Apple's iTunes Sells 25 Billion Songs

Cisco recently unveiled its Visual Networking Index Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update, a rather long-winded title for a white paper. But don’t let its wordy head mislead you. Within its pages are some giddying data, forecasts, and conclusions that can send any geek’s heart to Nirvana, or something that resembles it in the geek world.

 

Anyway, according to Cisco, there were 36 million tablets connected to the mobile network in 2012. This figure was 2.5 times larger than that of the previous year. Data also revealed that each tablet generated 2.4 times more traffic than your average smartphone.

 

Along with this increase in number of connected mobile devices, mobile Internet traffic worldwide also increased 70 percent in 2012, almost double that of the previous year. Currently, mobile Internet traffic is 12 times bigger than the whole Internet worldwide way back in 2000.

Microsoft to Turn Windows Phone Into Another Xbox

Microsoft, Nokia, and wireless operator AT&T threw a lot of their respective marketing muscles behind the Lumia 900 Windows Phone smartphone. Despite this, however, the phone, which has received much critical acclaim for its innovative design and refreshingly different mobile OS, posted so-so sales numbers.

It was not a flop. It was not a blockbuster, which Microsoft and Nokia badly need, either.

Nokia's Lumia 900 sold more units than expected; however, it was not big enough to give Windows Phone a significant market presence.

Things are looking bad for the smartphone partners. Things, however, are not desperate.

Things could improve a lot later this year, when Microsoft launches its next mobile OS, Windows Phone 8. And if we're to believe the rumors and leaks, the next-generation Windows Phone OS will come with some serious firepower.

Is Facebook releasing its own smartphone?

Doomed IPO or not, Facebook doesn't seem too happy being an app on everybody else's smartphone. No, sires, the social networking behemoth wants to have its own smartphone, most market analysts believe.

There's no shortage of Facebook-friendly smartphones today; however, Facebook wants to launch its own smartphone, reports say. (Photo from HTC)

Not that we should accept everything that analysts say at face value. God knows we would all be millionaires by now if we were to receive a peso for every analyst forecast that didn't turn out quite near what actually occurred later.

Facebook wants something like this, its own smartphone. (Photo from ubergizmo.com)

But putting our aspirations to be millionaire aside for a while, we might see some semblance of future reality in what these rumors, I mean analysis and forecasts, say.

Facebook has been quite vocal about its lack of mobile muscle, about how mobile Internet could be detrimental to its advertising-based revenue model. Also, this is not the first time Facebook and smartphone have been used in one sentence by media and market commentators.

Some observers claim to know better than Facebook's top honchos and have said in no ambivalent way that making its own smartphone would be like committing suicide for the social networking site. Of course, an equal number of analysts say it would be a good idea, almost as great as eradicating world hunger.

Either way, it would be something exciting to see. Don't you agree?

Samsung's Galaxy S III Runs Windows Phone: Best of Possible Worlds

Samsung continues pushing the envelope with the latest version of its Galaxy S smartphone, the Galaxy S III (or S3, whichever you prefer).

Powered by a 1.4GHz quad-core Exynos processor, 1GB RAM, and a GPU that the company claims runs 65 percent faster than the Mali 400 that comes with the Galaxy S II, the latest Galaxy phone comes with a removable 2100mAh battery.

Windows Phone-powered Samsung Galaxy S III: Best of possible worlds

Nokia needs to arrest decline in emerging markets

Nokia is having a hard time catching traction in the smartphone market.

While most reviewers have only good things to say about its Lumia series of Windows Phone-powered smartphones, consumers are somehow not buying.

Nokia's Lumia 900 and other Windows Phone smartphones get all the media attention.

And although most of the more than 2 million who actually bought the phones as of the first quarter of 2012 are very much satisfied about their Nokia smartphones, there are just not enough of them to counterbalance all the bad news hitting the Finnish mobile vendor.

Finally, with Nokia's Lumia 800, Windows users need not be embarrassed by their phones

Let's admit it, most fans of Windows have been afflicted with smartphone envy, for the longest time. While lovers of the iOS and Android platforms have been proudly and at times brashly displaying their iPhones and Android phones, users of Windows-badged smartphones are surreptitiously using their own.

The humiliation, both self-imposed and bestowed by popular culture and market realities, has continued for quite some time. That is, until now.

Nokia's Lumia 800 eases Windows users' smartphone envy.

Last week's launch of the Lumia 800 smartphone by Nokia finally ends most Windows users' wait for a real "Windows smartphone." Finally, Windows users need not feel inadequate each time an Android or iPhone fan whips out his or her smartphone.