over $1000 unlocked, but it has also helped user in new lines of watch phones that will debut in 2010. Heck you can even SMS and MMS with the watch. Plus the displayed time doesn’t look so bad either.

10. Acer Liquid A1 – This quad-band GSM based Smartphone features a Qualcomm 8250 1GHz processor, offers WiFi, 3G and a 3.5 inch touchscreen with WVGA output. Plus users will love Android 1.6 (Donut). The Liquid A1 also featured a built-in GPS receiver and a 5MP camera with auto focus. While not the newest version of Google Android, it’s still a powerful option.

11. HTC Snap – The Snap is another Windows Mobile 6.5 smartphone that offers many of the typical features found on this list, including WiFi, Bluetooth 2.0 + A2DP, a 2.4 inch QVGA display and built-in GPS. It also introduced the HTC ”Inner Circle” button which allows users to pull up their most popular, requested emails with the single click of a button. If you’re a business user who sends a lot of emails and who would rather have a non-touchscreen based device, this is the best option of 2009.

12. Nokia 5800 XpressMusic – One of only three Symbian based devices to make our list, the 5800 XpressMusic brought touchscreen capabilities to Nokia with a 3.2 inch resistive display. The unit also features a MicroSDHC card slot with an included 8GB memory card in the box, WiFi and even a TV out port with a Nokia Video Connectivity Cable. I personally love the widget enabled setup on the device and despite less than stellar reviews it’s still a great option for Nokia/Symbian lovers.

13. Blackberry Bold 2 (9700) – I loved the Bold and the next iteration of the device was even more impressive. Featuring 3G data connectivity, WiFi 802.11b/g and 3.5mm headphone jack the Bold 2 felt like a business phone, while bringing in a more consumer friendly vibe with extended multimedia and app use. Again the device featured the same 3.2 mega-pixels (auto-focus) camera as found on the Blackberry Tour 9630, which isn’t stellar, but makes the cut for a business based phone.

14. Nokia N97 Mini – I liked the N97, but I also prefer smaller, more portable devices and that’s what the N97 Mini offers. This unit comes equipped with a 5MP camera with dual LED flash an autofocus, WiFi and A-GPS maps with Nokia Maps (which are now free to download and use worldwide).  This device also uses a MicroSDHC card slot expandable up to 16GB. The screen is still resistive but offers 3.2 inches for nice finger friendly access to apps.

15. LG KP500 Cookie – This is the only phone on my list to feature it’s own custom mobile operating system. I like the Cookie because it’s cheap, even unlocked it’s only around $199.99. The Cookie features a 3MP camera, bluetooth 2.1, MicroSDHC card support and offers a TFT 3″ touchscreen. If you want a cheap “entry level” touchscreen phone and you don’t need all the bells and whistles of a standard Android, Blackberry, WinMo or iPhone device this is a nice option to check out. Plus it comes with worldwide friendly quad-band GSM abilities.

16. HTC TouchPro 2 – With a sleek design the TouchPro 2 is worth a closer look. The unit features a 2.6 inch touchscreen display with 800 x 480 pixels resolution, 512MB of ROM, 288MB of RAM, a microSD expansion slot, and a 3.2 megapixel camera with auto focus. Sure it’s still a WinMo device, but with the HTC Sense UI it’s definitely a powerhouse of a business device. 3G, WiFi and the ability to flip the phone over and use it as a full-duplex speakerphone also makes it a device worth checking out.

17. Sony Ericsson C510 Cyber Shot – If you want a phone that’s built for picture taking and music playing, but you don’t need the 100,000 apps offered by Apple, this is a good choice. The C510 is a sturdy built phone that offers a 2.2 inch display, geo-tagging capabilities and 3.2MP cyber-shot camera.  It also offers something called “smile technology” which auto takes pictures when smiles are detected, kinda cool, but not always useful. I like this phone because it’s a phone and very little more, which is a nice change of pace. If you want a secondary phone as a non-business device and you don’t tend to use your phone for much more than making calls and taking the occasional pictures, I would give the C510 a closer look.

18. Blackberry Storm 2 – Another Blackberry device with a 3.2MP camera, however it also offers a 3.25″ display with improved SureType technology (compared to the original Blackberry Storm). The Storm 2 also offers Integrated GPS and WiFi b/g plus 3G data connectivity. It’s still not a perfect touchscreen option, but it offers a good deal of business and personal use options so you can take it to work with you and then play with it at home.

19. Samsung i8910 Omnia HD – With a 3.7 inch AMOLED touchscreen display the Omnia HD offers one of the best outputs you’ll find on a cell phone. The phone also features an 8 MP camera with 3264×2448 pixels resolution, autofocus and LED flash. It also offers the Symbian OS v9.4 Series 60 rel. 5 mobile OS and WiFi plus 3G capabilities. The HD also offers HD 720p recording at 24fps and D1 720×480 pixels at 30fps, with QVGA time-lapse and slow-motion video recording capabilities.

20. HTC Hero – This smartphone features a Qualcomm 528MHz processor with 288MB RAM and 512MB ROM. It also offers a nice amount of connectivity including WiFi, GPS, Bluetooth 2.0 + A2DP and quad-band HSPA (3G).  With Google Android users will love this phones apps and games and with a 5MP camera it serves as more than just a nice touchscreen friend phone.

Those are my top 20 phones of 2009. With Google Android gaining an ever increasing market share, Windows Mobile 7 ready to pop up hopefully sometime in 2010 and Apple promising new advances with the iPhone series, it should be an interesting 2010.

Top 20 Cell Phones Of 2009. From Business To Personal Devices Companies Delivered is a post from: The Inquisitr

While there has been no direct links to brain cancer and cell phones, the state of Maine doesn’t want to take any chances. According to recent reports the legislator in that state are proposing warning labels for cell phones which state that the devices may cause brain cancer.

Maine isn’t the only state looking at this type of legislation, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has proposed similar requirements, regardless that no scientific consensus has been agreed upon in terms of the effects caused by cellular devices.

Under Maine’s current bill, phone manufacturers would have to label both cell phone boxes and their actual devices with warnings about the “possible” link to brain cancer, while also suggesting that users keep their devices away from their head or body. Hey Maine, how do I carry my cell phone if it has to be kept away from my body? [SlipperyBrick]

Maine Proposes “Cancer Warning Labels” For Cell Phones is a post from: The Inquisitr

In the semi-annual CTIA Wireless Industry Survey there were a lot of interesting facts and figures but of them all it has to be the fact that some 740 billion text messages were sent in the first half of 2009 in the United States alone. This works out to 4.1 billion daily SMS messages winging their way around the US each and every day.

Of course this is bringing about the old “running out of spectrum” bugaboo from FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski who said at the CTIA wireless industry convention on Wednesday in San Diego:

“We are fast entering a world where mass-market mobile devices consume thousands of megabytes each month. So we must ask: what happens when every mobile user has an iPhone, a Palm Pre, a BlackBerry Tour, or whatever the next device is? What happens when we quadruple the number of subscribers with mobile broadband on their laptops or netbooks? The short answer: We will need a lot more spectrum The biggest threat to the future of mobile in America is the looming spectrum crisis.”

Source:  Digital Daily – OMFG: 4.1 Billion Text Messages Sent Every Day in US

With those kind of figures it is only a matter of time until psychologists start lining up their next BMW’s as texting is declared a disorder of some sort.

4.1 Billion text messages sent every day in the US is a post from: The Inquisitr

Hugh Jackman was performing in “A Steady Rain” with Daniel Craig on Wednesday when an someone in the audience’s cell phone started to ring. He wasn’t pleased. Video below:

Hugh Jackman tells cell phone user to STFU during performance is a post from: The Inquisitr

Word is beginning to trickle out of Japan that the country’s government and music companies are trying to get a pioneering system in place that is designed to stop unauthorized copying of music on mobile phones. As well repeat offenders could find their phone’s music playing capabilities disabled.

The system would be dependant on a centralized database containing information about music that is authorized to be downloaded as well as verifying that cellphone users weren’t downloading illegal copies of music files.

According to the folks over at FreakBits the system is planned to be in service by April 2010. I bet the RIAA is getting the biggest woodie possible at the thought of being able to do the same thing here.

Play illegal music on cellphone and find it shut down is a post from: The Inquisitr

Okay, okay, so texting is popular. Everyone is doing but way ahead of the bell curve has to be the pre-teens and teens as they bruise their thumbs in order to stay cool, or cheat at school. Does this mean though that we really have to condone excessive texting to the point that we have a national championship to figure out who is the fast texter?

Sure the publicity for GL, who sponsored this massive nonsense, is worth the $50 Grand that the winning 15 year old girl walked off with, but I still ask why do we need to do this?

Kate Moore, the 15 year old winner, said that parents should chill out about their kids texting through dinner cause they could end up just like her with a big purse of money and a new phone.

Moore, with a speedy and accurate performance, beat out 20 other finalists from around the country over two days of challenges such as texting blindfolded and texting while maneuvering through a moving obstacle course.

In the final showdown, she outtexted 14-year-old Morgan Dynda, of Savannah, Ga. Both girls had to text three lengthy phrases without making any mistakes on the required abbreviations, capitalization or punctuation. Moore squeaked through by a few seconds on the tiebreaking text, getting the best two out of three. As she anxiously waited for confirmation of her win, tears streamed down her face.

The teen dismisses the idea that she focuses too much on virtual communications, saying that while she has sometimes had her phone taken away from her in school, she keeps good grades, performs in school plays and socializes with friends — in person — on the weekends.

In between, she finds time to send about 400 to 470 texts a day. Among her uses of the text messages? Studying for exams with friends, which she says is better done by text because she can look back at the messages to review.

Source: Yahoo News

I realize full well that I am probably in the minority here but this just strikes me as being wrong. It’s right up there with kiddy beauty pageants as far as I am concerned.

[Kate Moore photo courtesy of LG]

Excuse me? $50,000 for texting? for a 15-year old? is a post from: The Inquisitr

I caught this one via Allen Stern’s post at CenterNetworks, but did you know that 35% of teens admit to cheating using their cell phones and that 23% don’t consider it cheating. This comes to us courtesy of a new report just posted to Common Sense Media (pdf).

Yes folks our kids are using those fancy cell phones they have emotionally blackmailed us into getting them for cheating at school. Whether it be as simple as storing notes to be used during tests to using the Internet as part of their cheating it is all happening under the watchful eye of teachers. Did we really think that our little darlings would do otherwise?

Here’s a few more findings from the study to cheer you up

• Nearly two-thirds of students with cell phones use them during school, regardless of school policies against it.
• Teens with cell phones send 440 text messages a week and 110 a week while in the classroom.
• 76% of parents say that cell phone cheating happens at their teens’ schools, but only 3% believe their own teen has ever used a cell phone to cheat.
• 45% of teens say that texting friends about answers during tests is a serious cheating offense, while 20% say it’s not cheating at all.

So much for actually learning anything eh.

Gee tell us something we didn’t know is a post from: The Inquisitr

It wasn’t really that long ago when the idea of having a carphone literally meant having a phone in your car and which you paid a really hefty price for. Then came the early days of cellphones and feeling like you were holding something the size and weight of a brick up to your ear. Those days have changed and just about everyone has, at the minimum, a cellphone.

Even I broke down this year and got one even though it was only because I got a deal on it and considering my health makes my wife a little more secure knowing I can get a hold of her at any time. As much as it might be a security blanket in our home for most people it has become their only form of telephone as the number of people opting strictly for cellphone has seen a decline in wireline phones.

However even that perception of cellphones being the standard is changing as more and more people are moving up to smartphones and all the services thy provide. In many cases that smartphone is becoming a lifeline both personally and in our business lives.

For a growing swath of the population, the social expectation is that one is nearly always connected and reachable almost instantly via e-mail. The smartphone, analysts say, is the instrument of that connectedness — and thus worth the cost, both as a communications tool and as a status symbol.

“The social norm is that you should respond within a couple of hours, if not immediately,” said David E. Meyer, a professor of psychology at the University of Michigan. “If you don’t, it is assumed you are out to lunch mentally, out of it socially, or don’t like the person who sent the e-mail.”

The spread of those social assumptions may signal a technological crossover that echoes the proliferation of e-mail itself more than a decade ago. At some point in the early 1990s, it became socially unacceptable — at least for many people — to not have an e-mail address.

Source: New York Times

It is this same type of attitude that is driving the sale of smartphones even if it means counting pennies or doing without other things. It is no longer a luxury, or a gadget, but is in fact becoming a social and business norm. In many places if you aren’t connected using a smartphone you are looked upon as being the next best thing to a luddite.

There is a downside according to psychologists  though

The smartphone, said Mr. Meyer, a cognitive psychologist, can be seen as a digital “Skinner box,” a reference to the experiments of the behavioral psychologist B. F. Skinner in which rats were conditioned to press a lever repeatedly to get food pellets.

With the smartphone, he said, the stimuli are information feeds. “It can be powerfully reinforcing behavior,” he said. “But the key is to make sure this technology helps you carry out the tasks of daily life instead of interfering with them. It’s about balance and managing things.”

Jeez .. I just get caught up with the cool kids and get a cellphone only to find out I’m still behind. Hopefully this same thing won’t happen if I managed to pull off a really good seal and join the really cool kids and et myself a MacBook laptop – because that would really suck crabapples.

Don’t have a smartphone – you’re a chump is a post from: The Inquisitr