CellPhoneBurn

The T-Mobile G1 captured all the headlines by being the world’s first Android-powered mobile phone, but the plan was always to have Android be a completely open source operating system, available for use in, well, any mobile phones that people felt like sticking it in. And so, a freelance company has done just that, and made the world’s second Android phone, according to Engadget Mobile.

Hailing from Australia, it’s the Kogan Agora. And if that’s not an incitement to go, “Eh? Who?” I don’t know what is…

Following on from the news that the Sonim XP3 is all set to pick up where the JCB Tough Phone left off, another announcement’s popped up today, stating that Sonim are going to pair up with something else that’s got four wheels and a massive engine. According to Engadget Mobile, next year we’re going to see mobile phones from the motoring marque associated with mud, off-roading, and driving up inaccessible mountains.

Yep, 2009 will see the first ever Land Rover-branded, Sonim-made mobile phones. Has there ever been a more perfect match-up than that..?

It’s been a while since we had any properly mental concepts on this blog, and no, the 01Phone doesn’t count, because it’s just a mobile phone, albeit a hyper-advanced concept. I mean the proper, hardcore sci-fi stuff like harnesses to control your phone with your mind, or a mobile phone that fits in a contact lens, or a whole bendy nanotech mobile phone.

Ok, this next story may have well have got drowned out in all the shouting about the Nokia N97 (yes, that included me going, “Want one, want one, want one!“), but the release of the smartphone powerhouse wasn’t the only news Nokia had to tell us yesterday.

According to the Boy Genius Report, Nokia also confirmed that their full acquisition of Symbian has now gone through. So, no more wrangling, no more negotiations, Nokia’s now in charge of the Symbian universe.

Which means what, exactly?

Well, it turns out the people who were secretly wishing for a new phone from this morning’s announcement were right after all. Headlining the Nokia World conference is a brand new mobile phone from the Finnish manufacturer. And anyone who guessed ‘touchscreen Nseries’ was right…

It’s the next evolution of Nseries mobile phones: the frankly mind-blowing Nokia N97. And it’s just biblical in its awesomeness.

Ages and ages ago, I did a post on the top ultra-super-mega-dirt cheap mobile phones on the planet. You remember, the one where the old Sony Ericsson J110 won. Well, that list was of the absolute low-end budget mobile phones, the phones for people who want ‘em simple, cheap and really nice to use. That’s why I only picked phones without a long list of features (or, with most of them on that list, without a feature).

But what about people who want their mobile phone to be cheap, but powerful? What if you want a mobile phone that does have features, but still has a low price?

News has come through from PC World that confirms how big music mobile phones are nowadays. Basically, recent figures released by the Entertainment Retailers Association have shown that over the last two years, 44 million mobile phones that’ve got mp3 players built in (which, let’s face it, is most of ‘em nowadays) have been sold, compared to just 8 million CD players.

Very intriguing news today, as it seems Nokia have something big in the works for their Nokia World conference, starting tomorrow. As yet, no-one knows precisely what they have in store, whether it’s new mobile phones or new services, or whatever, but it’s reasonably certain they wouldn’t put a big countdown online (that big one just up there), unless it was a big announcement.

The question is, what do Nokia have in store?

Since it’s a Friday afternoon, I thought we’d have a little bit of fun, with a blog post that has no merit whatsoever, but which should give you a laugh at our expense. So, for your reading pleasure, I present the results of our not-in-any-way-useful survey: who in Mobileshop has the worst ringtone on their mobile phone? Who has the ringtone that most makes their co-workers want to smash their head in with a brick?

However, this test needed to be about more than me slagging off people’s ringtones based on my personal opinions. It needed to be scientific, taking in variables such as what mobile phones people are using, the cadence of the song, the hidden meanings…

Being a man, I naturally like to see two enemies squaring up to have a massive fight. It’s especially funny when it’s two big names from the world of mobile phones. We’ve seen it before with Modu having a pop at Nokia, Microsoft having a pop at Google Android, and Apple yelling that they could ‘ave everyone with one hand tied behind their back, rah, rah, bring it on, etc…

Round here, mobile phones are known, day to day, as useful tools of communication, and essential devices for the modern human. Over in the Vatican, though, a different view of mobile phones prevails, according to the Telegraph.

According to Father Federico Lombardi, mobile phones are causing ongoing and irreparable damage to people’s souls.

Way back when (well, in February), we ran a story on Modu, a company aiming to bring modular mobile phones to the market. They had potential, they had a fighting spirit, and they had a unique offering for people who wanted something a bit different from their mobile phones. Put simply, they made a tiny little mobile phone module, that you could slot into other ‘jackets’, like a USB Modem sleeve, or a top-end camera phone sleeve, or whatever, the idea being that the jackets gave you your extra features like camera, or media player, and so on.

I haven’t done any ’silly concept’ posts for a while, but we have an entire section on this blog dedicated to silly concept mobile phones. Basically, I pick a famous brand name, and vamp about what their concept mobile phone might be like. However, I have to admit defeat and say that I probably can’t come up with a sillier concept than this, fresh from the pages of Engadget Mobile (who, it would seem, have written their entire post with tongue welded into cheek). It’s a set of thumb protectors, that you wear when texting, or using your Blackberry.

And its name? Awethumb.

Oh. Dear. Lord.

Ok, I am going to say straight off the bat that I’m going to be a good boy when writing this blog post, as the content of it, although it would normally make me snigger at someone else’s expense, is actually quite serious, and a deeply unpleasant situation for the two people involved.

Roughly about a year ago, you may well remember that a mobile phone was released that shocked me. It shocked me because it was quite simply the toughest, hardest, most stupidly rock solid mobile phone in the history of, like, everything.

It was, of course, the JCB Tough Phone, it struck a chord with you guys, judging by the number of comments on the original post. As many of you are aware, the JCB Tough Phone was actually a re-badged Sonim XP1. Well, now, they’ve brought out a new mobile phone, and it’s got one aim.