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There's nothing worse than getting getting out-of-sync traffic information. Your navigation system re-routes you to avoid the traffic "slowdown," and it ends up taking longer than if you had just stayed on the highway.

The problem is rooted in the current traffic monitoring system that is currently in use in California - home to some of the most horrific traffic pile-ups in the country. Traffic flow is detected using fixed-position traffic-sensors (either video-based or inductive-magnetics embedded in the ground) and can only provide reactive data. That is to say, you can only detect traffic flow through changes in average highway speeds.

A group of 100 students at UC Berkeley want to make traffic flow detection a more accurate endeavor. They plan to trial a new system, dubbed Mobile Century, in which vehicles will be fitted with GPS-equipped mobile phones to serve as mobile traffic sensors. The Nokia N95 will be the handset of choice as these students drive all day between the cities of Ward and Fremont. And, the fleet of Nokia N95s will upload data to the Mobile Century servers every 3 seconds.

It looks like Samsung's efforts throughout the last months to develop the world's slimmest LCD for mobile phones have finally brought them to a happy end.

They have already broken their own record and have announced the development of what is truly the world's slimmest mobile phone display so far. The new 0.82 mm display is available in 2 sizes, 2.1 and 2.2 inch and features a 240 x 320 pixel resolution (QVGA), 500:1 contrast ratio and 300nit brightness. The company also announced that it has developed a new mobile technology, which it is calling, "i-Lens", for integrating the entire panel assembly, including a protective layer, into a single, thinner module that is more shock-resistant and easier to read than conventional panels

Friend of a friend JP from Nokia's former Multimedia Unit took this picture today inside Nokia Headquarters in Espoo, Finland. If you're not familiar with Nokia's reorganization plans then here is a brief summary: Before January 2008 there were three divisions inside Nokia making phones: Mobile Phones (the devices with model numbers that are 4 digits), Enterprise Solutions (Eseries) and Multimedia (Nseries). They jammed all those into one division now called devices. They created a new division dedicated to software and services and lastly they created a division called Markets that deals with advertising, manufacturing, etc.

While we're waiting for Motorola to finally unveil their Z10 Symbian UIQ based smartphone, they've decided to refresh the Z8 by teaming-up with Ferrari. The end result is way much better looking Z8. It's still much the same old Motorola Z8 but spiced up a tad with legendary Ferrari logos, not that the Ferrari name will make it perform any better, but it will match that just purchased Ferrari.

The only physical difference is that the Z8 Ferrari Limited Edition has red instead of green backlight and comes bundled with two Ferrari video clips, pre-registration to the official Ferrari website, Ferrari mobile content (wallpapers and ringtones), and direct links to the popular online magazines like Top Gear, Auto Express, GQ, Esquire and Autosport.

Motorola Z8 Ferrari should be available in the Ferrari store and Motorola European retail channels sometime in the first quarter of 2008.

Samsung Electronics introduced SGH-L760, a new 3G mobile phone, which offers essential features for today's mobile users. SGH-L760 satisfies the end users' needs of having a user-friendly hardware and software menu interface, up-to-date multimedia features and stylish design. The phone also meets the mobile service carriers' needs to encourage their customer's mobile data usage through fun and convenient mobile data experience.

Samsung's new SGH-L760 is a sexy UMTS 3G slider equipped with the most of popular mobile features including a 2 Megapixel Camera, Really Simple Syndication (RSS) Reader, FM Radio with Radio Data System (RDS), the latest music features and much more to entertain mobile users.

The first images of the forthcoming successor to the Samsung BlackJack have appeared.

The SGH-i617, shown with AT&T branding will run Windows Mobile 6 Standard as well as feature an improved QWERTY keyboard, which was a common complaint among users.

The complete featurest includes quadband GSM and dualband W-CDMA support with HSDPA high speed data access, QVGA display, 2.0 megapixel camera with video recording up from the original 1.3 megapixel unit, microSD expansion slot and Bluetooth 2.0 along with support for AT&T Music and AT&T Video services.