Verizon’s BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) Storm has enjoyed a beefy update as of Sunday evening, if you haven’t picked it up already from the leaks. The BlackBerry 9630 has had performance issues from the get-go, and OS 4.7.0.148 promises to fix many of them, a full list of which can be found over here. A full QWERTY keyboard in portrait mode and a speedier camera seem to be the biggest improvements, but feel free to leave a comment with what you’re noticing most. The last big update didn’t seem to nail everything down, here’s hoping this one will. To pick up yours, go to blackberry.com/upgrade through Internet Explorer, or better still, go to Options, Advanced Options, Wireless Update, to download the new firmware over the air.

Okay, okay, roll in those tongues ladies, this is about Rogers (NYSE: RCI)’ first Android-toting smartphones, the HTC Magic and Dream, not your beloved Joshua Jackson of Dawson’s Creek fame, however dreamy and/or magical he may be. As mentioned, Rogers has announced the first Android devices in Canada for $149.99 on three-year contract, and are offering a promotional $30 6 GB monthly data plan. You can pick ‘em up in stores now.

One of the biggest questions that lingered after their launch event in Toronto was “why did it take so long for Android to get to Canada?” I’d like to think that Rogers was taking the high road and waiting until Exchange support was available, but it seems more likely that they didn’t hop on board last fall like T-Mobile (NYSE: DT) US did because the iPhone 3G was still fresh out of the gate and they didn’t want to cannibalize any sales; even now, based on some of the ads they showed us, it’s clear Rogers is pushing the slider Dream more than the newer, more impressive, full-touchscreen Magic.

Hit the jump for some first impressions of the HTC Magic and HTC Dream from Rogers, and a bunch of pictures both of the handsets and Joshua Jackson, if you’re into that kind of thing.

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As I promised, during the next few days I’ll post a short article about the conferences I plan to attend in Barcelona within two weeks. The first on my list is GSMA Mobile Innovation which is organized as part of the HiT Barcelona World Innovation Summit.

I’ve first heard for HiT conference back when I was at the Mobile World Congress. Immediately I found a reason to visit Barcelona once again. If you haven’t seen Barcelona, make sure to schedule the trip as soon as you can. The city is beautiful!

Anyway, the conference has two parts: Innovation Plenary Congress which takes place on June 17th and Innovation Marketplaces which focus on three industries: TeleCom, CleanTech and HealthCare. As you can guess, I’m most interested in the TeleCom part which is organized in co-operation with GSM Association and is called GSMA Mobile Innovation Marketplace.

The sub-event will attract more than 400 senior executives, leaders, and speakers from all across the industry, including mobile operators, venture capital, innovators, mobile industry suppliers, and major brands. Over two days the focus will be on “Ideas to Power Mobile Business” through a number of initiatives…

And that’s about it for this introductory post. You can get more information from the event’s official website.

When was the last time you walked into a Sprint (NYSE: S) retailer and walked out of the store without wasting half a day waiting for an agent to activate your new handset? Activating a mobile phone generally takes a good long while, regardless of how experienced a sales rep might be – and that applies to pretty much all wireless carriers. One of the biggest problems during the headlining launch of the iPhone 3G were the long lines and delays caused by having to register each handset with AT&T (NYSE: T) before leaving an Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) store. That same problem could have potentially mucked up Sprint’s Palm (NSDQ: PALM) Pre launch, had there been sufficient launch-day stock.

Limited Palm Pre stock might have prevented massive lines as Pre-hopefuls wait for their Palm Pre’s to be activated in the store.

InsideSprintNow has shed some light on the Palm Pre activation procedure, and Sprint’s Palm Pre activation procedures seem to be fairly similar to Apple and AT&T’s iPhone 3G activation process. The Palm Pre will be activated in Sprint’s system by Sprint agents, allowing the customer to finalize the activation by turning the Palm Pre’s “Hands-free Activation” feature. The silver lining, it seems, in the Palm Pre’s limited launch supplies is that we won’t be seeing droves of eager Pre fans waiting to have their Palm Pre registered on Sprint’s network.

The new activation information confirms that Sprint reps will Pre-activate (see what we just did there?) the Palm Pre on Sprint’s internal network. While the customer activation process is dead simple, Sprint customers will still have to enter all relevant information into Sprint’s system before allowing the Palm Pre to be activated. Here’s to hoping that long-delays in waiting for Palm Pre activations don’t hamper Sprint’s Pre launch.

Early June is really shaping up to be an exciting week in the mobile world. Just a couple days before the Palm (NSDQ: PALM) Pre is scheduled to go live across the US, Sony Ericsson (NYSE: SNE) will be announcing their latest “eco” phones. Come June 4th, our favorite Japanese-Swedish phone maker will unveil the latest set of mobile phones to benefit from the “green” technology debuted in Sony Ericsson’s GreenHeart eco-phone concept.

Sony Ericsson’s GreenHeart Concept phone was announced last year to show off the phone maker’s commitment to environmentally-friendly technologies. The GreenHeart features bio-plastic housings, recycled plastic keypads, a zero charger with 3.5mW standby power, digital manuals (instead of paper ones), and environmentally friendly packaging. We’re expecting to see the digital manuals and smaller, recycled post-consumer packaging materials used in Sony Ericsson’s upcoming “green” lineup.

Does microSD count as a green technology? Because that’s really what we’d like to see in future SE handsets.

[SonyEricsson via CellPassion]

Palm has announced that it will be unveiling a new Palm (NSDQ: PALM) Pre video advertisement during a Palm Pre launch party in Hollywood on June 3. For those lucky few that will get to drink and eat on Palm’s dime will apparently be treated to comedy performances from the world’s best comedians. Palm will also unveil the ad simultaneously online through a live webcast.

The new Palm Pre ad will have something like 1,000 Kung Fu ninjas (or whatever it is you call a Kung Fu-er) doing their thing in choreographed unison. These Shaolin Tagou students were directed by the same people that choreographed the Beijing Olympics’ Opening Ceremonies, so you know this Palm Pre ad is going to be hot!

Hop on over to Palm’s Facebook page for a sneak-peak of the upcoming Palm Pre commercial.

Palm Pre commercial preview.

By now it’s clear that Sprint (NYSE: S) and Palm (NSDQ: PALM) will have limited supplies of the Palm Pre on hand for the June 6th launch of the WebOS-powered smartphone. Most Palm Pre hopefuls will probably get to the front of the line on launch day to find that the Palm Pre has sold out. But, that doesn’t necessarily mean Pre-hopefuls will have to wait too long to get their hands on a Palm Pre. A pair of new rumors has Sprint stores re-upping their Palm Pre inventory on a daily basis and allowing eager Pre fans to get on a waiting list for the Palm Pre.

PreCentral reports that Sprint will be receiving daily Palm Pre shipments after its initial launch on June 6th. The shipments are aimed at restocking already limited Palm Pre inventories to help meet demand. Compared to Verizon (NYSE: VZ)’s launch of the BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) Storm, which immediately sold out and wasn’t re-stocked for days on end, Sprint is taking a more pro-active approach.

And, should you miss out on one of the few Palm Pre’s stocked by your local Sprint store, you can rest easy knowing that Sprint will be taking down names for a Palm Pre waiting list. One of our reliable tipsters has informed us that Sprint stores will open up a Palm Pre waiting list once a particular store sells its last Pre. We presume customers will still have to be at the store in person to get on the wait list. We wouldn’t recommend you start camping out now, but it sure couldn’t hurt!

Just a few more days until June 6th!

Let’s start things off by making it clear that this latest leak may be nothing more than a hoax. But, if true, it looks like a launch-day trip to Best Buy in search of a Palm (NSDQ: PALM) Pre is likely to end in tears of frustration for most Pre-hopefuls. A forum user over at EverythingPre has posted a set of alleged Best Buy inventory screenshots that show some seriously dismal Palm Pre inventory numbers for most Best Buy locations in the US.

Given that Sprint (NYSE: S) has declared Palm Pre shipments will be limited on launch, it’s not all that surprising to see Best Buy getting the short end of the stick. In fact, most Best Buy locations will be getting no more Palm Pre units than can be counted on a single hand. The lucky stores will see a couple dozen Palm Pre units, at most.

Palm Pre fans in California will apparently find just 16 Palm Pre units available for sale in the Burbank and Glendale stores. The rest of California’s Best Buys will have no more than a handful (a single handful, at that) of Palm Pre’s on launch day. With Pre-launch day looming just over the horizon, Best Buy had better get cracking on stocking up Pre inventories.

[Via: EverythingPre]

Android smartphones are great in their own right. The capacitance-based touchscreens used in Android devices make for some down-right enjoyable finger-flicks. The speedy Android OS is fairly intuitive (not as intuitive as a certain fruit company’s wares, but still well intuitive) and packs a decent set of features. Unfortunately, the iPhone has taken hold of the burgeoning smartphone market in a way that up-and-coming smartphone platforms may have trouble repeating.

A new “Market Share” report from Net Applications points to the Android platforms flagging market share numbers following the platform’s launch late last year. The Android platform saw its market share growing at the same rate as the iPhone in its post-launch months. The first five months of sales of the Android-powered G1 spurred market share growth on par with the iPhone, but data for the sixth month shows a slowdown in marketshare growth. It’s still to early to make heads or tails of the data in a long-term perspective, but it sure does look like Android is falling behind the iPhone’s post-launch growth numbers.

Month 6 is a bit worrying for the Android platform

The likes of Palm (NSDQ: PALM) should be worried. Net Applications’ numbers suggest that new smartphone platforms may have trouble reaching past the early adopter market and breaking into the more lucrative mass-market. The Android OS’s early, post-launch growth may have been fueled by early adopters scrambling to play with the new smartphone platform. But, once the early adopters had their toys, the Android platform’s penetration into the consumer market seems to have waned.

On the other hand, Android may be doing just fine. Net Applications polls member websites to gather market data, which may not accurately reflect true market performance. With T-Mobile (NYSE: DT) getting ready to presumably launch the HTC Magic as the T-Mobile myTouch3G, we’re sure Magenta’s higher-ups are hoping that Android growth stays on par with the iPhone’s intial growth-pace.

[Via: MarketShare]

Now that a fair number of Android-powered HTC Magic handsets are roaming the wild, courtesy of Google (NSDQ: GOOG)’s handset giveaway, it would make sense that Google’s Android-partner in the US is getting ready to launch their second Android phone. T-Mobile (NYSE: DT) USA will be following up their T-Mobile G1 with the launch of a new Android smartphone this Summer. It’s not clear when in the next few months T-Mobile will be unveiling their new Android handset, nor are we told which Android phone will be coming to T-Mobile.

According to the No. 4 US wireless carrier, “T-Mobile is planning to offer the follow-on device to the T-Mobile G1 early this summer.” That would put the launch of the new Android phone sometime in the next two months.

It stands to reason that T-Mobile is looking to launch their own-branded variant of the HTC Magic. The Magic has been on our radar for quite some time, and had once been speculated to hit T-Mobile as the T-Mobile G2. As far as we know, the “G2″ moniker is dead. We may see the HTC Magic hitting the US as the T-Mobile myTouch3G.

Stay tuned. This Summer should be vewy vewy interesting!