Another week of mobile news, rumours, and mysterious goings-on

With most in the European continent turning their attentions towards a certain hulking shiny black piece of new consumer electronics (aka PlayStation 3), it has been an uncharacteristically slow week on Pocket Picks, a site for those obsessed with slightly more diminutive gadgets. Still, this week has not been without its share of curiosities.

We began with Viviane Reding imploring the mobile industry attendees of CeBIT to adopt a standard mobile TV format, claiming that a move towards DVB-H was necessary to fully capitalize on its estimated 2009 ₤7.8bn market potential.

Elsewhere at CeBIT, the world's first solar powered phone was paraded courtesy of HTW Electronics and Samsung unveiled a snazzy new Bluetooth headset developed in conjunction with HiFi manufacturing god, Bang and Olufsen.

Speaking of music, 3 got some good news in the form of the prestigious award for Best Digital Music Service at last week's Music Week awards – for the second year running. Also celebrating was LG's iPhone-baiting Prada handset, scooping the 'best of the best' gong at the international red dot design awards in Germany.

There has been a steady decline in terms of iPhone news of late, but news that Apple is already gearing up for the mass manufacture of the unit in Taiwan is certainly quite revealing. It's a pity that an ill-informed eBay user didn't hear about that before they spent nearly ₤600 on a supposed iPhone handset; truly there is one born every minute. As for the other big surprise entry to the phone market, Google seems content to let the press speculate their lives away about the nature of the mysterious G-Phone device for now.

Although there have been no news thunderclaps this week, there's been a shower of quirky and interesting goings on. These ranged from mobile software applications that can variously calculate your age, your darts score and communicate via sign language, to a dog employed to sniff out mobile phones in prisons and a new anti 'artificial electromagnetic wave' head lotion designed to help keep out those nasty harmful mobile signals. As always, the world of mobiles continues to surprise and delight.

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