SEOUL, South Korea and ESPOO, Finland – The best way to cater to the market should be to simply ask the market what it wants. Based on this, mobile phone giants Nokia and LG have asked the community for ideas, while LG took this a bit further and is offering US$80 000 in prizes for the best concept.

On its corporate blog, Nokia Conversations, the Finnish manufacturer has set seven categories for mobile phone components. For each, voters will have a week to select their favourite hardware combinations, although the system limits them to “reasonable” features, not allowing full high-end specifications. Currently, only display and user interface are available for voting, but from the 22nd of March onwards, the following categories will open, with a week’s interval: size and shape, materials, operating system (Symbian or MeeGo), connectivity, camera, and enhancements.

From the voting above, Nokia will get its design team to come up with concept sketches, which will also be up for voting. Unfortunately for enthusiasts, the complete set of ideas from the campaign Design by Community will not be turned into a product, but just a concept, although we are sure Nokia will use it as contribution for its market research.

For LG, this is the third annual design competition. With the partnership between crowdSPRING and Autodesk, the manufacturer will offer prizes in cash and software valued up to US$80 000. The competition is limited to US residents, who simply have to design a concept of the “next-revolutionary” mobile phone. LG’s Design the Future ends on 26th April this year.

For the first prize, LG and sponsors will offer US$20 000 in cash, one Wacom Intuos4 medium tablet, and a licence of the Autodesk industrial design software. LG will take ownership of every idea posed to the manufacturer, because this, of course, does not only require a hardware design, but a full-blown concept – the judges will follow a strict criteria which sets creativity/originality at 40%, need-fulfilment at 30% and feasibility at 30% as well.

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LG, Nokia Ask Users for Design Ideas

MOUNTAIN VIEW, USA – When it comes to Google’s “monopoly”, the search giant can easily control what users get and don’t get. In this case, Google has bundled Android, its own operating system, with Buzz – the competitor to Twitter.

Google Buzz is far from being real competition to Twitter, even though it is now included in GMail, and Google will push it on Android, and wherever else it can. Twitter has beaten many other micro-blogging websites from the market, such as Jaiku, which was once in Google’s portfolio.

The service is more than just a micro-blogging portal, it enables simple social networking by allowing users to easily share links, photos, video-ratings, and more. Pretty much like Twitter, although everything is unified, without the need for third-party apps. As Buzz is quite young, there are very few programs that allow connectivity to it, although with time this should change.

If apps dedicated to Twitter begin to bundle Buzz connectivity, that could surely pose some threat to the famous micro-blogging service.

The Google Android widget for Buzz brings a simple bar to the home screen, with the ability to attach photos, and share location. It is compatible from Android 1.6, comes in English, and can be downloadable for free from the Android Marketplace.

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Google Buzz Widget for Android Poses Competition to Twitter

PHOENIX, USA – Technology company Objecs has created a product that will ensure that the dead will never be forgotten. The Memorial RosettaStone Tablet is bundled with NFC technology which allows visitors to simply hover their NFC-enabled handhelds and access multimedia relating to the one who is six-feet under.

Although this might sound creepy to some, it will allow families to remember their lost loved ones when visiting them at the cemetery, similar to viewing a photo album at the grave site, although in high-tech style.

Several companies have high-tech products similar to this one. The closest one is from a Japanese company, which enables individuals to capture a QR code, which the mobile phone will interpret and direct the user to a webpage that carries multimedia of the deceased.

Another technological product offering multimedia-on-the-grave is a video screen that constantly loops imagery from the deceased individual. The display is made weatherproof, and is activated with an infrared sensor that detects when a visitor stops by the grave.

The advancement in wireless connectivity, notably NFC, is dedicated to ease users’ lives when it comes to wireless payment, check-ins, and other functions that waste people’s time. The technology is not widely used at the moment, as it is still being tested, although some airports and supermarkets are moving forward in embedding NFC and speeding things up.

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NFC-enabled Headstones Enables the Dead to Communicate

SEOUL, South Korea – The tablet hype has began. Following Apple and HP, it is now Samsung who is rumoured to be developing its own tablet, and for mobility’s sake, it is understood to run on Google Android, and feature 4G connectivity.

Apple’s iPad clearly shook the industry. Tablets weren’t a novelty, but these weren’t hyped either – no one really paid attention to these, and although the iPad is considered an over-sized iPhone, it surely created some momentum for the new devices. In our interview with Freescale, prior to this year’s Mobile World Congress, we were made aware of the excitement when it comes to tablets/smartbooks, with processor giant ARM expecting the market to increase to 130 million tablet units.

The rumour on the Samsung tablet came from Emmanuele Silanesu, National Product and Marketing Manager, Samsung Australia, who had claimed that the tablet will have an Intel chip on-board, but actually run on a Windows operating system. The latest findings point to Google Android rather, as well as 4G, VoIP and an ARM chip powering the upcoming device.

Samsung has launched devices similar to a tablet, known as an UMPC, going by the model name Q1. Unfortunately for the South Korea manufacturer, UMPCs did not stick, and now is the turn of smartbooks.

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Samsung Readying Own Tablet, with Google Android, 4G

CUPERTINO, USA – Patents uncovered from the USPTO have unveiled a new social networking app being developed by Apple, for its iPhone. iGroups will be a crucial move for the manufacturer to keep up with the demands of always-connected users.

Several mobile phone makers are already advertising their handsets as having built-in Facebook and Twitter connectivity options. There are even mobile phones dedicated to this, such as those from INQ. Although among the 140 000 apps at the iPhone App Store there are several that cater to social networking, an app built by Apple will serve as an additional advertising opportunity.

From the sketches, it is noticeable that the app will have geo-location tools, possibly to make iGroups compatible with FourSquare.

According to Mashable, iGroups already exists at the iPhone App Store, therefore it is likely that the new app from Apple may have to be renamed.

Apple Developing Own Social Networking App for iPhone Users