Phones galore at the CTIA show

What do sumo wrestling, sushi and lots of cool phones have in common? They were all at Pepcom's MobileFocus showcase at the CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment trade show in Los Angeles, a special event held Tuesday night for members of the media. While hungry journalists nibbled on Japanese finger food, suited up to battle one another on the sumo mat and threw back a few drinks, mobile-handset makers and other mobile technologists showed off their latest products.

T is for Teen
First up was LG, which touted the VX 3450, aka the "Teen Phone" (not to be confused with "Teen Wolf," the 1980s teen movie starring Michael J. Fox). The Teen Phone, which just came last week, is being sold by Verizon Wireless. I'm not really sure what, specifically, makes this phone particularly well suited for teenagers. But it is cheap--$29.99 retail when purchased with a service plan, according to the PR person at the booth. Kids (or cheap adults such as myself) get all the functionality of a low-end phone. It also comes with a cool feature that allows you to compose your own ringtone.

LG also showed off a bunch of its other phones, including the VX8500 Chocolate music phone, which is also offered through Verizon Wireless. This was the first time I had gotten my hands on the Chocolate. It's a cool-looking phone and the music tracks sounded pretty good as well. But there's something about the fact that LG and Verizon have copied Apple Computer's iPod design that rubs me the wrong way, especially since the click wheel in the center of the phone doesn't really work like the click wheel on an iPod.

CrackBerries with style
Research In Motion showed off its new 8100 BlackBerry Pearl phone. Now available for use on T-Mobile's network, the Pearl has a very cool design. In fact, it's the first BlackBerry device I've seen that looks like a real phone and not a souped up calculator. Clearly the company is trying to appeal more to average consumers. While I like the way the phone looks, I can't say I was crazy about trying to type an e-mail on it. The abridged sure-type keypad seems like it takes some getting used to. Maybe I'm just slow, but I can't see myself tapping out any long messages on this keypad. Then again, I hate text messaging.

Phones as fashion
I know it's nothing really new, but I thought the Nokia 7370 fashion phone was also interesting and fun. The tan phone has an etched floral-pattern design, and it swings open to expose the keypad and activate the phone. The thing that I find sort of funny is that the company has a little Nokia tag sticking off the side of the phone, as if to indicate that it is of designer quality, like a Kate Spade handbag or something. Even though I am a huge "Project Runway" fan, I'm probably too cheap to pay the $350 retail price for the phone just to be fashionable. I'm also sure there are people out there who wouldn't blink at the price.

Activewear for the ultimate techhead
Since I'm on the subject of fashion, I also swung by the Motorola booth and checked out the latest version of the Audex snowboarding jacket, made by Motorola and snowboarding gear specialist Burton. The jacket, which comes in pink for women and black for men, is Bluetooth-enabled and allows snowboarders to listen to streaming music from their iPods or Motorola Q handsets. They also can make calls from their Motorola phones while on the slopes.

There's a built-in control panel on the sleeve for changing tracks, checking the ID of a caller or picking up calls. Stereo speakers are built into the collar. The microphone is sewn into to the sleeve for hands-free talking. While some people may see this as an ultra-cool 007 kind jacket, it seems bit more ridiculous and Inspector Gadget to me.

TV anytime, anywhere
In addition to many handset makers, MobiTV, which provides streaming video content for mobile phones, was also at MobileFocus Tuesday night. The company was showing off its newly announced service, which allows people to access MobiTV channels on their PCs through their broadband connections. MobiTV is partnering with AT&T to offer the service.

For $20 a month, subscribers get as many as 20 channels of streamed Internet, which they can access from any PC with a log-in username and password. Some of the channels currently available include HGTV, The Food Network, Bloomberg, Oxygen and the Weather Channel. The Fox News Channel can also be streamed, but is accessible only by customers who have AT&T Yahoo DSL Internet.

This service really stumps me. I can't figure out exactly why anyone would pay $20 a month to get cable TV channels on their PCs. Most people don't want to watch TV on their PCs, and besides they're already paying about $50 a month for cable anyway. I guess the service might appeal to frequent travelers who miss TV while they're on the road. But Slingbox, which has created a device that taps into your cable service at home and streams it over the Internet to your laptop, is addressing this need with a different product and business model. With Slingbox, there's the one-time box fee, but no ongoing subscription fee.