Hasta La Gadget!

SMS-based telemarketing is a serious problem in India — so serious, in fact, that the government has decided to crack down in a pretty severe way. As of this week, every Indian mobile user or company is allowed to send only 100 text messages per day, as part of a new anti-spam initiative from the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India. The move is just the latest in a series of campaigns to combat a boom in aggressive telemarketing that, according to some, borders on harassment. Authorities say spam phone calls have already declined significantly since 2007, when the government instituted a national “do not call” registry, yet the problem persists, with many users complaining of receiving commercial texts during the wee hours of the night. Regulators seem confident that these new rules will go a long way toward solving this riddle, though some have been left wondering why India’s millions of mobile subscribers should pay the price, rather than the spammers themselves. The Los Angeles Times, meanwhile, is reporting that subcontinental telemarketers have already begun circumventing the new regulations by re-focusing their efforts on junk mail, ad-based Twitter feeds and other ways to be just as annoying as they ever were.

[Image courtesy of Thomas Hawk]

India caps text messages to curb telemarketing, Desi teens plot mutiny originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 29 Sep 2011 18:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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This article was written on June 25, 2007 by CyberNet.

Despite the fact that the iPhone will be released in just a few short days, we still really haven’t heard much about the details of the phone in regards to settings, and even some of its features. A recent video floating around the web gives us a glimpse at some of the settings that you can expect, including a sample of a few ringtones.

There’s a whole list of new details here, I’ll just point out some of the ones that stood out for me. From the movie, we learn:

• Included with the iPhone is an in-line viewer for PDFs, Microsoft Word, and Microsoft Excel documents in email.
• Want to listen to a portion of a voicemail again? Rewind it like a sound file.
• iPhone headphones include volume and call control.
• Limited ringtone selection available in the start menu, and Gizmodo points out that it doesn’t look like songs can be used.
• Confirmed IMAP/POP support

Cost

Now, another thing we haven’t heard any official announcement on is the price of the service plan. While there is still no word yet, using the current prices that AT&T charges for their BlackBerry users, we can get an estimate of what you might expect.  Currently, BlackBerry users are charged between $34.99 and $79.99 per month for data, and between $49.99 to $99.99 for voice. Assuming that iPhone pricing will be similar, we can expect the range of prices to be between $84.98 and $179.98.

Remember, if you decide to purchase an iPhone, you will be required to sign a two year service contract.  Should you decide that you don’t want the phone/service anymore, you will incur a $175 cancellation fee.

iPhone Shortcomings?

Engadget is reporting that a “trusted source” of theirs has been fooling around with an iPhone, and not all of their reactions were positive.For example, they pointed out that the keyboard was “disappointing,” and often times registers multiple keys because of the two-fingered nature of the keyboard. If you plan on doing a lot of typing, it’s possible that you’re better off sticking with your BlackBerry. Another shortcoming mentioned was that the touchscreen took some rough-handling at times before it would register the input, which is certainly something that would take getting used to.

When you head into an Apple store or AT&T store on Friday, be sure you play around with the phone before you commit to buying it, and make sure that it’s something you’d want for two years.  I’d hate for anyone to have to shell out the $175 required in cancellation fees.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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This article was written on December 01, 2006 by CyberNet.

The news seems to be blanketed with coverage of AllofMP3.com over the past few weeks. All of the commotion and news can be setup in a nice repeating loop. I think this should cover everything in case you have missed something:

1. United States threatens Russia’s entrance into the World Trade Organization if they don’t shutdown allofmp3.com.
2. Russia agrees to shutdown allofmp3.com saying ”The United States and Russia agreed on the objective of shutting down websites that permit illegal distribution of music and other copyright works. The agreement names the Russia-based website allofmp3.com as an example of such a website.“
3. AllofMP3 sips their tea while they mock the United States for trying to shutdown their legal (in Russia that is) website.
4. Lather, rinse, and repeat (replacing the World Trade Organization with some other threat).

I think that sums things up pretty well, don’t you? From what I can see this whole thing is just going to be a constant battle between the two countries but nothing will ever come of it.

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

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Without a dedicated app, iPad users have had to use Facebook’s iPhone app on the iPad. Image: Facebook

We’ve been without an official iPad Facebook app for so long it has seemed as if it would never arrive. But rumor has it we won’t be waiting for it much longer.

There’s a chance Facebook’s iPad app and an HTML 5-based mobile platform (rumored to be codenamed “Project Spartan”) are ready to hit the prime time, according to multiple reports. Both could be introduced at Apple’s iPhone event this Tuesday.

We first got a sneak peak at what looked to be Facebook’s iPad app in July. It was tucked away inside Facebook’s iPhone app and could be accessed by tweaking a setting when running it on your iPad (until the hack was removed). News of the mysterious “Project Spartan” also showed up this summer. The project was rumored to “use Apple’s own devices against them to break the stranglehold they have on mobile app distribution,” according to technology blog TechCrunch, but it could instead be used to demonstrate iOS 5’s HTML 5 capabilities at Apple’s upcoming media event.

The news about “Project Spartan” was discovered on a Facebook mobile developer’s page that has since been taken down.

If Facebook’s iPad app and Project Spartan don’t end up taking the stage at 1 Infinite Loop on Tuesday, the two products may be unveiled at Facebook HQ on a later date.

via TechCrunch and Mashable

Australian carrier Telstra has revealed this 4.5-inch colossus from HTC, and the above picture from CNET shows it’s likely to arrive under its Holiday moniker. This is the first LTE smartphone announced for Australia, while something similarly tall, dark and Android recently arrived in Korea as the HTC Raider 4G. CNET reports specs that tally with that other model: the big screen is qHD and the power comes from a dual-core 1.5GHz CPU coupled with 1GB of RAM. Like the Raider, the Holiday appears to be running Sense 3.0, not the refreshed 3.5 iteration that debuted on the Rhyme, and it looks primed to be one of the first handsets to launch on AT&T’s brand new 4G network. So, expect to hear more from Ma Bell on this “titanic” rival soon.

HTC Holiday spotted sunning itself on Australian shores originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 29 Sep 2011 16:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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