Sony Ericsson to do first Windows phone

Posted by Ina Fried

Handset maker Sony Ericsson is announcing plans for its first Windows Mobile device, a move aimed at boosting the company's presence in the North American smartphone market.

The first product is a business-oriented phone with a QWERTY keyboard, but a family of devices is expected. Over time, Microsoft hopes Sony Ericsson will leverage its camera and music expertise to help build more consumer-oriented devices.

"They've really got some great consumer brands that we'd love to partner with and bring to Windows Mobile," Microsoft Vice President Pieter Knook said in an interview.

The company is expected to have more to say about Windows Mobile in general at its press conference Monday, but Microsoft isn't announcing any details on its future operating systems. There have been rumors aplenty about both a modest update to Windows Mobile 6 and a future version that would have much more touch-screen capabilities a la the iPhone.

Knook acknowledged that Apple has included some nice features with the iPhone, particularly in the Web browser, but declined to talk about when Microsoft might incorporate some of those advances.

"We are certainly investing in the browser," Knook said. "We are certainly investing in entertainment scenarios."

Photo handling is another area he identified as important. The most recent version of Windows Mobile allows for photos to be uploaded to Windows Live Spaces, but Knook said there's more work to do on that front.

"That's still an area where the user experience is more cumbersome than it needs to be," Knook said. As for music, Knook noted the company's recent purchase of Musiwave, as well as the work being done by Microsoft's Zune team.

"We do envisage that some of those experiences will come to the Windows Mobile platform in the future," Knook said.

Update: The device will be known as the Xperia X1, featuring a 3-inch VGA display with an "arc slider" to slide out the keyboard. The device will support HSDPA and HSUPA networks, as well as Wi-Fi.

Heavy cell phone use tied to poorer sperm quality

By Amy Norton

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Spending hours on a cell phone each day may affect the quality of a man's sperm, preliminary research suggests.

In a study of 361 men seen at their infertility clinic, researchers at the Cleveland Clinic found an association between the patients' cell phone use and their sperm quality.

On average, the more hours the men spent on their cell phones each day, the lower their sperm count and the greater their percentage of abnormal sperm.

The findings, published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, add to questions about the potential health effects of cell phones and other wireless devices. Some studies, for example, have linked long-term cell phone use to a higher risk of brain tumors, though many other studies have found no such connection.

The concern is that, over time, the electromagnetic energy emitted from mobile phones could theoretically harm body tissue -- by damaging DNA, for example.

However, the new findings do not prove that cell phones somehow damage sperm, according to the researchers.

"Our results show a strong association of cell phone use with decreased semen quality. However, they do not prove a cause-and- effect relationship," lead researcher Dr. Ashok Agarwal told Reuters Health.

He and his colleagues based their findings on semen samples from 361 men who came to their infertility clinic over one year. All of the men were questioned about their cell phone habits.

In general, the researchers found, sperm count and sperm quality tended to decline as daily cell phone hours increased. Men who said they used their phones for more than four hours each day had the lowest average sperm count and the fewest normal, viable sperm.

"We infer from our results that heavy cell phone use ... is associated with a lower semen quality," Agarwal said. But whether cell phones somehow directly affect men's fertility is not clear.

Agarwal said he and his colleagues have two studies underway aiming to shed light on the issue. In one, they are exposing semen samples to electromagnetic radiation from cell phones to see what, if any, effects occur.

The second is a follow-up to the current study that is assessing a larger group of men. Agarwal said this study is more rigorously designed and will account for certain other factors like lifestyle habits and occupational exposures that might affect sperm quality.

SOURCE: Fertility and Sterility, January 2008.