Right around the beginning of May at the I/O event, Google revealed its daily Android activation data, which turned out to be 400,000 Android activations daily. It’s been two months, and now Google’s Android boss Andy Rubin has an adjustment he’d like to make to the numbers. “There are now 500,000 Android devices activated every day, and it’s growing at 4.4% w/w,” tweeted Rubin this morning. → Read More

We knew that the T-Mobile MyTouch 4G Slide was on the way — or, at least, we had a pretty darn good reason to believe as much. Sure enough, it’s the real deal: ol’ Magenta has just painted it up with a proper press release, announcing that it’ll it the stores sometime in July for an as-of-yet-undisclosed price. T-Mobile’s decided to take a somewhat rarely taken route with the marketing behind this one. Rather than playing up the 1.2 Ghz processor, the “4G” connectivity (with “4G” in quotes, of course, because T-Mobile’s 4G is arguably not actual 4G), or the 3.7″ WVGA (800×480) SuperLCD display, they’re pointing all of their hype machine’s energy at a different component: the camera. → Read More

Ambitious goals are nothing new to HTC. As last year came to a close, the Taiwan-based phone maker promised to sell 60 million handsets in 2011, three times what it sold in 2010. With a good six months left before we see if that last goal will be met, HTC has vowed to add another 1,370 retail stores in mainland China, bringing its total to 2,000. → Read More

The iOS hacking world is full of all kinds of crazy terms and phrases. “Cydia”. “DFU Mode”. “Saving your blobs.” That last one — the blob one — is a particularly important idea for those on the cutting edge of the jailbreak scene. To break down the concept as simply as I can: by saving a record of a few chunks of data (the SHSH “blob”) uniquely generated for your iPhone during a firmware upgrade, you can later downgrade (read: go back to) that firmware without iTunes throwing a hissy fit. Be it that you ever accidentally update to a build that just doesn’t seem to be jailbreakable, you can return to one that is. With iOS 5, however, this process seems to be on the way out. → Read More

When we reported on the Nexus 4G, Google’s first Ice Cream Sandwich smartphone, we weren’t sure whether or not it would be a “pure Google” device or a handset made by one of the tech giant’s manufacturing partners. The inside source promised a “monster-sized” 720p display, a 4G radio of some kind, an an OMAP440 processor, but none of the leaked specs hinted at who would make the device.

Today, however, BGR’s source has given some new information about the handset that definitively answers our question. → Read More

As the launch of any new platform tends to do, MeeGo’s debut on the Nokia N9 last week sparked a glimmer of hope. Nokia has never been the best at making software that’s as pretty as it is powerful — but with MeeGo’s fancy animations and surprisingly well thought out UI, we walked away pleasantly surprised on almost all fronts. Maybe, just maybe, we figured, Nokia might find a way to keep MeeGo around, even as they fleshed out their new-found allegiance to Windows Phone 7. Maybe if it proved popular enough? Not gonna happen, says CEO Stephen Elop. → Read More

A new start-up has popped up out of Tel Aviv called SearchBBM, and it could save BlackBerry users a few bucks on their SMS bill each month. Basically, SearchBBM lets you find other BBM users through Facebook, Twitter, or through their username. → Read More

Glasses-free 3D should be like water, or air: everyone should have access to it. For a couple days, we in the U.S. have been exclusively lucky in that one of the best (if not the best) Android phones of this year launched with us first. If you haven’t guessed yet, I’m talking about the HTC Evo 3D. Fortunately for those in Europe who have suddenly turned green with envy, the wait is coming to a close. HTC announced this morning plans to launch its power-packing HTC EVO 3D across Europe in July. → Read More

Alright, fair denizens of the Interwebs: put on your skeptics hat and polish up that ol’ grain-of-salt, because this one’s kinda shaky. Android fan site Droid Attic nabbed the above shot of what looks to be Best Buy’s internal inventory listing for the Motorola Droid 3. According to the listing, the in-stock date (which in many cases means the day the products arrive, generally one day before it’s put on the shelves) is set for July 13th. If everything comes together, that means the Droid 3 could very well be on sale by July 14th or 15th. So what’s shaky about this? First, this is the first we’re hearing of Droid Attic; we won’t hold that against’em, but we can’t vouch for their accuracy. Second, these inventory dates aren’t exactly set in stone — especially not 2+ weeks out. In many cases, the dates put in when the listing is created are placeholders, often only getting swapped out for the actual date a day or two before the products hit the delivery trucks. In the end, it’s entirely feasible that the Droid 3 will hit the shelves in Mid-July… just don’t get your heart set on it yet. → Read More

If at first you don’t succeed, dust yourself off, fly across the Pacific, and try again! At least, that seems to be the plan over at Apple. On Wednesday, Judge Lucy Koh gave a court order rejecting Samsung’s request to check out the iPad 3 and the iPhone 5, but in her order we stumbled upon a tricky little passage. In that passage, Judge Koh hinted that she would not give Apple the preliminary injunction it’s hoping for.

Now, two days later, Apple has taken its beef to South Korea where Samsung is headquartered, filing yet another lawsuit in the tangled web that is the Samsung-Apple copycat war. → Read More

For those of you who own the Motorola Atrix 4G, you know that it does all kinds of cool things. For one, it turns into a little laptop when you clip it into its corresponding laptop dock. It’s also the first dual-core smartphone to launch in the U.S., so it was the trend-setter of snappiness, if you will.

One thing the Atrix 4G doesn’t do, however, is run Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread, at least not until next month. That’s right Atrix owners, you’re in for a real Gingerbread treat. → Read More

Even though Apple has let Google answer life’s navigational questions for us thus far, it doesn’t mean that Apple wants one of its biggest competitors cashing in on the iPhone and iPad forever.

Speculation surrounding Google Maps getting replaced in iOS has been around for years. In 2009, Apple bought a couple mapping companies. In mid-2010, the iPhone maker scrapped Google and Skyhook‘s location databases in favor of its own, and a couple months later started hiring iOS engineers with mapping experience. That’s more than enough to keep the rumor mill spinning, but things got a bit juicier today. The legal disclaimer section of the iOS 5 included references to a number of different mapping companies that aren’t Google, most notably TomTom. → Read More

If Sprint were a physical being that I could high-five, I’d totally be giving them the Bro-iest high-five the world has ever seen right now. → Read More

Sometimes rules are meant to be broken. Hungarian site Technet.hu knows this, and decided to shoot a spy-style video of Nokia CEO Stephen Elop showing off the first Nokia Windows Phone 7 smartphone at a secret event, despite the fact that the Nokia boss specifically asked attendants to put away cameras. → Read More

Praise be to the phone gods! We no longer have to keep calling HTC’s Facebook phone the ChaCha. BGR confirmed that the HTC ChaCha is headed to AT&T as the HTC Status, and we’re all glad to see one of the world’s most poorly named phones get a new title. Apparently, HTC was having some trouble with search service ChaCha over the branding.

We originally reported that the phone could launch on July 17 based on a date displayed in leaked photos. BGR claims the phone could launch as soon as next week, bringing a dedicated Facebook button to the AT&T masses. Unfortunately, still no word on pricing. → Read More