Emirates said the first permitted mobile phone call was made on a flight between Dubai and Casablanca. The aircraft, an Airbus A340, is fitted with a system which stops mobiles from interfering with a plane’s electronics.

Emirates plans to extend the system to more aircraft and later this year add BlackBerry and other data services. According to the airline, the mobile service will only be activated when the aircraft is at cruising altitude and the cabin crew will be able to monitor and control the use of the system.

MoGo Wireless announced the availability of their Cell Ranger line of intelligent amplifiers for cellular phones. Intelligent amplifiers are a new product segment superior to the current array of amplifiers offered in today’s market. This launch represents a significant step in the expanding market for solutions to cellular customers’ frustrating signal problems in both technology and form factor.

Cell phone users appreciate the increased signal strength and reduced number of dropped calls they experience while using Cell Ranger plug-and-talk products. Laptop users with broadband cellular air cards also experience increased data rates and reliability. Cell Ranger products are compact and attractive, making them ideal for cellular users of all types that may be experiencing poor cellular reception.

Spb Software House has released a new version of Spb Weather 1.7.4 with special integration support for the new version of Spb Mobile Shell.

Spb Mobile Shell 2.0 introduces the next generation user interface while keeping all advantages of a Windows Mobile device.

iambic’s EzQuote is a complete and straightforward solution allowing anyone on the go to track their favorite stock quotes. It offers an organized interface where to easily add/edit and remove stocks as well as get a quick overview of their current market prices. In-depth information is provided for each stock upon selection through its “details” screen. Compatible with any recent BlackBerry phone, including Pearl, Curve, and 8800.

Google’s search tool for mobile phones has increased searches by 20 percent, according to the company.

The software for Nokia, BlackBerry and now also Windows Mobile phones, makes searching 40 percent quicker, because it needs fewer clicks and there’s no waiting for a browser to download the search engine’s Web page, Google said.

RESETgame, makers of Par 72 Golf, have released a new action title for Palm OS and Windows Mobile devices. Tank Ace 1944 is a 3D strategy shooter that puts you in command of a World War II tank. There are three different scenarios: Allied, German, or Soviet and three tanks a Sherman, Tiger, and T34, each with movable turret and cannon. The goal of each round of play is to clear the enemy from a map sector and drive them off the far bank of a river so that your side can cross and advance.

The Internet has profoundly changed journalism, but not necessarily in ways that were predicted even a few years ago, a study on the industry released Sunday found.

It was believed at one point that the Net would democratize the media, offering many new voices, stories and perspectives. Yet the news agenda actually seems to be narrowing, with many Web sites primarily packaging news that is produced elsewhere, according to the Project for Excellence in Journalism’s annual State of the News Media report.

Avian, a brokerage firm whose research covers the high-tech and aerospace industries, said that an unnamed large manufacturer is seeing return rates of 20 to 30 percent on SSD-based notebooks, thanks to failures and performance issues.

Laptops with flash memory-based solid state drives (SSDs) are being returned at an alarming rate because of technical failures and performance shortcomings, according to a study released this week by Avian Securities.

Returns due to technical failure ran at 10 to 20 percent, 10 times higher than failure rates for conventional drives, the report said.

Research In Motion announced a BlackBerry Java Development Environment (JDE) plug-in for Eclipse–a new development tool that enables Eclipse developers to create and test robust wireless applications for the BlackBerry platform seamlessly from within the familiar Eclipse Integrated Development Environment (IDE). The BlackBerry JDE Plug-in for Eclipse will enable Eclipse developers to create powerful mobile applications for the large and growing base of BlackBerry smartphone users while maintaining a familiar Eclipse development environment. It will also allow Eclipse developers to leverage the inherent capabilities and benefits of the BlackBerry system architecture and development tools.

Electric Pocket has introduced FindMe for Windows Mobile and BlackBerry devices. FindMe enables users, their friends, family and colleagues to share their current locations automatically and securely through their BlackBerry or Windows Mobile Smartphones without needing GPS. FindMe offers the opportunity to “tag” commonly visited locations, such as home, office, soccer field or favorite bars and restaurants, and post those locations on their Facebook profiles. Unlike many location-sharing programs, FindMe doesn’t broadcast geographic location information. Only the names of locations that the user has tagged will be shared on their FaceBook profiles. Since FindMe uses cell tower location rather than GPS, it will work with any GSM Windows Mobile smartphones and all CDMA and GSM BlackBerry devices with trackballs–chiefly the popular Pearl and Curve models.