LONDON: Google is reportedly planning to expand its existing voice-recognition assistant for Android that will allow users to perform actions in their natural language similar to how Apple iPhone's Siri functions.
According to AndroidandMe.com, the company is planning to add a natural language processing feature to Google Voice Actions, already available on most Android phones.
Voice Actions allows users to give commands by saying keywords such as "send text to". But the updated software could allow it to respond to commands by using more natural verbiage, similar to Apple's Siri.

THE country’s leading telecom giants, Globe Telecom and Smart Communications, are in a tight battle again, this time over this year’s hottest gadget, the iPhone 4S.
Starting tomorrow, Friday, Globe and Smart subscribers can start availing themselves of the iPhone.
Globe was the exclusive dealer of iPhone for three years since 2008. Smart got the dealership license for the new model in October.
The war is expected in pricing. Neither Globe nor Smart wants to reveal its prices. Obviously, one is feeling its way on the other. One will try to outsmart or outsell the other by offering a lower price.

Taipei, Dec. 15 (CNA) Taiwan's major telecom giants and Apple Inc.'s participating stores will start selling iPhone">iPhone 4S, Apple's latest handset model, Friday at more than 1,000 venues nationwide.
It will mark the first time that Apple's premium outlets will synchronize sales with Taiwan's three largest telecom operators-- Chunghwa Telecom Co., Far EasTone Telecommunications Co. and Taiwan Mobile Co. iPhone">iPhone 4S will go on sale at more than 1,000 telecom outlets and at 16 Apple stores, according to market analysts and Foxlink Group, the parent company of Studio A Inc., a premium reseller of Apple products in Taiwan and Hong Kong. The mobile carriers will bundle handset sales with telecom services, while Apple stores will sell standalone handsets.

Sales for Apple’s new iPhone 4S smartphone will be launched in Russia at midnight, two months after its launch in the United States and at a higher price than the previous version.
The handset will sell for 35,000 to 46,000 rubles ($1,120-1,500), depending on memory size, retailer, and color.
The iPhone 4S will be priced higher than the iPhone 4 with the same memory size at the launch in Russia in the fall of 2010.

Twitter has done its year in review, Facebook revealed the top shared news stories of 2011, so it’s only natural that Google would follow suit with its very own annual recap.
The search giant has unveiled its UK Zeitgeist 2011 search list, and few will be surprised to learn that the Royal Wedding between Prince William & Catherine Middleton topped the list, in an event that saw hundreds of millions of people watch from around the world.

The dramatic saga (at least according to phone geeks) of the Verizon Galaxy Nexus ends today as the device appears in stores for $299.99 with a 2-year contract. There has been loads of hype surrounding the device, but before you get too swept up on the moment I wanted to offer up ten reasons that I am sticking with my Apple iPhone 4S on Verizon. As regular readers know I have now had my own HSPA+ Galaxy Nexus for two weeks and can speak from experience with both devices.

15 December 2011 - To celebrate the tenth anniversary of crime epic Grand Theft Auto 3, Rockstar Games has released a mobile version of the seminal PS2 classic on iPhone, iPad and Android.
The game lets you run loose in Liberty City -- a toothy satire of New York -- doing driving missions for mob bosses, shoot-out chores for corrupt cops or just causing chaos with reckless abandon.
GTA made popular the open world, something that's been influential in endless sandbox games that followed, and caused a stir in tabloid headlines for its senseless violence: something that's stuck with the franchise ever since.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia, Dec 15, 2011 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Today, Mobidia Technology, Inc., a leader and innovative provider of mobile data solutions, announced the launch of the iPhone version of their smartphone application, My Data Manager, a popular smartphone application that helps mobile subscribers understand and manage their data use on their phones with real time information. The new application is also available to mobile operators and handset and tablet OEM's as a component of a fully customizable and extendable carrier-grade data management and analytics solution. The Windows Phone and Blackberry versions will also be available in the very near future.

Gwyneth Paltrow is letting us in on her NYC recommendations in her goop City Guide iPhone app. Find out if it's worth downloading.
Gwyneth Paltrow releases iPhone app
Most days we wake up and wonder: "How does Gwyneth Paltrow spend her days in New York City?"
Our prayers have finally been answered: Paltrow's email newsletter, goop, now has its very own iPhone app.
"I have always dreamed of finding a city guide that would be just right for me, like a trusted friend whose opinion you knew you could count on," Paltrow wrote in this month's goop.

It is the fifth generation of the iPhone, a device that combines a widescreen iPod with a touchscreen, mobile phone, and Internet communicator.
Highlights include a voice recognising and talking assistant called Siri, personal computer independence, cloud-sourced data (iCloud) and an improved camera system. A selection of the device's functions can be controlled by voice.
The iPhone 4S comes in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB.
The recommended retail price starts at RM 2,190.

Panasonic has announced plans to re-launch its range of mobile phones in Europe, after an absence of almost six years.
The Japanese manufacturer said it would launch its first 'global' smartphone next year. The new handset will be released in Europe in March 2012 and later in the US, China and elsewhere in Asia.
Panasonic said the phone featured a 4.3-inch OLED screen and would be waterproof and dustproof. The company did not confirm any other specifications for the handset.

(Reuters) - Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd said on Sunday its annual mobile handset sales this year had exceeded 300 million units for the first time in the company's history.
The world's second largest handset maker by volume said in a statement it had broken its sales record by the end of last month.
Handset sales in 2010 were about 280 million.
"We look forward to extending this success going into 2012," JK Shin, President and Head of Samsung's Mobile Communications Business, was quoted as saying.

Microsoft on Monday released an iPad version of OneNote as well as versions of its Lync corporate communications program for iOS, Android and Symbian.
It’s part of the difficult balancing act facing Microsoft in mobile. While Redmond does its most extensive work for its own Windows Phone operating system (and did so for Windows Mobile before that), the company knows it can’t afford to ignore the more dominant operating systems.
Microsoft has a number of iOS apps, including PhotoSynth and Bing, among other titles. It recently added an Xbox Live app, though its features are considerably more narrow than the Xbox Live capabilities available on Windows Phone.

It was back in June 29, 2007, when Steve Jobs transformed the mobile phone market with the launch of the very first iPhone. Thus started the era of smartphones. Since then, hundreds of thousands of mobile phones got launched in their bid to play catch up with the flagship phone from Apple.
Whoever had imagined that Google would launch a whole new mobile OS, Android? Even the traditionally sloth Microsoft went back its drawing boards and came up with a very polished operating system, something very uncharacteristic of their corporate image. And then there was WebOS that was fancy, fresh and intuitive, and yet could make no mark in the market. Thanks to Android being open source, a lot of OEMs were born and reborn. Some of them are Samsung, HTC, Micromax and Lava. And there are much more trying to make a mark.

Is what you see in the image, the "Sony Ericsson Atrix Black Z Plus Prime," the name of a phone or an American Gladiator?
Sadly, this is a question I've asked myself before, as cell phone names have become a bit ridiculous these days. It appears that I'm not the only one who feels this way either because a company called YinzCam has come up with an entertaining way to poke fun at phone-naming schemes.

Sometimes, the simplest gadgets turn out to be the most useful, and such is the case with the Macro Cell Lens Band.
What you see here is pretty much what you get: a rubber band with an embedded macro lens that you can wrap around any smartphone to take close-up photos. When not in use, you can simply wear it on your wrist or store it in your wallet on a credit card.

KARACHI: A strong demand for cellular phones has led to their higher imports which increased by 60 per cent in the last four months.
Mobile phone imports in July-October 2011 swelled to $220 million from $137.3 million in the same period of last year while imports in July-June 2010-2011 went up by 66 per cent to $523 million from $315 million in July-June 2009-2010.
The cell phone market is now bustling with buyers because of a wide range of varieties.

By now, you have already heard about the claims made by 25-year-old Trevor Eckhart that the Carrier IQ software - designed by an eponymous Mountain View company - can be considered a rootkit that logs practically all actions made by the mobile phone users on which the software has been secretly installed.
You also might have heard about the company trying to make Eckhart retract his claim, threatening him with legal action and denying that its software does anything except collecting information needed by carriers to improve the quality of their services.