Android

Did you know that my birthday is on St. Patrick's Day? It is; it's true. And did you know that my favorite iPhone game (though it's on other platforms now) is Angry Birds? Also true. I was hoping that Rovio, makers of the game, would continue the holiday theme it's been on lately with Angry Birds Seasons and publish a St. Pat's version of the game for my birthday. And The Unofficial Apple Weblog says that, according to Rovio CEO Peter Vesterbacka, it's doing just that.

Vesterbacka said the game should be "very … Read more

The Samsung Galaxy S is officially still chilling with Android 2.2 Froyo. But if you're fed up with frozen yogurt and you want to try a little Gingerbread, an update to bump up the phone to Android 2.3.2 has appeared online at the SamFirmware forum.

Read more of "Samsung Galaxy S Android 2.3 Gingerbread update leaked" at Crave UK. … Read more

Today's show title comes from the Sloppy Joe scene in "Billy Madison" and continues our weeklong tribute to Adam Sandler's comedic repertoire. We know how you kids like 'em shloppy!

Jeff uses the first bit of the episode to bemoan the Washington, D.C., legal system for its use of traffic-ticketing speed detectors in deserted 40 mph stretches of road.

Take a look at the video and let us know if you think Jeff's ticket is warranted, taking into consideration his admission of guilt on a live, recorded podcast that is definitely admissible in a court of law. Cool story bro!

Now onto the first of today's stories: game company THQ is organizing an anti-North Korean rally in San Francisco to protest the country's dictatorship and abhorrent human rights violations.

The walk from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Yerba Buena Gardens will feature speeches by economic experts, musicians, and the launching of 10,000 balloons.

But the other side of the story is that THQ is also throwing the rally to promote its upcoming shooter game called Homefront that puts the player in control of an American soldier challenging North Korean forces in a dystopian occupied United States. Keeping with last week's discussion of the violent realism in Call of Juarez, could this be another case of too real, too soon?… Read more

Sony Ericsson is betting big that its Xperia Play will offer a new way to bring gamers and phone users together, but it's not the first time that the company has tried to do so.

Seven years ago, just as Sony Ericsson was getting into a groove with notable handsets like the P910 and S710, the company rolled out one of the more interesting mobile accessories I've ever seen. The EGB-10 Gameboard allowed you to play games on selected Sony Ericsson handsets while using controls that were more comfortable than a standard navigational keypad.

Though its design was … Read more

Opera Software and London-based phone maker Inq Mobile have penned a deal to preload Opera Mini 5 browser on several Android smartphones, as well as feature phones.

The U.K. will be the first to receive the models this month, followed by Australia and other European, Asian, and North American markets (Canada) in which Inq Mobile operates.

Opera Mini is known for speedily compressing and rendering Web pages through its proxy servers, an asset for feature phones in particular. In addition, the browser features tabs, bookmark sync, and a password manager.

Impulse buyers, beware. Loopt is jumping on the deal-a-day bandwagon, pushing alerts for deeply discounted goods and services in its location-aware social-networking app for iPhone (iOS) and Android.

Loopt's new "Reward Alerts" program, announced today in time for next week's South By Southwest technology and music conference, will push notifications for instantly redeemable deals.

However, to keep its daily deal from being a dime a dozen, Loopt will push a few high-value deals at various times throughout the day. Deals are based on your location, possibly down to the city block if the provider wants, and … Read more

Motorola grabbed the spotlight a few weeks ago when it introduced its Atrix Android-powered smartphone. The handset isn't just a fairly impressive smartphone, it also has the capability to combine Voltron style with a type of dock that turns it into a laptop replacement.

Motorola is calling the gadget a "webtop" computer. It's not meant to be a user's main computing device--it uses the handset as a primary brain, so it's underpowered when compared with even a Netbook--but it's an interesting competitor to other not-as-laptop portables, like tablets.

And despite having its own tablet on the market, the Xoom, … Read more

Welcome to the 411, my column answering all your questions about cell phones and cell phone accessories. I receive plenty of questions about these subjects via e-mail, so I figured many of you might have similar queries, too. At times, I might solicit answers from readers if I'm stumped. Send your questions and comments to me at nicole.lee@cnet.com. If you prefer to remain anonymous, let me know in the e-mail.

Question: I'm a Verizon customer, and very soon my upgrade is up. I've had a Motorola Q, and now a BlackBerry Tour, and quite frankly, I love having a QWERTY keyboard without all the slide-out stuff. However, I'm also totally a techie, and while the Motorola Droid Pro seemed like my dream phone at the time, that came out quite a while ago in "cell phone years," and from what I read it was just "OK." I'm thinking I might have to switch to a more touch-screen-based phone, since they get all the best capabilities, but I really don't want to if there is something else on the horizon.

Is there something that I should just wait on that would be more for me, or am I just likely stuck with either the Droid Pro, or a more touch-screen phone like the iPhone (which I will definitely wait for its future versions since Verizon is switching over to 4G, and the current Verizon iPhone is already in a way dated) or one of the many droids?--Jonathan, via e-mail

I wouldn't want to force you to switch to a touch-screen phone if you're not quite ready, but you're right that the touch screen is where it's at if you want a high-end smartphone.… Read more

Update: This post was updated on March 1, 2011 to reflect graphical options we previously overlooked in the Dungeon Defenders game. We'd previously stated that the iPad version of the game had more aliasing than the Xoom, but overlooked an option in the game to smooth out the graphics and have since updated the 3D graphics section. We apologize for any confusion this may have caused. Thank you.

The tablet wars will be in full swing in the next couple of weeks. Last week, we witnessed the opening salvo with the release of Motorola's Xoom. The Xoom is … Read more