Hasta La Gadget!

Skype announced Friday that its Tuesday press conference at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona will now be held jointly with Verizon Wireless.

John Stratton, executive vice president and chief marketing officer for Verizon Wireless, will join Josh Silverman, chief executive officer at Skype at 5:15pm local time.

No other information was revealed, but mobile analyst Sascha Segan will be on hand to bring you all the details. He speculated earlier this week that Skype’s press conference might involve its planned VoIP client for the iPhone that works over AT&T’s 3G data network, but now that Verizon is involved, it’s anyone’s guess.

Stay tuned.

AT&T and Sling Media have reached an agreement under which AT&T’s 3G network will support the SlingPlayer mobile app.

Sling released its iPhone app in January 2009. In May, AT&T blocked it from its 3G network, citing bandwidth constraints, but allowed it on its Wi-Fi network. The two sides have now come to an agreement on the 3G front.

“Just as we’ve worked with Sling Media in this instance, we look forward to collaborating with other developers so that mobile customers can access a wider, more bandwidth-sensitive, and powerful range of applications in the future,” Ralph de la Vega, president and CEO of AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets, said in a statement. “Collaboration with developers like Sling Media ensures that all apps are optimized for our 3G network to conserve wireless spectrum and reduce the risk that an app will cause such extreme levels of congestion that they disrupt the experience of other wireless customers.”

AT&T said it had been testing Sling’s 3G app since mid-December and recently notified Sling and Apple that its optimized app can run on the 3G network.

It turns out the cell phone market may be finally recovering: ABI Research reports that handset sales hit 336.5 million globally in the fourth quarter of 2009, which is up 15.1 percent compared to the same period one year ago.

Nokia has been a minor player here in the U.S., but the Finland-based manufacturer led global handset sales once again with 37.7 percent market share. Samsung grabbed the number two spot with 20.5 percent share, a huge increase over its 15.2-percent position one year ago. LG nabbed third place with 10.1 percent market share.

Sony Ericsson and Motorola both slid to 4.3 percent and 3.6 percent, respectively. HTC nudged upwards to 1.0 percent thanks to a late boost in both high-end and consumer devices.

Insurance industry researchers say they’re not sure that the use of cell phones leads to more car accidents. While conventional wisdom has been that holding a cellphone and talking while driving is hazardous, crash data doesn’t  clearly show it.  What’s more amazing, the conclusion comes from the Highway Loss Data Institute, an arm of the insurance industry that generally finds most every aspect of driving to be dangerous to motorists and by coincidence to insurance industry loss reserves.