Rev up your iTunes and plug in your iPhone, OS 3.0 is ready to rock. What do you have to gain from the update? Well, let’s take a looksee…

• Copy and paste! Holy crap!
• Landscape keyboard
• MMS
• Spotlight search
• Voice memos
• Stereo Bluetooth
• TV Shows, movies and audiobooks through iTunes

Smaller things like background internet radio are also there, but really, why all the talk? Git goin’ and check out iPhone OS 3.0 for yourself!

It looks like that little wireless venture between Earthlink and SK Telecom (NYSE: SKM) has finally hit a crossroads. Helio has been thus far managed on two fronts - with investors Earthlink and SK Telecom getting equal say in Helio’s future. Well, it seems that Dusan’s mention of Earthlink taking a lesser role in Helio was pretty much on point. SK Telecom was set to pump more (much needed) cash into the hemorrhaging carrier, and today it was announced that SK Telecom will be investing another $70 million into Helio - effectively giving them a controlling stake in the company and the right to direct the company’s development.

We’ll have to wait and see how Helio fares in the long run. With SK Telecom at the helm, we’re hoping to see some of those uber-cool Korean handset start to hit US shores.

[Via: Reuters]

In a rather groundbreaking move, Nokia (NYSE: NOK) has announced that they will give the N95 to Cingular with a 1900 Mhz radio. This will allow those residing stateside to actually use the high-speed HSDPA connection, which Cingular pushes over the 1900 Mhz spectrum. And Cingular does seem to be the logical choice for the N95, as it is the only US GSM operator with a 3G network up and running (even if it is highly unreliable and barely usable). But more interesting is Nokia’s decision to actually release this mega-smartphone in the US. Nokia may be aiming to pre-empt Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and its iPhone and, at the same time, trying to garner more market share in the US. However, the two devices are radically different in terms of their form factors. So we’ll just have to wait and see how this new offering will fare here in the States.

The Symbian Smartphone Show is officially over for this year. The most notable news, as far as I see, is the launch of two new Symbian OS powered handsets by Samsung and LG Electronics. Hope their products will sell well, as it would be nice to see more smartphones coming from the two companies.

If you take a look at the present Symbian OS handset market, two companies are dominating the industry - Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE). Japanese NTT DoCoMo (NYSE: DCM) orders phones from other manufacturers for their own subscribers, and those phones are rarely (if at all) available outside Japan. Addition of Samsung’s and LGE’s phones to the Symbian ecosystem could further strengthen the position of Symbian OS in the mobile OS market. And could also provide benefits to the users of the two companies’ smartphones.

In addition to the new phones, many interesting applications and services were presented. Full retrospective is available from these two links: day 1 and day 2. Also, if you still haven’t - read the keynote from the Symbian’s CEO Nigel Clifford.

Again, unfortunately I wasn’t in London during the Smartphone Show. However, I think I gave my best to present you the full picture. For that matter, I’ve used photos from other sites including: AllAboutSymbian, SymbianOne and the official Smartphone Show blog. Enjoy!
UPDATE: Also, see the David Wood’s favourites from the Smartphone Show.

Just like the first, the second day of the Symbian Smartphone Show also brought many news. Among the top news is the release of the new book from Symbian Press that will help developers prepare for the ASD exam. In the other news:

• Applications:
  • Quickoffice 4.0 demonstrated
  • DreamConnect 3 - relationship manager for UIQ 3 devices
  • Mobile Systems’ Diets S60
• Services:
  • FreeBe TV - now available on your desktop
  • ThinPrint - affordable realtime email
  • emoze - free push/pull service (includes email, calendar, tasks, etc).
  • Discretix and Symbian: Secure DRM implementation
  • Synchronica’s Mobile Manager now supports Symbian smartphones
• Misc:
  • msystems’ mDOC H3 embedded flash drive is Symbian Approved
  • QSurround Mobile Technology

Discretix, the leading provider of embedded security and Digital Rights Management (DRM) solutions for mobile devices and flash memory, today announced availability of a white paper addressing the challenges of a secure DRM implementation on Symbian OS. The white paper will be available for download on the Symbian Developer Network website, partner extranet as well as the Discretix website.

Read the full article »

QSound Labs, Inc., a leading developer of audio and voice software solutions, is presenting its QSurround Mobile Technology in both ARM’s exhibition stand #79 and Texas Instruments (NYSE: TXN)’ (TI) exhibition stand #40 at the Symbian Smartphone Show.

QSurround Mobile offers an enriched audio experience providing virtualized surround sound for close proximity speakers and stereo headsets for mobile phones. This enables users to experience superior audio with multi-channel or stereo surround through a more immersive sound field as though they are surrounded by numerous speakers. The QSurround Mobile technology is targeted for the emerging mobile digital TV market which is expected to be one of the key drivers for the rollout of mobile services on the 3G networks (third generation networks).

The first day of the Symbian Smartphone Show has ended. And what a day it was. Two new phones from Samsung and LG Electronics and bunch of product and service announcements. But, let’s start with the Nigel Clifford’s keynote, where he argues that the new kind of lifestyle emerges - smartphone lifestyle. And the rest:

• Phones:
  • LG JoY
  • Samsung SGH-i520
  • Sony Ericsson P990 goes LocationFree
• Applications:
  • CoPilot Live navigation for UIQ 3 smartphones announced
  • PeerBox Mobile: Access open P2P networks
  • UIQ 3 applications development market
• Services:
  • Truphone - free or cheap phone calls
  • Scalado to provide mobile imaging software solution for Symbian OS
  • Visto’s push email solution receives Symbian Approved mark
  • SlingPlayer for Symbian announced
  • MobiComp enables RemoteXT to safeguard smartphones
• Developer:
  • S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1 launched
  • Symbian Signing gets better
  • Sony Ericsson announces its complete offering for OpenGL ES
  • Carbide.ui Theme Edition announced
  • New Symbian Platinum Program members: CMWare, CoWare, Navicore

At the Symbian Smartphone Show, Symbian’s CEO Nigel Clifford today announced that the smartphone is poised to change the way people live in ways as profound as those triggered by the Internet and PC in the 1990s.

During his keynote at The Symbian Smartphone Show at ExCel in London, Clifford stated that a smartphone revolution is well underway and among his forecasts were that:

• the developing world will account for 50% of smartphone sales within five years
• a “smartphone generation” is occurring and the demands of the youth market will drive innovation and smartphone use
• mobile phone access will be the next significant Internet phenomenon

Read the full article »

One of the interesting companies which presents its offer at the Symbian Smartphone Show was definitely Truphone. They provide a service that routes your mobile calls via the Internet, giving you free mobile calls to other Truphone users and very cheap calls to anyone else.

Their service is especially interesting when used in roaming, where Truphone allows you to save big. Speaking of savings, until Dec 31st 2006, US users can call across the US & Canada for free, whereas UK users can call free to landlines in 40 countries worldwide.