Personal communications

T-Mobile USA has lost close to half a million subscribers during the third quarter, according to the company's earnings statement out this morning (PDF).

The network lost a total of 492,000 postpaid contracts -- the lucrative long-term contracts that that bring in regular income for a cellular network -- during the quarter, causing a drop in its average revenue per user (ARPU) to $42.78, a decline of 7 percent on the same quarter a year ago.

The firm also reported a net 287,000 wholesale customers, including machine-to-machine (M2M) agreements and through its resellers.

However, T-Mobile USA … Read more

Research in Motion has won key government security certification for its BlackBerry 10 operating system months ahead of its launch, allowing the smartphone to be used in secure government workplaces.

The FIPS 140-2 certification signals that U.S. and Canadian government agencies, along with private firms, can deploy BlackBerry 10 smartphones as soon as they launch, with a guarantee that data stored on the devices is appropriately secured and encrypted.

FIPS (Federal Information Processing Standard) certification is issued by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, and it's a must for mobile platforms before the U.S. government can … Read more

As Hurricane Sandy bore down on the East Coast last week, millions of residents were left without power, cell phone service, Internet, and home phone service. In an outpouring of support for people left stranded by the superstorm, several mobile carriers took to the streets offering free device charging stations and access to emergency wireless phones.

Verizon announced this week that it will continue to help Sandy victims by waiving all charges for domestic voice and text usage for its customers in the New York and New Jersey areas between October 29 and November 16.

"Verizon Wireless continues to … Read more

T-Mobile today added Baltimore, Houston, and Washington, D.C. to the list of U.S. cities served by 4G (HSPA+) on its faster 1900 network.

"As a part of our $4 billion plan to transform our network, T-Mobile continues to strengthen an already fast and competitive 4G experience in major metro areas across the country by installing new equipment and retuning our 4G airwaves to work with more devices," T-Mobile USA Chief Technology Officer Neville Ray said in a statement today.

One of the devices that the carrier specifically highlighted to get the faster 4G coverage is the … Read more

Sprint is starting to flex some muscle with regional carriers.

The company announced today that it has inked a deal with U.S. Cellular for $480 million. The deal: Sprint will acquire 20MHz of PCS spectrum in the 1900MHz band across Chicago, South Bend, Ind., and Champaign, Ill. Sprint will also get 10Mhz of spectrum in the St. Louis market, as well as 585,000 customers, or about 10 percent of U.S. Cellular's subscriber base.

"Acquiring this spectrum will significantly increase Sprint's network capacity and improve the customer experience in several important Midwest markets including Chicago … Read more

Judging from an invite that just hit our desks, Verizon and HTC will pull the tarp off a fresh smartphone on Tuesday. The press event is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. in New York, and we plan to be on hand to find out just what kind of luscious mobile technology will drop from the sky.

I personally hope this event will center around the rumored HTC DLX handset, a 5-inch-screen phone said to be armed to the teeth with a truckload of powerful components and software. These include Android 4.1.1 Jelly Bean, an 8- or … Read more

Verizon Wireless today announced that starting in January it will kill its self-branded app store, which is installed on BlackBerry and Android devices.

Launched back in March 2010, the app store has mostly played second fiddle to Google Play on Android smartphones and tablets. Viewed as bloatware by a sizable segment of users, it pales in comparison, when it comes to selection, to even the Amazon Appstore or Getjar.

Even with some improvements over time, it has not been able to keep pace with Google's official distribution channel. In fact, even Verizon is quick to point out that a … Read more

When Americans think of mobile phone brands, two maybe three names spring immediately to mind: Apple, Samsung, and perhaps Motorola or even HTC. I bet Sony isn't on the tip of your tongue, despite the company's marketing efforts. … Read more

CNET has confirmed that the LG Nexus 4 for by T-Mobile will not come with Wi-Fi calling capabilities. The change was first reported earlier today by the tech blog TmoNews.

As one of the more popular features in select T-Mobile Android smartphones, it allows users to make calls via their Wi-Fi connection instead of using the carrier's towers and cellular network. Not only could this lead to potentially stronger signal in homes, but also it doesn't count against allotted monthly minutes.

Why there is no Wi-Fi calling in the new LG smartphone is fairly easy to explain. The … Read more