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If you've seen Ice Cream Sandwich and the Galaxy Nexus in action, then it should be clear that the menu button has no future in the Android ecosystem. In order to drive that point home, Google has posted over at the Android Developer blog urging app creators to "say goodbye to the menu button." With the until now standard key getting the boot, big G wants devs to start designing interfaces that focus on the ActionBar introduced with Honeycomb. Of course, there's only so much room on the screen, and that's where the "action overflow" button comes in handy....

All of new RIM CEO Thorsten Heins' fresh ideas will apparently still be revealed to the company's board in a couple of weeks, but he's already dropped some gems in interviews with the Wall Street Journal and Reuters. First item on the agenda? Getting current users upgraded to the latest and greatest BlackBerry hardware. Citing internal statistics that indicate 80- to 90- percent of the company's customer base aren't running BlackBerry 7 hardware yet, it will work closely with US carriers to promote upgrades until the new BB10 devices hit later this year. There's no word on what the carrier deals include, but he hinted at device or preloaded app bundles. He also promised an...

MasterCard is all over the map when it comes to mobile payments. The credit company will partner with anyone, anywhere, anytime if it means getting new customers and making a buck on the deal. Its latest offering is called QkR, an Australian effort with support from the Hoyts chain of movie theaters and Commonwealth Bank. The initial trial run will be at La Premiere...

Seriously, we can't caveat this one enough -- there is no way of knowing if this is in fact the Galaxy S III or, if it is, when it might come to market -- but, it looks like Samsungs "next big smartphone" just made a cameo on the company's support pages. Listed as the GT-i9300, the mystery device reared its head over at the Global Download Center of the United Arab Emerites site. If Sammy is to keep with its naming scheme i93XX would be a flagship device -- the i90XX line was the Galaxy S, i91XX represents the S2 series, while the i9250 and i9220 are the Nexus and...

Despite only being on sale in the US for around three months, Amazon’s Kindle Fire has already become the joint most-used Android tablet. According to data released by analyst Flurry, Amazon’s locked-down Android device has gone from having 3% to 36% of the “application sessions” on Flurry’s ad network since November.
Here’s a graph showing the Fire’s astonishing growth, without any help from Europe or the “RotW” either:

So what does this show? That people do want tablets, but they’re not particularly bothered about the OS as long as they’re cheap and marketed very well. Something like that?
Link via...

Anonymity is something that has been strived for ever since information could be intercepted. From the days of mail couriers to the founding of mobile banking, remaining anonymous has been critical to success. Mobile platforms are obviously difficult to keep secure.
ProxyDroid hopes to help with that. Created by cmadeye, ProxyDroid is an Android app that is specifically designed to keep your browsing safe. According to cmadeye the app:

Just wake up from a very restful week-long slumber? First of all, we're envious of your good fortune. Second, Research in Motion made a few changes to its leadership chart. Third, you must be really hungry right about now. So grab a sandwich, come back in an hour and join Myriam, Brad, Sean Cooper and our very special guest Kevin Michaluk (yes, Mr. CrackBerry Kevin himself) as we discuss the northern news, as well as anything else that happened this week.

Be sure to send questions or comments you have for us or Kevin via Twitter (we're @engadgetmobile), or make your voice heard in our Ustream chat room during the show!

January 27, 2012 5:00 PM EST...

Although it was previously announced that it is unlikely that the new device from Samsung is presented at the World Mobile Congress next month, the information that has been leaking make us think otherwise, and now Samsung shows the Galaxy S III listed in the Global Download Center.
The model shown is listed as GT-I9300 and the curious thing about this is that download center includes all models of the company. Maybe they have already the release date, as some argue that the release of this device deserves it´s own event but the date remains uncertain.
Some previously leaked information about possible specifications says it will have a 4.6 inches AMOLED screen HD, Exynos 4212 processor dual-core 1.8GHz, 2GB of RAM and a camera 12MPX.
However, only time will tell us when they will announce their final characteristics and release date, meanwhile we have to wait and hopefully Samsung exceed our expectations.
Tell us what you think in the comments!...

What's that? An HTC PI86100 Windows Phone with AT&T-specific LTE (bands 4 and 17) showing up in the hallowed halls of the FCC? Why, this must be the Titan II, announced a tad over a fortnight ago. Docs show that a production unit of the device, sporting the aforementioned LTE bands as well as 850 / 1900 3G (also AT&T compatible), is ready to take on its new Windows Phone competition sometime soon. Is it a guarantee that the phone is nigh at hand? Not quite, but at least it signifies that the 16 megapixel beast is one step closer to showing up in our hands.
Gallery: HTC Titan II in the FCC...

Not so long ago, AT&T attempted to purchase wireless carrier T-Mobile from parent company Deutsche Telekom in March of 2011. Due to a variety of legal and ethical reasons this bid for market dominance was officially abandoned on December 19, 2011. A condition of this buyout was upon failure, AT&T would have to directly pay T-Mobile $3 billion cash, as well as another $1 billion in spectrum licenses. The result of this tragedy was AT&T posted a staggering $6.7 billion dollar loss for fourth quarter last year.
Who do you think has to pay for this? Apparently AT&T thinks the subscriber does, because less than a week ago they decided to raise their customer’s rates yet again. If your thinking of switching to AT&T the prices on all smartphone data packs have been raised by $5 per phone.
Five dollars not a lot you say? Let’s look at the numbers:
AT&T has 71 million subscribers currently. If each subscriber pays $5 dollars more AT&T will see an extra $355,000,000 in pure profit per year....