GigaOM

Tweens, also known as the sixth grade set, are the newest wireless demographic. They want their toys and they want their mobile phones, and parents, well they better suck-up and spend the dollars. Or perhaps deal with surly kids for a long long time. (Hey maybe this could be a theme for a WB show!)

“It’s cool and popular,” Patty, a sixth-grader in Valrico, Fla., said of her reason for wanting the mobile phone. “And I can talk to my friends and talk to my dad and mom.”

The reason parents are letting them have these phones is because cellphone companies are offering really cheap family plans where additional lines cost sometimes as little as $10 a month. It shows that the market is getting as mature as it can get, and the wireless penetration could be hitting a peak. Still, tweens represent good money for companies who are making “tween” phones. Companies like Firefly Mobile and Tiger Electronics. (more)

My colleague Damon Darlin points out over at business2blog that “Jeff Hawkins, the inventor of the PalmPilot, Handspring, and the Treo, just announced at PC Forum that he is going to start a new, and as-yet-unnamed, company based on brain research he has been pursuing at his Redwood Neuroscience Institute.” Does this mean he is resigning as CTO of Palm One? Or does it also mean that things are getting hairy inside Palm and he is deciding to bail out before the iceberg meets the company? Timing of this is pretty awkward, given that PalmOne is out selling its vision to investors on the east coast.

California wants SBC to sell naked DSL, but FCC is saying - don’t even think about it. In case People’s Republic of California gets away with it, then well every state is going to come up with its own set of rules for naked DSL. Florida, Georgia, Kentucky and Louisiana - all states in the home territory for BellSouth are contemplating naked DSL. Which cannot be good. It makes sense for FCC to articulate a coherent policy which is more for the consumers, and less favorable to the mega carriers. Actually things are getting touch for consumers when it comes to broadband options. The Brand-X case hearing is coming up, and if the independents lose this one, well hello to broadband duoply and goodbye competition. Many believe that if cable guys get away with denying ISPs right of passage on their networks, phone companies will also get the same privilege. Oh man… oh! [Via} More on naked DSL!

Vonage calls are being blocked again, this time by a cable operator and a wireless broadband service provider, according to Brooke Schulz, a spokesperson for Vonage. News.com broke the story. The company has not revealed any details, but previously it had faced similar issues with Madison River Communications, a tiny telecom operator. Still, it is going to be a major issue going forward, as CEO Jeffrey Citron had earlier pointed out.

Dell makes all these noises about cutting back on outsourcing, bringing back jobs to the US… blah blah blah… we have had a bad experience there… blah.. blah… blah! Well not really! Last week Michael Dell went over to India, to Mohali in particular which is suburb of beautiful Chandigarh, in the land of Punjab, … to open a call center. The company also has one call center in Banglaore and one in Hyderabad. Actually Dell at present employs about 7000 people in India, according to News.com. Sepia Mutiny writes:

We welcome Dell to the land of sardars in shades on scooters with sidesaddle Sikhnis, wax-tipped moustaches and mooli parantha. And we offer this unsolicited advice: the 12-step program for keeping your Punjabi workers happy is, the dhaba should be no more than 12 steps away.

Or as the translation goes, Paah ji, I am getting a Dell.

Indian telcos target rural community are adapting wireless networks for unique uses.

Sunil Bharti Mittal, chairman of India’s second-biggest mobile-phone network, says fishermen on the nation’s southern coast are using their cell phones while at sea to call traders and find out who’s paying the most for lobsters. He’s planning to stop that. Instead, Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd will offer the fishermen a wireless Internet service that would provide up-to-date prices for their catch and even allow them to book orders from their boats. Doing that, the fishermen ‘will significantly increase their earnings’, he says. Fishermen aren’t the only ones on Mr Mittal’s radar screen. In the next 12 to 24 months, he plans to introduce technology that will enable farmers to monitor weather conditions in real time on their mobile phones.

via The Desi Flavor

Sony PSP is going hit the stores this week, and as Russell says it is one of the most eagerly awaited platforms on the market, something that could actually turn Sony’s fortunes around. I think so too. (There is a great story on PSP in Business 2.0.) Sajeeth Cherian, the wunderkid behind BitTorrent for dummies software, Videora, has come up with a unique new application, PSP Video 9. It will take any video and turn into a format that PSP can read. So now you can download videos using Videora, and then convert them to PSP friendly format within a few seconds. Thats right! Videora will seek out the video you want using RSS, download it to your PC using BitTorrent and PSP Video 9 will take this video, convert it to the PSP video format and copy it to your docked PSP, all while you are asleep. He calls this PSP casting. “When combined with another application, Videora + PSP Video 9 form the first PSPcasting solution, allowing you to download, convert and copy video to your PSP, automatically using BitTorrent and RSS technology,” he says. Podcasting, so 2004! But more seriously, this could really help PSP lovers get more value out of their devices. Imagine watching Alias whole riding the subway to work!