When we're all old and gray, our grandkids will gather around and ask us to tell them stories of the olden days. And one of those tales will probably be about what is was like to use a phone charger you actually had to plug in. Wireless charging has officially become "a thing," and with accessories like their WIreless Plate Charger, the latest Nokia phone chargers are definitiely at the forefront of this technology.

With their most recent phones – the Lumia 820, Lumia 920, and Luna – Nokia has enabled wireless charging, making for possibly the most laid back charging procedure yet. The charger essentially just plugs into the wall, but beyond that, there are no wires to deal with. You just place your phone on top of the pad and it's done.

How is this any different than using a regular phone charger, you may ask? Well, first consider how many times you've probably panicked, looking all over for your charger, with your phone battery at dangerously low levels. Now imagine your Nokia phone charger was pretty much stationary, always plugged into the same outlet, like a phone speaker or dock. Yep, that's pretty easy to find.

In general we think wireless charging is just a dandy idea. But in particular, we're failry impressed with Nokia's DT900 Wireless Charging Plate. It comes in fun, bright colors, as well as standard black or white, to match your Lumia 920. It's also compact and modern looking, the kind of thing that looks sleek on your desk and doesn't draw unwanted attention.

And for how new this technology really is and how handy of a gadget the Wireless Charging Plate can be, it's priced pretty cheap, around the $50 range. It's an accessory that's worth it for any owner of a new Nokia phone. And just imagine how much fun you'll have telling the grandkids that "back then," you were the first person on the block to get one.

Related articles

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• Bring your Nokia Lumia alive with wireless charging

There's no telling how a Microsoft-made smartphone would affect the company's dealings with hardware partners

Right on the tails of a major week for Microsoft's Windows Phone 8, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that Microsoft may be developing a smartphone of its own to go with its new OS.

The November 2 article, which cites "officials at some of Microsoft's parts suppliers, who declined to be named," says the company is running tests in Asia on their own smartphone, a device measuring between 4 and 5 inches.

However, the article's sources say the company is still undecided as to whether the device in question will ever go into mass production. And, when asked about the phone by the WSJ last week, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer declined to comment.

Still, the possibility is intriguing. Should Microsoft come out with their own handset to accompany Windows Phone 8, it's anybody's guess how that would affect its partnership with hardware partners, like Samsung, HTC, and Nokia. After all, Apple certainly doesn't let competitors use its smartphone OS.

And, if Microsoft really is planning to launch its own mobile device, it would be a complete 180 for them, after years of developing the software and leaving the design up to others.

Even so, as Gizmodo points out, a Microsoft-made smartphone could be a thing of beauty:

"Microsoft’s eye for design is keener than ever, and while WinPho is great, it’s yet to make the impressions it could. Or even should. A Microsoft phone could change that."

But don't get carried away. Quoting an older article on its own site, Gizmodo cautioned:

"Even if these reports turn out to be totally accurate — and that’s far from certain — this does not mean that Microsoft is close to actually making a phone you can buy. It doesn’t even mean it ever will. Just that it’s developing the hardware, and testing it. That’s it."

The latest addition to the Lumia family, Nokia's Verizon-exclusive Lumia 822 arrives this month

And we thought they'd never get back together...

Verizon announced this week that, for the first time in three years, they'll be carrying a Nokia smartphone.

The Nokia Lumia 822, a version of the Lumia 820 customized for Verizon, will start rolling out to Verizon subscribers this November, a press release announced. Though no release date has been publicized, a source told Engadget that it may be available by November 8, while BGR thinks it'll be out on November 12.

With the announcement no doubt timed to coincide with all of Microsoft's recent events, the smartphone runs on WIndows Phone 8, and is available exlusively through Verizon.

So how, exactly does the Lumia 820 stack up against other Lumia devices? Well, for one, it's curvier, and its camera pod and flash placement has the same lengthwise setup as the Lumia 920 and 810, "instead of the transverse layout found on the Lumia 820," writes Engadget.

As for specs, the Lumia 822 packs a dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor, has 8 GB of internal storage, and 1 GB of RAM, though you can get models with up to 64 GB.

Its 4.3" screen has a resolution of 800 x 400, and it's got an 8 megapixel camera as well as a 1.2 megapixel front-facing camera, and an exchangeable shell for wireless charging.

It body seems pretty sturdy, which is no surprise for a Nokia phone, though some have called it a little thick. Still, says one TechCrunch reviewer, "If anything, the version I played with was even thicker than normal because someone had swapped the stock backplate with the wireless charging plate, but the end result was a device that was still very comfortable to hold."

Available in white, black or grey, one of these bad boys will run fairly cheap – about $100 on a 2-year contract with Verizon.

The bright and colorful Nokia Lumia 920 line is coming in November, but only to AT&T

It's big, it's bright, it's beautiful, and it's coming in November – but only to AT&T?

Nokia recently unveiled the Lumia 920 at a press event in New York last month. But as TechCrunch and many others reported today, the company just announced that its flagship Windows Phone 8 device would be coming exclusively to AT&T in November, along with the Lumia 820.

TechCrunch seems to have anticipated this news, brushing it aside to focus instead on how great they think Nokia's new smartphone is:

"The Lumia 920 has just about everything you could ask for in a smartphone, with a 4.5-inch 720p display, a 1.5GHz Snapdragon S4 processor, a relatively large 2,000mAh battery, and of course, the heady combination of Windows Phone 8 and Pureview imaging."

But others, like Gizmodo, are taking issue with the Nokia's recent deal with AT&T, calling the exclusive "dumb" and citing 5 reasons why.

According to Gizmodo, the deal is going to hurt Windows Phone 8, and that "the premier Windows Phone device of the year [...] should be made available to as many U.S. shoppers as possible."

Captain Picard facepalms at Nokia's decision to give AT&T an exclusive

Meanwhile, says Gizmodo, carrier exclusives in general almost never work, and that, in particular, the exclusive Nokia gave to AT&T for the Lumia 900 didn't work either. The argument here is that users don't change carriers just for a new smartphone.

Another reason why Gizmodo is facepalming over the whole deal? They say that the Lumia 920's Qi wireless charging capabilities should be a major selling point, but that it's being downplayed by the fact that their device with Qi won't be widely available.

What do you think? Is an AT&T exclusive on the Lumia 920 a good idea? Leave your opinion in the comments section.

According to their latest campaign slogan, OIS is on. But Nokia's marketing team is way off in recent ads for the Lumia 920.

As Mashable reported the day of the device's September 5th unveiling, Nokia's been left with pants ablaze after two independent bloggers discovered that images and video used to promote the new Lumia 920 were misleading.

To clarify, the campaign's entire raison d'être was to pump up the Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) technology used for the new Nokia Lumia's “Pure View” camera. The argument here is that OIS makes for better pictures and video.

The campaign, shot in Helsinki, presents a model in different scenarios, with split screens labeled “OIS Off” and “OIS On.” Obviously, the images and video clips labelled “OIS On” are clearer, and even have a more artistic appeal. The only problem is, they're fakes.

Light diffractions in the Nokia Lumia 920 campaign images show they can't have been taken with the device

Neither the campaign photos nor the video were shot using the Lumia 920. Instead, a leaked picture of the photo shoot showed artificial lighting and professional equipment.

Since the story's emerged, Nokia has issued an apology, while still trying to cover its own ass. In an emailed statement, Nokia spokesperson Brett Young told Mashable:

“The video was produced while the Nokia Lumia 920 was in early prototype and still not ready to show the full benefits of the amazing innovation it contains.”

An independent blogger posted this photo of the proffessional lighting and camera equipment at Nokia's shoot for the new Lumia

That's like McDonald's saying the Big Mac in their ads only looks so big and juicy because the squashed sandwich you received with your order wasn't ready to display yet.

Nevertheless, says Young, “while there was no intention to mislead, the failure to add a disclaimer to the video was obviously a mistake.”

Apology aside, the campaign video now also contains a disclaimer that clarifies the footage is a “simulation of OIS technology.”

Nokia posted genuine photos on their site taken in low light with the latest Lumia 

Meanwhile, Nokia has posted some real photos on their site that were shot in low light with the Lumia 920 and without “artificial lighting or stands.” These are compared with similar images shot with competitors' devices. Assuming the new Lumia's pictures are the real deal, they do look quite good.

Finally some pictures have surfaced with close-ups of a device that might be the next generation of Nokia phones.Up till now, we’ve only had leaked pictures, component images and patent application drawings to fuel speculation about what Nokia’s very unique Windows Phone 8 might look like.

The phone in the pics has a boxy design, like the shape of a deck of cards. One of my first thoughts: if you aren't connected by Bluetooth or a headset, the edges might make it tiring to hold for a long period of time.

The views also show elongated speaker grilles down one whole side. The phone is  supposed to feature DTS sound - multichannel audio technology that is known for surround sound formats. The poor quality of speaker sound in portable devices today is almost as big a deal as battery life. DTS could mean a big leap forward in the audio experience. From a design standpoint, we can't imagine speakers extended the whole length of the handset. Maybe it's just for effect.

There's a lot that pictures can't tell. So the rumors of specs like a quad-core SoC, 12-megapixel camera and 4.5-inch HD screen should be taken with a big grain of salt.

Of course, this is all just a guess at whether these models are sourced from Nokia or rendered from legitimate hardware images or specs, but they are interesting. Maybe, we'll hear more on September 5th when Nokia and Microsoft hold their press event.

No matter what, a boxy design like this would be a real departure from the Apple, HTC and Samsung smooth, rounder edged and stylized cases we love right now. Windows 8 or not, I'd feel like Nokia's new device is drawing attention to my hand the way my eyes can't help but notice to a Nissan Cube on the street.

Nokia has partnered with Microsoft and plans to get back into the smartphone game with the launch of Windows 8-based devices. According to a source who prefers to remain anonymous, Nokia will be making their plans public at Nokia World next month.

Nokia officials aren’t commenting on the rumors, but Arnaud Bauduin, a Paris-based fund manager at Ofi Asset Management said on the matter, “To come back, they either need to surf on a Microsoft success in mobile or become cool again -- two complicated challenges.”

Nokia’s Lumia devices entered the market 9 months ago, but service providers like AT&T chose not to carry them. Since many customers didn't know about the existence of the Lumia devices, this had a huge negative impact on sales.

To improve the visibility of the phones, Nokia will be using volunteers from its U.S. staff called Nokia’s Army, to work with the salespeople at the major carriers. Nokia’s Army will focus on educating the sales staff and customers about the Lumia alternative.

Nokia believes that timing of the launch of their new Windows 8-based devices is key. They plan to have their smartphones on the store shelves ahead of Apple’s expected Sept. 12 unveiling of the new iPhone. 

Nokia has a lot of ground to make up. Their U.S. market share is at approximately 2% as Q2 this year. In 2001, it peaked at 32 percent.

Smartphones have finally taken over the United States with more than one third of American adults -- 35% -- own smartphones. According to The Pew Internet Project's survey found that 83% of U.S. adults have a cell phone of some kind, and that 42% of them own a smartphone, translating to more then 35% of Americans who own a Smartphone. Individuals who own a Smartphone fall into one of two categories include:

• One-third of cell owners (33%) say that their phone is a smartphone.
• Two-in-five cell owners (39%) say that their phone operates on a smartphone platform (these include iPhones and Blackberry, as well as phones running the Android, Windows or Palm operating systems).

American's now officially count for more than 100 million users Smartphone users in the United States. Android and Apple iOS continued to grow between November 2011 and January 2012, gaining 2.3% and 1.4% respectively. Google’s mobile platform topped the charts with a total market share of 48.6%, while Apple managed to capture a 29.5% share.

Smartphones are the main source of main source of Internet access for one-quarter of the smartphone population including 87% of smartphone owners access the Internet or email on their hand-held, including two-thirds (68%) who do so on a typical day. Most smartphone users such as Samsung Galaxy S3, BlackBerry Bold, etc typically use their smartphone rather than a traditional computer to access the Internet. Smartphone owners under the age of 30, non-white smartphone users and smartphone owners with relatively low income and education levels are particularly likely to say that they mostly go online using their phones. The Android OS Platform is the most common smartphone platform, followed by iPhone and Blackberry devices. Most Smartphones are operating on an Android Platform are especially common among young adults and African-Americans, while iPhone 4S and Blackberry devices are most prevalent among college graduates and the financially well-off.

Overall, in the Smartphone Market Samsung continues to tighten its grip on the featured phone and smartphone market. Nokia was still the global leader followed by Samsung and then Apple, which showed the highest percentage growth.

1)      The World's Most Expensive Mobile Phone is a the iPhone 4S "Diamond Rose" edition boasts a price tag of £5 million, which currently translates to $8,184,968.42. The lucky purchaser or recipient of this astounding and very glittery cell phone will receive 00 individual flawless diamonds totaling over 100 carats, a rose gold Apple logo with 53 diamonds, and a single cut 7.4-carat pink diamond on the home button. Sigh.......I guess I'd better start saving my money now.

2)      The first mobile phone call was in 1973 on a warm, sunny afternoon by Motorola General Manager Martin Cooper took to the streets of New York with a prototype mobile phone. The first phone call he made to was s Dr Joel S Engel of Bell Labs phone company. When Dr. Engel heard who was head of research at Bell Labs answered the phone call he was greeted by Martin Cooper's voice was delighted to be able to inform him that Motorola had officially created the first mobile phone. His exact words were, “Joel, this is Marty. I'm calling you from a cellphone, a real, hand-held, portable cellphone.”

3)      The first cell phone launched in 1984 at a whooping cost of more than $3,995 -- which is about $9,000 today, accounting for inflation. However, a hand-held cell phone was a definite status symbol for all of those 1980s yuppie types because the DynaTAC appeared in Gordon Gekko's hands in Wall Street, and later, Patrick Bateman used one in American Psycho. It was also made famous by Zach Morris in the 1990s high school television series Saved by the Bell.

4)      The first cell phone to be actually classified as a “Smartphone” debuted in 1993 at Florida's Wireless World Conference weighing a little more than a pound and featuring a  PDA type look with an early LCD touchscreen display. The original press release stated, “Designed by IBM, Simon looks and acts like a cellular phone but offers much more than voice communications. In fact, users can employ Simon as a wireless machine, a pager, an electronic mail device, a calendar, an appointment scheduler, an address book, a calculator and a pen-based sketchpad all for the cool price of $899.” Oh and by the way only 2000 of these “Smartphones” were ever produced.

5)      Germany's Friedhelm Hillebrand is credited with creating today's most popular Smartphone and cell phone feature i.e. the ability to text message or also known as the SMS texting system. Hillebrand created  the concept of a 128-byte text message to be sent via the existing mobile phone network. In 1985 Hillebrand experimented with making notes on his typewriter to come up with the ideal message length: 160 characters.

6)      With more than two-million mobile phone towers and antennas in the U.S, cell phone towers and antennas are often disguised as signs, clock faces, drainpipes, telephone poles, church and cathedral roofs and even weather vanes especially in our more urban areas. One of the most popular ways of disguising cell phone towers is in plastic trees. They're so popular websites like FraudFrond.com “pays homage to the fake trees that disguise our cell phone towers." World renowned photographer Robert Voit  featured an entire exhibit dedicated to photographs of the fake cell phone tower phenomenon.

7)      Experts has recently identified telephonophobia, nomophobia, frigensophobia and ringxiety as conditions that can affect the mobile phone users of our generation. Telephonobia is the fear of making or recieving phone calls, while  nomophobia means no-mobile-phone phobia and is the is the fear of being out of contact either by your phone being lost by either dead battery or no cell phone service. Ringanxiety is  when you hear (or feel) your mobile ringing when it's not (talk about cell phone obbession) and Frigensophobia is the fear that using your mobile is damaging your brain.

8)      In 1986 Scott Jones an promising and upcoming a26-year-old research scientist at MIT, invented the modern cellular voicemail system over a pizza or at least while attempting to order a pizza. His business venture Boston Technology won bids to create the voicemail systems for the mobile industry's big names. Talk about getting a lucky break with such a useful idea.

9)      The world's most popular phone is the Nokia 1100, a basic GSM candybar launched in 2003 and became the world's best selling mobile device ever with more than 250 million 1100s have been sold worldwide.

10)  Mobile device users are seeing an increase in QWERTY keyboards that offer more intelligent software means that use textonym faux pas are now being replaced by auto-correct faux pas, but not before they made the crossover from mobile to real life.

Smartphones are an essential part of our daily lives from driving, grocery shopping and talking or texting our loved ones. Smartphones are an integral part of our daily lives that we cannot live with or without whether we're a tween, teen, a busy mother on the go, a father recording his son's first home run or a grandparent’s joy at seeing photographs of their first grandchild. Smartphone applications are a reflection of that diversity and individuality of every Smartphone user from the most necessary to the funniest applications available for every Smartphone user. Here's a list of the Top 10 Funniest Applications for Smartphones:

1.) Pocket God is an episodic and exciting application available for Android and Apple Smartphones that allows its users or players to determine what type of God they would be if they were all powerful. Players can choose whether they're a benevolent or vengeful God of their very own island with up to six islanders per island, an availability of five different islands and a number of forces of nature are yours to control and manipulate. Pocket God is a fun application for any Smartphone user especially if you have a little time to kill, after all its not everyday your God of your own island.

2.) AgingBooth is your more than typical application that shows people what they might look like when they get older. AgingBooth was launched by PiVi & Co the creators of both FatBooth and BaldBooth, some of the most popular iPhone 4S application. Now AgingBooth for Android is available to download for free on the Android Market.

3.) The Moron Test is currently one of the best selling applications well...since the introduction of the Smartphone with millions of players worldwide. The Moron Test features simple, addicting gameplay, five sections featuring hundreds of fun puzzles and even hilarious characters, sound effects, and music.

4.) BaldBooth is similar to AgingBooth and instead shows the user what they might look like if they had no hair rather than simply being older. BaldBooth is a hilariously fun way to instantly make people bald on photo with your HTC OneX and other smartphone which can be shared with family, friends or colleagues via email, MMS, FaceBook, and Twitter.

5.) Talking Lila the Fairy will allow Smartphone users to discover Lila's world of magic and songs. Lila is a flower fairy that lives in a meadow who loves to sing and cast magical spells over the Smartphone users like Nokia Lumia 900, Galaxy S3, etc. Lila the Fairy can create flowers, animals, stars and other items with the help of her fairy dust.

6.) Talking Santa is a free Smartphone application that lets you tickle Santa and make him laugh, you can also poke or slap him but that may cause Santa not to give you gifts anymore. If you're nice to Santa by bringing him milk and cookies or naughty by running him over with a giant snowball will determine what types if any presents he brings you for Christmas.

7.) GhostRadar is a paranormal application for the Ghost-hunters in your life. The GhostRadar will continuously run sensors on your Smartphone to determine if there is anything strange happening around the user. GhostRadar applications has set the standard in ghost hunting because it analyzes the readings from sensors giving indications only when interesting patterns in the readings have been made and has a  voice to let you know when interesting words have been detected.

8.) Talking Tom Cat is your perfect pet cat that responds to your touch and repeats everything you say. He can be especially fun for children and even allows you to record your own videos of Tom Cat and share them on YouTube and even Facebook.

9.) SackDude: If you're feeling a little stressed or a little irritable, Sack Dude is your interactive Smartphone stress ball. So if you’re having a rough day, just remember Sack Dude can be smacked, set on fire, tickled or electrocuted and is your perfect stress reliever.

10.) FatBooth:  if you are feeling a little fat FatBooth will really show you might look like carrying those few extra pounds. Or if you are having a really bad hair day FatBooth could make you feel much better about how you look now.

The Good News is that all these applications only cost $.99.