PAY DOUBLE? WTF?

Now, you can sign a new contract with Verizon, pick any phone and then ditch the service for $175. But according to a leaked doc, those days are numbered.

Beginning 11/15, early terminations on contracts with unspecified “advanced device”(s) will be subject to a fee of $350. And while that policy might slow ebay entrepreneurs just looking to make a few easy bucks on a resold Blackberry, it’s devastating to the average guy who just wants to ditch his contract early.

The good news, however, is that fee will drop by $10 every month. But still, that’s a $110 termination fee in month 23 of a 2-year contract…which is clearly absurd. [BGR]

via Gizmodo

Best Cell Phone Deal on the Planet?

Walmart has been beta testing their exclusive Straight Talk no-contract wireless service for months, but now the retailer will offer two low-cost wireless plans nationwide starting October 18th, including an unlimited plan for just $45.

The first offers 1,000 minutes, 1,000 texts and 30MB of data for $30. That seems alright, but for $45, you get unlimited anytime minutes, unlimited texts and unlimited data.

The catch? You probably won’t be using much data on their disappointing line of phones that all sell for $100 without a contract—though a “Samsung 451″ (a model number that brings up a Samsung set top box) promises full QWERTY and certainly implies a bit more functionality. The LG Slider 290, which doesn’t handle much beyond email, is your other higherish-end option. (continue reading…)

AT&T Microcell

Zacks Investment Research is reporting in a matter-of-fact tone that AT&T’s long-rumored, long-desired 3G Microcell femtocell will be hitting some markets “in the next week.” The full list of initial launch areas hasn’t been disclosed, but Atlanta, San Antonio, Seattle and North Carolina are all specifically mentioned; as you might recall, Sprint restricted the launch of its Airave for some time, too, so limited availability out of the gate wouldn’t really come as a surprise. AT&T had no comment when asked about the report, so it’s a wait-and-see game — but if you’re clinging to one bar of service, have hope that help is on the way.

via Engadget

Deutsche Telekom, the owners of T-Mobile in the U.S., are reportedly looking into acquiring competitor Sprint. Together, the two companies would have a customer base that rivals AT&T.

According to The Daily Telegraph, Detsche Telekom is prepping a multi-billion dollar offer for Sprint Nextel, which is the third-largest wireless carrier in America. Together, the two companies would have a combined customer base near AT&T’s nearly 80 million subscribers. (continue reading…)

HTC Touch HD

Fanboys the world over swooned over the HTC Touch HD when it launched last year, but word is that HTC’s planning on making a major change to its high-res handset for the sequel: it’s switching to Android. That’s at least the hot whisper ’round the tubes this afternoon, and while that would ordinarily be enough to make the ‘droidboys to go crazy, there’s even more — the CPU is reportedly a 628MHz Qualcomm chip, not the slightly overtaxed 528MHz number we’ve seen in every other Android handset to date. Sure, it’s just a measly 100MHz, but if that’s enough to make Sense and HD video on the 3.8-inch 480 x 800 display run smoothly we’ll be all grins. If any of this is true, that is.

[Via Engadget and BGR]

I Love iPhone

A recent customer survey (of only 200 customers — what are these surveys getting away with only 200 respondents?) claims that the iPhone 3GS has a 99% satisfaction rate. A full 99% of 200 polled iPhone customers claim that they are satisfied with their purchase, while 82% of them claimed they are “very satisfied.” That’s higher than previously, too: previous versions of the iPhone got a 73% satisfaction rating. You’re probably not surprised by this, but guess what? People love their iPhones.

What don’t they love about them? 8% said the phone wasn’t compatible with their company’s IT infrastructure. 41% still say the battery life isn’t long enough for their tastes. And a little company called AT&T has drawn the most ire: 55% of respondents say the AT&T network was the worst feature of the iPhone 3GS. So there you go. This just in: ten of eleven Twitterers I just surveyed do like ice cream. That survey is probably just as shocking as the iPhone one, which is not much.

Still, quite a deal Apple has. Your product has almost unanimous satisfaction from customers, and the worst thing about it… is the fault of a completely separate company. Good deal indeed.

via TUAW

True, it’s not the first app offering turn-by-turn driving instructions for the iPhone 3G or iPhone 3GS — but it is from TomTom, an industry heavy-weight that is finally delivering on years of rumor and speculation. After starting with New Zealand a few hours ago, the iTunes App Store is now populated with region specific TomTom apps for NZ ($95), Australia ($80), US and Canada ($100), and Western Europe ($140). If that sounds expensive… it is; dedicated TomTom navigators start at $120. In other words, this isn’t one of those knee-jerk 99 cent App Store purchases. Naturally, that price does not include the announced TomTom iPhone car kit (rumored to cost £113.85 (about $194) with bundled mapping software) that mounts and charges your iPhone 3G or 3GS while enhancing its GPS performance, speaker, and microphone. Our advice: wait for the reviews before dedicating your non multi-tasking iPhone to the dashboard for navigation duties.

Update: Recombu took the software for a spin and seem duly impressed by their ability to navigate streets with an iPhone taped to the dash (not a joke). They say that when a call comes in, the TomTom app “turns off but restarts as soon as you finish the call.” Lame. See the video overview after the break.

iTunes appstore link

via Engadget

By Matt Buchanan

How scary is this? A BlackBerry upgrade sent out by the service provider Etisalat in Dubai and Abu Dhabi is actually spyware.

RIM says they had nothing to do with the update it, and are telling affected people how to get rid of it. So far, no one knows exactly why the carrier sent out the update, described as “required for service enhancements.” It’s actually a spy program developed by SS8 Networks, a company that makes communications interception software.

It’s not only frightening on the same level as Amazon’s ability to remotely delete books from thousands of Kindles at once—but customers had no clue they were downloading spyware. They just noticed it killed the crap out of their batteries.

So maybe think twice, or even three times, about just how secure your smartphone is. Luckily mine are just filled with photos of fancy coffee drinks, and you can see them for free on Twitter anyway. [Yahoo]

via Gizmodo.

With all signs (literally) pointing to a new Storm joining Verizon Wireless’ lineup in the not-too-distant future, it’s just about the perfect time to start discounting the current model in hopes of working that inventory down before the inevitable launch of numero dos. Starting today, VZW customers can snap up the SurePress-equipped Storm 9530 for $99.99 on contract, which is a full Benjamin less than it has been since debuting last November. If you’re looking for a word of advice on the situation, here’s ours: hold out for the next revision — you’ll thank us later. via Verizon drops BlackBerry Storm price to $99.99 on contract.

via Engadget

Google’s updates surrounding location are now coming fast and furious. Just a few days ago it added location to Google Maps for the Chrome and Firefox browsers. Today, it brings location to the mobile web on the iPhone.

If you have the new iPhone 3.0 software and go to Google’s homepage in Safari, you’ll notice a new message below the search box that reads, “New! Try My Location to find restaurants, shops and bars near you!” If you click on the My Location link, the iPhone will pop open a dialogue asking if it’s okay for Safari to use the device’s location services to locate you. If you opt-in, you’ll see a new blue dot below the search box with your location next to it. Do a search, and it will return local results.

The fact that mobile Safari can access location is a huge feature. It’s what’s going to allow Google Latitude, Google’s location-based social network, to work on the device without a native app, as we described a few months ago. Something else that is potentially interesting about this is that Safari, like some of the other native iPhone apps, can apparently run in the background. Now, I’m not sure if it can still access location services while it’s running in the background, but that could be very interesting for something like Latitude.

And accessing functionality like location in the browser seems to tie in well with Google’s ultimate goal of having the web be the platform of choice.

For many people, such a feature will bring up privacy concerns. Here’s what Google has to say about that:

As always, your privacy is one of our top concerns. Google won’t use your location in search unless you explicitly opt in. And you can always disable the feature from Preferences at the bottom of the homepage.