A Legacy Living On: T-Mobile Sidekick Reborn As The Android-Powered Sidekick 4G

Call me a nerd, or call me nostalgic — but I loved the Sidekick series. Though that love fizzled over time (partially due to hardware issues in the later Sidekicks, partially due to the fact that smartphone prices plummeted while their user-friendliness skyrocketed), the first three Sidekicks are still some of my favorite devices ever.

Today, just two weeks after T-Mobile and Microsoft announced that they’re pulling the plug on the old Sidekick cloud servers, T-Mobile is officially unveiling something they (and I) hope can bring life back to the Sidekick series: the Android-powered, Samsung-made Sidekick 4G.

From pictures of the hardware, it looks like Samsung has kept most of the things that Sidekick fan know and love. The overall shape remains unchanged, and it still packs a roomy-lookin’ 5 row key (which I’m really, really hoping is on par with Sidekicks prior). Alas, there is at least a change or two that the more devout fans might not like: the handset’s signature (and oh-so-awesome) display spin-out has been replaced with something they’re calling a “pop-tilt” hinge (we’ve confirmed that this display slides, rather than spins), and the physical trackball has been replaced with an optical trackball.

Here’s what you need to know:

• 1 Ghz Samsung Hummingbird CPU
• 3.5 inch touchscreen display (First Sidekick with a touchscreen!)
• “Group Text” app (Seems to just be a “Reply All” type thing, rather than a managed Group Texting app a la Beluga or GroupMe)
• “Cloud Text” app (Which they say “provides the option to text with friends and groups across platforms, from wherever a customer is, whether from the comfort of their PC’s large screen and keyboard, or from their new Sidekick 4G”)
• “Sidekick Media Room” app provides access to Youtube, Slacker, T-Mobile TV, and any audio/video that might be on the handset
• Comes pre-loaded with Facebook and Twitter
• Dedicated Jump key for jumping between active applications (It’s not quite clear how this works, but it sounds like it’s more than what simply holding the Home key usually provides.

We’ll be checking this thing out at CTIA Orlando (March 21-23) in just a few days — check back in then for our hands on impressions! In the mean time: what do you think? Is this a worthy revival of the Sidekick line?

Is Windows Phone 7′s Copy & Paste Update Delayed?

With March 14th just days away, we’re nearing the end of the “first two weeks of March” window that Microsoft had promisedwould bring Windows Phone 7′s long-awaited Copy & Paste (Codename “NoDo”) update.

After word got out that Microsoft’s Pre-Update Update (the one intended to do little more than prep handsets for the big update on the way) was bricking handsets, folks started wondering if the dates might slip back — and if Microsoft’s French PR blogis to be believed, that’s exactly what has happened.

From their blog (Translated with Google Translate):

We are delighted to share with you that this update will be available in the second half of March through your Zune software. A notification will be pushed on all the Windows 7 Phone, allowing you to perform the update in the best conditions.

I’m no mathematician, but I don’t think the “first two weeks of March” ever falls in the “second half of March”. In the meantime, go watch this incredible fan-made WP7 commercial.

Microsoft's Ventura could be a cloud music / video platform, having something to do with Zune

Zune hasn't gotten much love from Microsoft as of late, but that might change over time -- ZDNet's Mary Jo Foley noticed that the company is staffing up for a cloud-based multimedia project (by a group known as "Ventura Media Services") directed at PCs, TVs and mobile devices. "The team is a tight group of music and video lovers that create services and experiences revolving around music/video discovery and consumption," read a series of job postings that date back at least as far as July of 2010, calling for software developers in Beijing and Redmond who are familiar with the Microsoft Azure cloud platform. (Two of them have "Zune" in the job title.) While it's hard to say if this project is a major focus for Microsoft no matter how often the job posting says "large scale" (we count four times) it'd definitely be nice to have some competition for Google and Apple when they start drawing the multimedia-streaming battle lines.

Shoppingkoo: Microsoft to pay Nokia 'more than $1 billion' to make Windows Phones

Though neither Nokia nor CEO Stephen Elop ever said there was an exchange of billions of dollars as a part of the company's tie-up with Microsoft for the Windows Phone platform, Bloomberg is sourcing "two people with knowledge of the terms" in saying that something in excess of $1 billion is flowing from Redmond to Espoo. Though the deal isn't yet finalized -- Elop said as much back at MWC -- it'd apparently call for Microsoft to pay out at least some of the cash upfront with Nokia sending cash in the other direction for device licenses. Interestingly, the deal is said to give Microsoft access to parts of Nokia's expansive patent portfolio -- and they'll have it for quite some time, too: the contract's apparently going to be good for "more than five years." That's more than most marriages, it seems (and roughly as expensive).

Microsoft Now Seeding Windows Phone 7 On Nokia With A Billion Dollars Up Front

The strategic partnership between Microsoft and Nokia,announced in February, was regarded as auspicious by some and desperate by others, yet some specifics of the agreement were largely a mystery until today. Most notably, Microsoft was rumored to have led the partnership with hundreds of millions of dollars, outbidding Google (!) to woo the once-magnificent Finnish giant. Considering Google’s sights are increasingly set on the low-cost phone market, it’s interesting that they didn’t just write a blank check. Or maybe Nokia didn’t want to appear to be flattened underneath the Android machine. Either way, Microsoft won out in the end, and the settlement paid has been reported by Bloomberg to be over a billion dollars.

Considering the sums involved in control of even a small segment of the mobile world, a billion doesn’t even seem like much. But it is, of course, a billion dollars. The question is: even at that price, did Nokia sell itself short?

Nokia still has an impressive amount of brand strength, though nonstarters MeeGo and Symbian 3 have made that remaining brand an exceedingly precious resource. To be sure, as was discussed after the partnership was announced, a complete outsourcing of the OS to Microsoft sacrifices some of their brand, but in the end Nokia needed a competitive product, something they haven’t had for years. Strange, then, that they went to Microsoft, whose own mobile brand has been practically effaced from the earth, instead of the all-conquering Android. I’m sure they had their reasons. A billion of them, actually.

The upfront price being paid by Microsoft is an investment by a still-rich company that could pay itself off fairly quickly. A billion dollars is a lot of money, but it’s defraying the cost of R&D at Nokia, who then will pay Microsoft a license fee for every copy of Windows Phone 7 they ship. The agreement, according to the source (who cautions that it is not finalized), runs for five years.

Think about it. A billion dollars for a five-year partnership with Nokia? I think Microsoft is taking Nokia to school here.

Yet it’s a good thing for both, since by hitching their ships together, only one has to turn around to make it worth it for the other. On the other hand, the investment is lopsided in that if Nokia keeps going down, it’s still a coup for Microsoft, who will at the very least have shipped a few million more WP7 handsets than they would have otherwise. Microsoft loves to spend money on presence like that, and this billion-dollar purchase, while bigger than others it has made, is just the latest in a long line of similar moves.

There are some other provisions, less clear from this source, suggesting Microsoft is acquiring a number of patents and using some Nokia services in WP7. I’m afraid with Bing, Live, and Ovi, there might be too many cooks in the kitchen, but they’ve got time to work that out.

I’m hopeful, personally — not to say optimistic. Nokia just has so much inertia, and their mobile vision has always been so much different from Microsoft’s (both from WinMo and WP7), that I fear the product created will be a sort of worst-of-both-worlds monster. But with the wolves shooed from the door by this cash infusion and a little fire in the veins courtesy of executivemea culpas, they might just make something exciting happen. And if it doesn’t work out, hey, I can think of worse ways to spend a billion dollars.

Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 Dealing With Nokia Comes At $1 Billion Price

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) won a huge new partnership with Nokia (NYSE: NOK) that could light a fire under its mobile division, but it will come at a price: over $1 billion.

The five-year agreement between the two companies—which somehow still hasn’t been signed—will see over $1 billion transferred from Microsoft to Nokia to encourage the production of Windows Phone 7 handsets, although it’s not all one-sided: Nokia will pay a licensing fee per handset to Microsoft that could eventually make the deal profitable for Microsoft, according to a report from Bloomberg. Still, the payments will start before the first Nokia Windows Phone 7 handsets arrive, which means that they’ll have to sell in decent volume for Microsoft to eventually see a payout.

It was pretty clear that Microsoft was going to have to pony up for Nokia’s business, as it competed with Google’s Android operating system business to score the largest phone design win on the planet. Nokia’s fortunes have waned of late against upstarts like Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and Google (NSDQ: GOOG), but it still sells more phones than anyone and retains a well-known brand.

Another reason Microsoft was persuaded to make a deal was because of Nokia’s deep patent pool, which it is not shy about using. Practically everyone is suing each other these days in the mobile market, with Nokia targeting Apple and Microsoft targeting Android market Motorola (NYSE: MMI), and according to the report Microsoft’s $1 billion investment will give it access to Nokia’s pool of patents.

Seems like a lot of money, but as GeekWire’s Todd Bishop notes, it’s 5 percent of Microsoft’s profits from the last year. That’s a small price to pay if Nokia and Microsoft can turn their deal into a winner in the smartphone market.

Windows Phone 7′s Pre-Update Update Starting Hitting Samsung Handsets Again

A bit over a week ago, Microsoft sent out an itty-bitty software update to Windows Phone 7 handsets. Intended as sort of a “Pre-Update” update, it was intentionally light on the features. In fact, it really only had two:

1. It patched up a few bugs in the update system to make way for the impending Copy-And-Paste update would go smoothly.
2. It randomly turned select Samsung WP7 handsets into paperweights.

Back when word broke that certain Samsung handsets were having issues (read: being bricked) by the update, Microsoft blocked all affected handsets from receiving the update and promised a second, less-dangerous update would be on the way in a few days. Sure enough, Samsung handsets have just started gettin’ the patch for the second time — and so far, so good. Got a Samsung WP7 handset, and a willing to test the waters? Let us know how it goes.

Fogale Nanotech taking the 'touch' out of 'touchscreen smartphone' at CeBIT

French sensor manufacturer Fogale Nanotech -- historically more of an industrial supplier than a consumer-facing one -- was demonstrating its non-contact capacitive sensors at CeBIT this week and how they might be used for the most consumer-facing application of them all: smartphone interfaces. Fogale had two stations set up, PCs running Windows Phone 7 emulators with the sensors attached out front (oriented like you might place a trackpad on a desk). Though they didn't have any actual phone prototypes on hand with the technology integrated, it's clear that they're trying to drum up support with a manufacturer partner or two; in the meantime, you can get a sense of what's going on by waving your hand over the phone-shaped sensors at the stations. We found that as long as you're within about half inch of the pad, the on-screen cursor flys by in perfect harmony with your finger. Of course, there are plenty of unanswered questions here: deciding on the best user experience for actuating taps is key... but perhaps more importantly, we're not certain that you need your hand waving slightly above your phone while using it anyway. Don't get us wrong, it's super cool -- but are you really that worked up over smudges? Follow the break for a quick video of Fogale's recorded demos plus some time at the live kiosk.

Fogale Nanotech takes the 'touch' out of 'touchscreen smartphone' at CeBIT

ShoppingKoo Report: Tablet-Optimized Version of Windows Not Ready Until Mid-2012

The company that practically invented the tablet is taking its sweet time getting back around to it now that people are actually interested.

Bloomberg reported late Thursday that Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) doesn’t plan to release a version of Windows specifically for tablets until “the 2012 back-to-school season,” which is generally considered July or August. Apparently Microsoft is planning to develop a tablet-suitable version of Windows 7, rather than Windows Phone 7, and it’s going to take some time to make the PC operating system ready for tablets with smaller screen sizes, gesture-based interfaces, and long battery life requirements.

It’s not clear from the report whether or not the software is really a version of Windows 8, which according to Microsoft watcher Mary-Jo Foley is on a similar mid-2012 release schedule. In the meantime, Microsoft and some partners have been showing off Windows 7-based tablets, and talking about a version of Windows 8 that will run on the ARM processors used in just about every tablet currently on the market or planned for this year.

But by then, Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) will have had over two years in the tablet market and Google’s Android partners will have been shipping devices for over a year. HP (NYSE: HPQ) and RIM (NSDQ: RIMM) are expected to launch tablets later this year running their own software as well.

MIcrosoft may be able to string things along for a while with Windows 7 tablets, but it doesn’t seem like too many hardware manufacturers are betting on Intel’s low-power x86 chips, meaning that Microsoft could have trouble gaining traction for those devices until that ARM-based version of Windows is ready. Considering that Microsoft founder Bill Gates considered the Tablet PC software Microsoft developed in the early past of last decade to be one of the company’s more important projects, it’s kind of amazing to see how far behind its rivals Microsoft has fallen.

A Microsoft representative declined to comment on the report.

From Apple: Why We Need An ‘App Store’ Trademark

Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) wants the term “App Store” to refer only to its own App Store, and not be a generic term for any company’s online shop for mobile-device software. In January, Microsoft objected, filing papers at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office arguing that the term is generic and Apple shouldn’t be granted a trademark on it. Now Apple has filed a response, explaining why the term App Store should belong to it alone.

The crux of the argument is that there are lots of other “noun plus store” constructions, both online and off. For example, The Container Store is trademarked, and Apple lawyers found plenty of others you may not have heard of, including The Paper Store, The Radiator Store, The Shade Store, and Swag Store.

As to whether the mark is generic, Apple says it isn’t, and notes that plenty of other “arguably descriptive” terms have been trademarked for particular services, including “Books On Tape,” “Vision Center,” “Cash Management Account,” and “The Beef Jerky Outlet.” (Of course, one could just consider those examples evidence of the fact that trademark owners have been overreaching for a long time now, with little or no resistance from the Trademark Office).

In addition, Apple gets in a dig at Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), saying the company should really be familiar with the concept of “genericness” because of its long trademark battle over the term “Windows.” Which, of course, is still trademarked.

The full document is available at TechFlash, which first reported the story.

Windows Phone 7′s Marketplace Surpassing 9,000 Applications

(Okay, Greg. Don’t make an “Over 9000!?” reference. Come on; you can do this.)

Microsoft might have made some silly choices with regards to getting people to develop for Windows Phone 7 early on, but it doesn’t look like they’re having too much trouble on that front.

Early this morning, the WP7 Marketplace surpassed 9,000 applications — which, as MobileBurn points out, is more than HP/Palm’s webOS (which got a much earlier start) offers up, and quickly approaching the 15,000 mark that RIM announced a few months back.

WHAT?! OVER 9000?! THAT’S IMPOSSIB — Crap.

Microsoft Increasing The Senseless Limit On How Many Free Apps A Developer Can Submit

So, let’s say you’re Microsoft. You’ve got this brand new smartphone platform — one that, thanks to the timing and that of the competition, is a bit of an underdog. To be at all competitive, you need to convince developers to not only make applications for your platform, but to make lots of applications for your platform. Now, what’s the one thing you definitely, absolutely, should not do? Limit those that are actually interested in your platform — say, by setting some arbitrarily low limit on the number of apps they can submit.

Alas, that’s exactly what Microsoft did. Up until this morning, Microsoft had limited developers to a maximum of 5 free applications. If they wanted to throw any more on the market, they’d either have to charge for the app or cough up $20 bucks for the submission. (Really? Charging the developer for submitting a free app, on top of the $99 yearly fee? Really?!) This cap is now set at a considerably more reasonable level of 100 apps.

I understand why they did this. They didn’t want a mountain of crapware filling their store — a totally reasonable desire. But this was probably the silliest possible way they could have gone about it. Deal with crapware developers individually, don’t just throw a wet blanket on everyone.

Microsoft details Windows Phone 7 updating problem, 'small number' of Samsungs affected

Redmond is opening up and offering a few facts, stats, and tips around its first update to Windows Phone 7 -- an update that didn't go smoothly for everyone -- and it sounds like there are at least three distinct failure modes, two of which are pretty simple to fix. The company figures that somewhere around 10 percent of users attempting the upgrade encountered a problem, but of those, "nearly half" failed because they lacked a proper internet connection or enough disk space (turns out the update process takes a backup of the phone's contents just in case something goes horribly awry). Most of the remainder may have been swept up in the issue affecting "a small number" of Samsung devices, an issue that the company says it's working to fix as quickly as possible -- and in the meantime, they've turned the update off for those models. 

Put simply, when you get prompted to install the update, Microsoft simply recommends that you've got plenty of hard drive space on your PC (you can't do this one over the air) and a solid connection to the interwebs; some 90 percent succeeded in installing the new code, which isn't too shabby considering this is the very first update to the platform they've attempted so far. Let's just hope that brick rate is down to zero by the time the good stuff comes, right?

Grey Area Getting $2.6 Million To Build Out Location-Aware Gaming Business

Nokia’s stock may have dipped to 1998 levels in the last few days on worries about its new smartphone strategy with Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT), but there are some good-news stories coming out of Finland’s mobile world, too. Grey Area, the Helsinki-headquartered, location-based social mobile game developer, has announced that it has picked up €1.9 million ($2.6 million) in a round of funding led by Index Ventures, London Venture Partners and Initial Capital.

In a post on the site Arctic Startup, Ville Vesterinen, the CEO of Grey Area (and also a founder of Arctic Startup), says that the funds will be used to help the company extend into the U.S. market.

Lifeline Ventures, which had contributed to a seed round for the company, also participated.

Going west to markets where mobile social gaming is very popular, with a high-profile backer like Index, is a significant step for Grey Area to expand its business. Recent numbers from the app discovery and tracking company Flurry noted that 64 percent of all mobile social gamers worldwide are located in the U.S.

Grey Area released its first game, Shadow Cities, last year as a beta on Apple’s App Store in Finland only. The game cleverly makes use of the phone’s location-aware and mapping capabilities, to create a game where people play each other in their present surroundings.

The game, which is free to play but features options for in-game purchases, quickly shot to the top of the Finnish App Store rankings.

You can see how a game like Shadow Cities can develop with additional layers of functionality, such as augmented reality interfaces. But it already plays on the nexus of several important trends in mobile content—namely location-based services, social media and gaming.

Although this first game is only for the iPhone, the company will in future develop for other smartphone platforms as well.

If you want a better idea of how the game works, watch the video below:

HTC Arrive is Sprint's first Windows Phone 7 device, launching March 20th for $200

Teased since Microsoft's launch event for Windows Phone 7 back in October of last year and recently launched in Europe as the 7 Pro, HTC's Arrive today becomes the very first CDMA device for the platform to be announced with a date and a price. Sprint picks up the QWERTY tilt-o-matic this coming March 20th for $199.99 on a two-year contract after $100 mail-in rebate, featuring a 3.6-inch WVGA display, 1GHz Snapdragon processor, 5 megapixel camera with flash and 720p video capture, 16GB of internal storage, and 802.11b/g/n WiFi -- oh, and Sprint is quick to remind us that the phone will be launching with Microsoft's anticipated copy and paste update, too. In-store pre-orders begin today with the purchase of a $50 Sprint gift card; follow the break for the full press release.

Angry Birds Now Coming To Windows Phone 7 On April 6th

If your Windows Phone 7 handset was one of the unfortunate few that got bricked by Microsoft’s little-update-that-couldn’t, you’re going to want to get that fixed quick. At the very latest, you’re going to want to have things all patched up by April 6th. Why? Because it’s Angry Birds Time!

Rovio’s Peter Vesterbacka confirmed last week at Mobile World Congress that the Birds were comin’ to Windows Phone 7, but he couldn’t get too specific about the launch date. Microsoft went ahead and filled in the gaps, with this post on the Windows Team Blog promising that Angry Birds and 5 other big-name titles (Doodle Jump, Plants Vs Zombies, geoDefense, Sonic The Hedgehog Ep: 1, and Hydro Thunder Go) will be hitting on April 6th.

For those new to Angry Birds, just remember: Take a break every 15-30 minutes to stretch your legs, rehydrate, and rest your eyes. If you start to feel cold when you’re not playing Angry Birds, it’s important to get help.

Microsoft pulls Windows Phone 7 updating from Samsung phones until it can resolve issues

Such a big load of trouble for such a small update. Microsoft's first WP7 firmware refresh has been causing some unfortunate brick-like behavior in Samsung Omnia 7s and the company has wisely decided to pull the new software back until it can correct whatever's going wrong. An official communiqué toWinRumors says Microsoft has identified the issue at hand and is working to correct it and redistribute the update as soon as possible. For any Samsung WP7  phone owners who haven't been able to resuscitate their device yet, the advised course of action is to go back to the store and swap it for a livelier one.

First Windows Phone 7 updating not going smoothly for some Samsung handsets (update: Microsoft suggests temporary fix)

So this is why they do phased rollouts, eh? If Twitter is the font of truth and reality that we suspect it to be, it sounds like users of some Windows Phone 7  models by Samsung are struggling with that minor first update that Microsoft started pushing this week. Basically, it sounds like the update isn't consistently completing; it some cases, users get an error message, and there doesn't appear to be any way to roll back or restore the prior firmware and get the phone back to a working state. Mass bricking is probably the greatest fear of software engineers before deploying handset updates to the field, so it's a good thing they're taking it slow; of course, that's not much consolation to the folks who are stuck making a call (on someone else's phone) to Samsung support.

Update: the::unwired is reporting information straight from Microsoft on how to fix a "bricked" device that doesn't complete the update, and it's deceptively simple: just pull the battery, put it back in, and turn the phone on. Failing that, perform a hard reset. Either way, the company is recommending you don't attempt the update again until the phone reminds you, which it says will happen in about three days.

Microsoft pushes small update to Windows Phones to prepare for copy and paste update later on

Don't get too excited when you see this update notification pop up -- as far as we can tell, it's got nothing users will notice -- but we've just been told by Microsoft that the company is getting ready to send out the first software upgrade to Windows Phone 7 devices in the field early this week. It's being billed as a "minor update to help prepare" for thecopy and paste stuff (which we're assuming is still targeted for early- to mid-March, per Ballmer's MWC keynote), though the exact timing of this first one will vary a bit depending on carrier. Oh, and a note before you hook up to try to grab it: it also required a recently-pushed update to the Zune software (or the Connector for Mac OS), so you'll need to get that first before restarting the app and looking for the phone firmware.

Microsoft Rolling Out A Pre-Update Update For Windows Phone 7

Whoa, whoa, whoa — I just realized how long it’s been since we’ve done our once-regular segment, Good News/Bad News. With that said, you can probably assume what’s coming next: It’s Good News/Bad News time!

The Good News: Windows Phone 7 handsets are getting their first software update today!

The Bad News: It’s not the update you’re waiting for.

According to Microsoft, this update is more of a primer than anything else. They’re patching up a few bugs in the update process itself, as well as putting some polish on some smaller bits that will make the big update that much less complicated to pull off.

Once you’ve received the alert saying your phone is ready for update, you’ll have to plug it into either the Zune software (PC) or Windows Phone 7 Connector (Mac) and let it do its thing.

Once that’s done, it’ll just be a few more weeks before the long-awaited copy-and-paste update starts hittin’ handsets near and far. Unless there’s another update before that, which will probably require at least two more pre-update updates.