In a business setting, Blackberry phones are usually the preferred smartphones mainly because of the great integration of push email services on to the device, not to mention Blackberry Messenger, which makes messaging effortless. But what do you do if the very reasons you have a Blackberry fail you?

This is what happened to millions of Blackberry users when the Blackberry network suffered a massive outage that lasted for three days. The bad experience was strong enough for some Blackberry users to actually consider transferring to other brands.

Based on a survey conducted by Kelkoo, a price comparison site based in Europe, about 19 percent of one thousand respondents said they will move to another smartphone manufacturer. More →

Microsoft is hedging its bets on the new Windows Phone mobile operating system as the one that will give Apple’s iOS a run for its money. Microsoft seems to have taken some inspiration from Apple’s very popular operating system and made its own innovations to make it more competitive and separate itself from the giant it wants to do battle with. People who have been able to play with the 7.5 Mango update have reported positively about it.  If you’re still unfamiliar about what Windows Phone 7.5 can offer you read on.

Probably one of the tent pole features of Windows Phone 7.5 that Microsoft thinks will attract consumers is its social media integration. Facebook integration was already featured in an earlier iteration of Windows Phone but with version 7.5 Twitter and LinkedIn have been added as well. The integration of these social networks is not just superficial it is integrated into the system. For example, photo sharing is a seamless affair. Sharing photos to Twitter and Facebook will only take a few clicks. More →

Cameras have become the de rigeur feature for practically every portable electronic device out in the market today. You can find it in tablets, music players, and probably 99 percent of every phone that is being manufactured today. But such a benign tech feature is being used for more creepy purposes, if we’re to base it on a new survey released by Harris Interactive.

The survey, which was conducted with more than 2,300 people in the United States, revealed that half of American adults would have no qualms filming secret videos of other people without their knowledge. The surveyed people didn’t necessarily get into a situation or an opportunity to film or spy on others, but they did mention several scenarios that will compel them to bring out their smart phones and film other people. More →

Here’s news that won’t really surprise you. A study conducted by comScore, majority of the non-computer traffic in the United States has increased by almost seven percent over the month of August this year. The increase in traffic has been largely attributes the use of smartphones, tablets and other portable devices. Smartphone usage has been identified as making up 64 percent of the non-computer traffic in the US, tablets occupy 28 percent.

In another predictable finding of the report, Apple’s various iOS devices dominated the smartphone and tablet categories. In terms of the tablet segment, the iPad made up 97 percent, while iOS smartphones (the various generations of the iPhone) owned 58.5 percent of the smartphone traffic. More →

The mad scramble for 4G dominance continues as Sprint announced plans to release LTE to 120 markets all over the United States by next year.

This is a logical step for Sprint as the carrier has finally snagged Apple iPhone 4S, which is a big win for the carrier. Sprint announced its network plans with the initial 120 market implementation of the LTE services. This will then be further expanded to a total of 260 markets by the end of 2013. Sprint also announced that it will be releasing its first LTE device in 2012. More →

For businesses that maintain twitter presence, there is an unspoken list of etiquettes that one must adhere to. These etiquettes arise out of a need to acknowledge your target audience and give respect to all those who interact with you using the medium of twitter. Some of these etiquettes are pretty simple and do not consume much time. Let us discuss these over the following points:

1. Acknowledge those followers who send a message to you. While there may be automated bots that could have been used to follow your account, there is a chance that many genuine followers will use a manual effort to follow your tweets. And these visitors and followers need to be acknowledged to offer them the respect they deserve.

2. If you run a business, then your twitter language must adhere to professional levels of excellence. You must try to avoid language that is mostly abbreviated.  The language being used must be clear, concise and crisp.  More →

Sony managed to gain entrance into the burgeoning mobile phone market industry at the beginning of the new century by performing an otherwise deft business maneuver – partnering with Ericsson, a popular mobile phone brand at the time. The new Sony-Ericsson partnership was successful in developing a lot of new mobile phones that captured the attention of fickle mobile phone user crowd. Some of these models are even considered classics now.

But the benefits of that partnership has dwindled significantly as other manufacturers tightened their hold on the market or increased their market share. Sony Ericsson’s market share, on the other hand, has declined. At one point, it held a nine percent market share but right now, it is said to be just holding a three percent share of the mobile phone market. More →

Students are always looking for tools that will save them time and help them boost their productivity. While there is a huge variety of tools available on the Web, most of them are either too expensive, too complicated or just not what is needed. Plus, with so many to choose from, it can be hard to choose the right one. No one really wants to test out 10-20 different tools just to find out which one is right for them. So, here are 7 Web tools for students that are sure to be all that you need and more.

Evernote

Evernote is the only notebook you’ll ever need as a student. It’s the ultimate note-taking tool that lets you save text, audio, images, and screenshots in an organizable online notebook. Once you sync your notes, they can be accessed from the Web, computer desktop and most mobile devices. What makes Evernote most useful its super fast search engine that lets you search through all of your notes, even text within images, in a matter of seconds. With the ability to add tags and create numerous notebooks, it’s very easy to stay organized with Evernote. More →

Samsung’s design aesthetics when it comes to its phone can be a hit or miss affair but although the company may have released some duds in terms of phone functionality or design, it has also released a lot of winners. Samsung has a lot of sought-after phones and I’ve got a very strong feeling that the Samsung Galaxy Skin is going to be one of them.

The Samsung Galaxy Skin was originally presented to the public as a design concept. And the reason was obvious – the Galaxy Skin uses a component that hasn’t been seen on a phone ever before – a flexible AMOLED display. Using this material makes the display totally bendable. It’s a crazy concept that is initially thought to be just that – a concept. More →

Samsung has been trying its best to weather the barrage of lawsuits Apple has been showering it in practically all continents. Apple means business in its claims that Samsung is infringing on the patents the guys at Cupertino hold. But now, it’s Samsung’s turn to use legal action against Apple as it tries to prevent the sale of the newly announced iPhone 4S. More →