The OtterBox Defender for iPhone 4 costs $49.95. OtterBox OtterBox claims you won’t find a tougher case than the OtterBox Defender Series for iPhone 4. But a company called Ballistic is saying its HC case–the HC stands for Hard Core–is “better” than OtterBox’s, offering four layers of protection instead of OtterBox’s two. Yes, never mind …

Want to ensure you have complete control of what Facebook friends can see on your smart phone? Good news: the social network has put in privacy controls for mobile users. Facebook has announced that all the privacy controls it recently introduced to desktop users are now available to anyone using a browser-enabled mobile device. To change your privacy settings on …

Rumor has it that Apple is buying millions of CDMA chipsets for a Verizon iPhone launch, according to TechCrunch. The tech blog published a story Sunday citing unnamed sources that said Apple ordered millions of CDMA chips from Qualcomm in what looks like preparation for a Verizon Wireless iPhone. TechCrunch said that the chipset order is due for December, which …

Internet telephony giant Skype plans to raise as much as $100 million in an initial public offering. The company said Monday that it has filed an S-1 statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. After the IPO, Skype will trade on the Nasdaq Global Market. Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, and Morgan Stanley are among the banks handling the IPO. Neither …

Motoblur on the Motorola Cliq XT Sarah Tew/CNET Today’s smartphone market is overflowing with devices and their hardware specs (processors, screens, and so on) are becoming increasingly similar among the brands, so it’s understandable that a company would turn to software to add its own unique spin to the devices. For Motorola, its solution for Android was Motoblur. Introduced and …

As a teenager I just about lived in the video arcade (Abbey Road in Farmington Hills, Mich.–anyone remember it?). I owned an Atari 2600, an Apple IIe, an Amiga, a Sega Dreamcast, and just about anything else that was good for games. You’d think, then, that I’d go ape over something like C64 for iPhone 1.7, a newly updated Commodore …

Now that news related to the iPhone 4 launch has cooled down, iPad rumors are heating up. The latest suggest a speedier and possibly smaller-screened tablet device from Apple as early as January. Digitimes claims to have the drop on Apple’s first revision to the wildly successful iPad. According to the report, Apple will beef up the speed of the …

Samsung Eternity II Samsung Summer isn’t just for movie sequels anymore, it could also be known as the season of cell phone sequels. On Monday, less than two weeks after it announced the Intensity II, Samsung stepped up and unveiled the Eternity II and Flight II for AT&T. As with most sequels, the new handsets attempt to expand on the …

Telstra and HTC joined forces today to launch the telco’s first prepaid Android, the HTC Wildfire, highlighting a few features that set it apart from the more powerful HTC Desire. The white Wildfire is a Fone Zone exclusive until 28 September. (Credit: HTC) Among these features is Swype keyboard input, a global exclusive for Telstra on the Wildfire. This software …

Of all the major U.S. carriers, AT&T’s lagged a bit on the Android front but has recently beefed up its selection of phones with the HTC Aria, the Samsung Captivate, and now the Sony Ericsson Xperia X10. Long rumored for AT&T, the Xperia X10 will finally be available starting August 15 for $149.99 with a two-year contract. Much like the …

Microsoft apparently has no intention of letting its failure with Kin keep it out of the smartphone market. The tech giant is working on a touch-screen phone under the codename “Menlo,” according to a Microsoft Research paper titled “User Experiences with Activity-Based Navigation on Mobile Devices,” (PDF) about Menlo. From that paper: “Menlo is a prototype mobile device with a …

In a preliminary agreement, BlackBerry maker Research In Motion has decided to allow the government of Saudi Arabia access to BlackBerry users’ messages, in order to avoid a ban on the device in the country, the Associated Press reported Saturday. The AP quoted an official at the Saudi Communications and Information Technology Commission as saying that the deal between RIM …

What looks to be the fourth-generation iPod touch has appeared online, with pictures of the next-gen iPod leaked to MacRumors from a parts supplier — and it has a hole for a front-facing camera in the front bezel. Unlike the iPhone, the iPod touch has never included a camera — its addition would greatly increase the value of the device …

Leicester City Council is planning to furnish each and every one of its 54 councillors with an Apple iPad next year. In justification of the expense, the council has claimed that laptops, which have suited people in all manner of professions perfectly well for years, are far too heavy and cumbersome to be lugged about everywhere. The iPads to be …

Google and HTC’s Nexus One handset may no longer be available to your average consumer, but it is for sale to Android developers. A recent post on the official Android Developers blog tells us that the ill-fated “superphone” sells for $529 as part of the Development Phones handsets. Previous developer phones include the G1 and the myTouch 3G/Google Ion. Although …