Samsung's latest ‘Optical Joystick' Phone, the SCH-V960 is suited with the latest technology that may revolutionize the way users interact with the menu and user interface of mobile handsets.

Users utilise the optical joystick key by placing their finger and moving a cursor to navigate through the menu, similar to a cursor of a mouse on a PC.

Nokia have announced their new year's celebrations will be webcast via MSN with streaming videos of concerts featuring international artists, including the Black Eyed Peas, Scissor Sisters, Nelly Furtado among others.

"Nokia New Year's Eve embodies our objective of connecting people to their passions. We expect this will be the biggest global New Year's Eve music celebration with more than 1.3 million expected to attend," says Jo Harlow, senior vice president, marketing for Nokia.

Internet pioneer Google is currently in talks with Orange about launching a possible Google branded phone with integrated internet surfing, email, and other Google functionality.

The plans would involve a multi-billion dollar partnership which will allow users to go online wherever they are, making it as easy as home based internet surfing.

The touch screen is real, but the phone is not...

We actually saw many fake phones around, and sometimes we like to post some interesting copy cat. This W810i is branded as OSCAR, has the same model name W810i (they dun even bother to change the name!). Phone body design is almost the same. The display screen is a touch screen where you can use a stylus to input text and select menu. Stylus is hidden nicely at the side, similar to those pda phone.

Samsung announced a 3-megapixel (M-pixel) CMOS image sensor (CIS) with a 1/4-inch lens aperture that is well suited for ultra slim camera phones.

"Our 1.75um-pixel, 1/4-inch lens aperture 3M-pixel CIS is a unique combination of Samsung's high resolution sensor technology and high speed serial interface that brings digital still camera-level picture quality to mobile handsets," said Yong-Hee Lee, vice president of Samsung Electronics' System LSI Division.

The Nokia 6155i Flip Phone Coming Soon From Nokia. Has 6X Zoom, Push-to-Talk, and Fast Wireless Connection.

The Nokia 6155i is a noble phone with various features that I must highlight.  Sandwiched between the skinny frame is a 128 X 160 pixel display, four-way navigation, and an external mini display.  The 1 megapixel camera has 6X zoom but it has one obvious flaw; the 1 megapixel itself which is limited to 1152 X 864 pixels.

InfoWorld Daily informs that LM Ericsson has agreed to acquire Redback, a maker of carrier edge routers, for US$2.1 billion.

Redback, in San Jose, California, makes routers for delivering voice, video, data and mobility services at the outer edge of carrier networks. It will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Ericsson, the Swedish telecommunications giant, but will retain its management team, it said in a statement.