I’m not sure everyone’s waiting for a day when people will be able to use their mobile phones while flying, but I know some folks that do. And I’m not talking about the phone calls — I do agree that could be annoying — rather I’m referring to sending text messages and using some data services while in-the-air.

According to Freesky Research’s study “In Flight Text Messaging”, in flight messaging tools will soon be an essential component of serving business travelers. As a matter of fact, they are predicting that only two years from now, airline passengers will send over 60 million text messages!

The idea is simple. Big airline carriers are feeling competition from low-cost airlines, and they need to prove just why they’re charging the same flight much more. Hence, beside the so called in-flight entertainment, we’ll see them adding some in-flight productivity tools for the demanding customers in the near future. And then later at some point in the future — we hope so — accessing Internet will be standard on all flights, for all passengers… More information is available on Freesky Research’s website, from where you can also buy a report.

Now we really know mobile technology is entering every possible sphere of our lives. Apparently, a woman in Egypt is seeking clarification from a court on whether her husband’s declaration of divorce by text message is legally valid.

After missing a call from her husband on her mobile phone, Iqbal Abul Nasr received an SMS from him saying “I divorce you because you didn’t answer your husband.”

If an Egyptian court declares the couple divorced, it would be the first reported case of divorce by SMS in the country. And while we’re on the subject, divorce by SMS has been highly debated across the Muslim world and some Islamic countries like Malaysia have banned the practice…

Finally, even though we consider ourselves to be quite tech savvy, we are totally against this — some things should be reserved for face-to-face meetings.

[Via: textually.org]

Current image sensors on cameras work by capturing a single color per pixel and ignoring the rest. Kodak hopes to change this in 2008 with prototypes of their new panchromatic equipped image sensors that stray away from the typical red green and blue by adding an extra monochrome pixel into the mix. This technique negatively impacts color reproduction, but increases sensitivity to light, a trade off that might seem worthy to some.

Now I never heard of this until I checked it out on Phone Boy’s blog this morning, but a Google (NSDQ: GOOG) search yields that this announcement is half a year old. That being said, the first prototypes are expected to come out in early 2008 and with rumors that Motorola is working with Kodak on a 5 megapixel cameraphone this should be a very interesting Mobile World Congress (aka 3GSM).

Hit up DP Review for more image samples provided by Kodak.

Here she is, we brought you the specs yesterday, to summarize: 3.2 megapixel camera, GPS, WiFi, HSDPA, 120 grams, 57 x 112 x 10 mm, now here is the actual device:

[Via: Mobile Review]

Notice the absence of the Symbian key, similar to the E51 it is now a home key. The buttons look Treo like, due to their raised nature. Whoever took this picture has balls, that looks like the inside of a Nokia (NYSE: NOK) building. All this device needs to be perfect is a 3.5 mm headphone jack, just like RIM has on their BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) lineup, something tells me it isn’t going to happen, sigh.

Considering that a third of the world’s population lives in Asia I’m not surprised about the fact that 78.9% of text messages sent and received originated from the region. That is 1.5 trillion messages. Think about it.

[Via: Textually]

OpenMoko, the guys behind the 100% open source software and hardware Neo 1973, are going to introduce the Neo FreeRunner at CES. Two versions will be made, each has a 500 MHz processor, WiFi, accelerometers, 3D hardware acceleration, but one will be triband 850 MHz with the other being 900 MHz. The only Linux based mobile phone platform worth talking about is Android and I feel that people are not gong to give Sean Moss-Pultz the attention his work deserves.

The entire Linux smartphone arena baffles me. I ultimately want to understand it and group all of the players into one catagorey “Linux smartphones,” but that space is even more fragmented than Java.

[Via: Forbes]

The Mobiado Stealth is a Russian made, Nokia (NYSE: NOK) S40 running, mobile phone with a body composed of aircraft aluminum, stainless steel and has a sapphire crystal coating on the screen. There will only be 1200 of these made, price unknown, but expect it to be between 10-20x what you would regularly pay for a 2.0 megapixel camera, QVGA screen packing device.

One more thing, WCDMA only works on the 2100 MHz, sorry USA.

[Via: Mobile Burn and Engadget]

We don’t even know what operating system this little guy runs, but we can tell you that is does support North America’s 850 & 1900 MHz 3G frequencies. It has a 1.3 megapixel camera, WAP browser (make sure to download Opera Mini if you buy this device), Bluetooth 1.2, FM radio and isn’t that ugly. Looks like a cross between a Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E51, 6120 Classic and a Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE) W890.

[Via: JAMP]

The LG KF600 is a Chinese only mobile phone that has the lower portion of its screen touch enabled. Why would one not make the entire device touch based? Cost. This is a short term solution to an industry trend where the future is touch on all devices, both high and low end. Both screens show only 262k colors, the camera is an impressive 3 megapixels, but either than that … we’re not jealous that Europe and America don’t have this model. An all touch screen version of this device will undoubtedly be sold, it just takes time for the price of components to fall.

No one thinks about it now, but at some point in your lifetime kids will be able to get a $50 handset with GPS, WiFi, 3G (maybe even 4G) and a 5 megapixel camera. This KF600 is just a precursor to an all touch model for the mass market.

[Via: Mobile Phone Help Desk]

Not that we haven’t heard it’s coming, it’s just it was three months ago and we’ve almost lost almost all hopes Sling will actually release the BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) version of its client…

Following Symbian S60, Windows Mobile and Palm OS client, SlingMedia finally announced its application for RIM’s platform. Yap, the BlackBerry owners — especially ones owning the WiFi enabled device — will be able to seamlessly stream their TV back to their beloved device while additionally increasing their addiction along the way. Timing is still not exactly specified, but I’m sure “later this year” sounds more than enough for some people. The price will be just under 30 bucks, which is a mere bargain considering you’ll be able to entertain yourself while pretending to work.

I’ve almost forgot, if you happen to go at CES, make sure you visit Sling’s booth – they’ll be demoing the application on the Pearl 8120.

[Via: Engadget Mobile]