There. I said it. I hate it. OK, I don't really hate it. But sometimes I want to smash it against the wall. The last time was in the pit at the Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's concert in Madrid. I was there, first row, centre of the stage, after waiting a whole night and day outside of the stadium. That night was the most amazing and magical I've experienced in a very long time, and certainly the best rock concert I've ever been to. Only one thing failed: my iPhone's camera.

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After yesterday's California earthquake everyone and their dogs* is posting videos online. Mobile Phones, camcorders, digital cameras, or CCTV, it doesn't matter: like the following clips show, it looks like this era of democratised gadgetry has made humans eager to record their own destruction, perhaps as a last chance to leave a notch in History. I can see it already, when the fourth angel sounds the trumpet, people will take out their mobile phones and start recording a video of the Apocalypse. Except iPhone users, who would only be able to take photos. That and change their Facebook status to "is watching the asteroid falling."

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A bunch of new photos and specs for Nokia's Tube, a.k.a. The 5800 XpressMusic, have been leaked to the Internet. The alleged iPhone killer will apparently come with a 16:9 16 million colour TFT LCD display with 640 X 360 pixel resolution, haptic feedback, a 3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, Dual LED flash, a built-in GPS and 140MB RAM. Also, lots of grease and fingerprints, it seems.

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Samsung has a new slider on the market in Europe and we're hoping it finds its way over here. The i8510 is a S60-powered GSM phone with very fast 3G speeds and Wi-Fi, as well as GPS. What makes this high-end phone lust-worthy, though, is the 8 Megapixel multifunction camera with Xenon flash that can record video at up to 120 frames per second. It also has image stabilisation and face recognition as well as other features. Couple that with Bluetooth 2 and 16GB of internal flash storage and you've got a serious, slim phone for T-Mobile users. And it looks really nice, too. [Symbian Guru]

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There's apparently a new touchscreen handset from LG on the way, and early word is that it's slated to be the Korean phone maker's new flagship phone. So far known as the KC910, it appears to be more camera than phone, shooting at 8-megapixels with a real Xenon flash, face detection, image stabilisation, and a 480p camcorder function, which is worth noting. It also supposedly has an 800x480 resolution screen, which means it can show 16:9 movies with no cropping, all in a form factor a little over half an inch thick. If they can throw in a few other high-end features like Wi-Fi and a good browser then this handset could out-media the iPhone and be a real challenger, but we're holding our judgment till we've seen it in action. [Electronista, via DC Sources, via Ubergizmo]

Remember QR codes? Those small, square designs that act like barcodes that you can scan with your mobile phone's camera? They're huge in Japan - those crazy Japanese are even putting them on graves.

Well, Telstra announced today that they'll be introducing the software to read QR codes on their NextG handsets as a free download for customers. And from the sounds of it, it will happen automatically - so you don't even need to do anything.

According to the press release, Telstra's planning on using the QR codes to offer, among other things:

"the latest news, sport and weather information; music files; maps; store information for later if you're in a hurry; tickets to shows; video presentations that give users guided tours, how-to information and trailers; links to social networking sites and special discount offers."

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BoingBoing found this story of a mobile phone camera voyeur trying to snap pics of a naked gal at a tanning salon before someone called the cops on him. This wouldn't be interesting at all except for the fact that when the cops came, the guy kept denying that he did anything until the cops searched him twice and found a mobile phone jammed up his rectum. Did the cops confiscate his phone? Did they force him to delete those pics? How many megapixels was the cameraphone? The Smoking Gun coming up short on this one. [Smoking Gun via Boing Boing]

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Twice we've brought you leaked info on Sony Ericsson's upcoming C905 mobile phone, and today at last Sony came good with official specs. The camera in its slider body is indeed an 8.1-megapixel one, with xenon flash, auto-focus, face detection and image stabilisation. The phone's also pretty full-featured, and is GPS-ready, with a 2.4-inch TFT screen and TV-out capability as we'd heard. So is it a camera with a bolt-on phone or the other way around? Read the specs in the press release to decide. Simultaneously, Sony came up with news of the S302 Snapshot, which sounds like a lower-spec sibling to the C905 with just 2-megapixels and a fixed-focus lens. Both should be available late this year.

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The leaked Sony Ericsson C905 Cyber-shot phone already has spy shots of it in the wild, detailing its rounded body and sliding face. The guy who played with it says it's 20mm thick and weighs 136 grams, which isn't all that bad if you're taking into account the fact that it's also an 8.1-megapixel camera. Two more shots after the jump. No shots that show the lens, unfortunately.

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The idea behind Nike's new PhotoID scheme is that you take a picture with your mobile phone and MMS it to Nike's computers. These grab the two dominant colours and send you back an image of a 1985 Dunk high-top basketball sneaker with the colours mapped on. Cool, but here's the neat bit: you can buy the sneakers. Clever bit of PR from Nike, but it does mean you could get a pair of sneakers in hues to match your fave photos... be that sandy yellow and ocean blue, or clean bedsheet white and nubile-skin pink if you're into that sort of mobile phone photography. Launches today, but you'll have to be in one of nine European countries if you fancy trying it out. [The Guardian]

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