It looks like the beginning of 2012 is going to be a piece of a cake for the Verizon Wireless PR team. Unless, you know, something crazy stupid happens. Last month, RootMetrics dubbed Verizon the top carrier in matters of data coverage. Now today, international marketing research firm and perpetual award giver J.D. Power and …

The iPad 3 could be just around the corner, as new reports from sources in Japan indicate a March launch date, as well as a “strange” or “unusual” Apple event to take place later this month. The news came via Japanese blog Macotakara, who had previously spoken of a February release but has corrected the report with a March date, …

Facebook may dominate the social media landscape today with 845 million users, but experts say that instead of consolidating around the market leader, the social media landscape is fragmenting, leaving big opportunities for startups, especially those targeting mobile users. This could be good news for entrepreneurs and investors who might be green with envy over Facebook’s projected $5 billion gain …

Details of Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 were prematurely outed thanks to a leaked video obtained by Pocketnow.com. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at Nokia’s press conference during CES. Nokia figures to play a major role in Windows Phone’s resurgence. CNET/Lori Grunin The next big iteration of its Windows Phone platform appears to address many of the early concerns and brings it …

ZTE and Sprint hope their new $99 Optik tablet’s rock bottom price can lure buyers eyeing the Kindle Fire. Amazon certainly created a hit with its low-cost $199 Kindle Fire, which aggressively undercut the iPad 2’s steep $499 starting price. Now Chinese electronics maker ZTE has stepped up to try to burn the Fire at its own game. With a …

Hey, remember the Peek, that handheld device from 2008 that supplied e-mail, and only e-mail, for $20 a month? Yeah, didn’t think so. After supporting customers on the original Peek, the marginally more useful Peek Pronto, and the Twitter Peek since then, Peek and its CEO Amol Sarva are shutting things down. This does, unfortunately, affect the “handful” of remaining …

Triple-digit iPhone sales growth catapulted Apple up two spots to become the world’s third largest mobile phone manufacturer. iPhone sales increased 128 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011 over the same period in 2010, according to data released today by research firm IDC. The firm identified the iPhone 4S, which was introduced on October, as the primary reason the …

Humble Bundles are renowned for offering name-your-own price indie game collections. But mostly they’ve been computer games. That changes today–sort of. The Humble Bundle for Android comes with three games: Anomaly: Warzone Earth, Edge, and Osmos. If you were to purchase them separately, they’d cost you $10.47. Buy the bundle, however, and you can pay whatever you want. A buck. …

Best Buy hopes the Super Bowl will bring super-sized crowds of smartphone buyers to its stores. The retailer plans to run its second-ever Super Bowl spot, this year placing the spotlight solely on mobile and creating a short-term deal that will dole out $50 gift cards to customers who buy smartphones this year. The push is part of Best Buy’s …

Were you bummed to learn that Samsung has opted to leave the Galaxy S III off the agenda for this month’s Mobile World Congress? If so, keep your chin up, because there should be plenty of other Samsung news coming out of the show this year. Indeed, the rumor mill has already moved on with a prediction that, among other …

It seems like not a day goes by without something going wrong with the latest kit. Everything’s in beta nowadays, whether it’s the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, Nokia Lumia 800 or the Apple iPhone. And it’s all Apple’s fault. And Android’s. And ours. And yours. Products that somehow didn’t work used to be embarrassing anomalies that led to mass recalls. But …

A new galaxy nexus, a new samsung tab and do you really answer your phone in the bathroom? all that and more on this week’s edition of Android Atlas Weekly for February 1st, 2012. I’m Justin Eckhouse alongside Antuan Goodwin and Jaymar Cabebe. Today we say goodbye to Antuan Goodwin who will be leaving the podcast to focus on Car …

A few weeks ago at CES, Corning announced that its next generation of glass surfaces will deliver thinner, stronger touch screens. Since Gorilla Glass covers some of the most premium smartphones–including the HTC Evo 4G, Samsung Galaxy S II, and Motorola Droid Razr–I wanted to take a closer look at what the material can offer phone owners. First of all, …

The right price can paper over many a flaw. That seems to be the case for the Huawei Ascend II, a recent addition for U.S. Cellular (and a phone that Cricket has had for some time.) Thanks to Android 2.3 Gingerbread, the Ascend II can perform all the basics with communication, connectivity, and downloading apps. Unfortunately, weaker internal features like …

Tens of thousands of people have signed a petition that urges Apple to change the ways its suppliers treat workers who will make the iPhone 5, our sister site CNET News reports. The campaign was started by a group called SumOfUs, and asks people to sign a petition telling Apple, “The quality of working conditions matters as much as the …