Apple’s popular iPod mobile media device, with 100 million units sold since 2001, has evolved from a music machine to a digital photo album, video player and podcast platform.

Most recently, fifth-generation iPod owners have begun downloading games from Apple’s iTunes Store for $4.99 apiece, ranging from tile and card classics, such as Mahjong and Texas Hold ‘Em, to newer puzzle favorites Tetris and Bejeweled. Two new titles have just been added to the lineup–Ms. Pac-Man and EA Sudoku–bringing the total number of games to an even dozen.

What do the automatic fish catcher, the easy sushi-maker, and the body-shaping petticoat all have in common? They’re creations of some of the world’s most innovative minds for the world’s laziest bodies.

Hoping to turn their contraptions into capital, some 700 inventors from 42 countries have gathered at the International Exhibition of Inventions to show off gizmos ranging from a multifunction umbrella that contains an anti-mugger alarm to personal armor made of coconut-fiber.

VITO Technology has released VITO AstroNavigator II, the GPS application that displays the sky map above you according to your current position, time and direction of movement. It is high time to break away from all the high-tech around and watch the night sky.

Screen tapping is brought to a completely new level in the new VITO AstroNavigator II. You will feel that touching the sky can be real fun. Everything (including zooming) can be done just by sliding the screen. Just like you all have recently seen in the famous presentation of a new iDevice.

For the new Blackberry 8800, Boxwave has released their Armor and FlexiSkin cases. In addition, they have released Designio Leather cases for the HP iPAQ rx4000, HP iPAQ rx5000, and the O2 XDA Atom Life. Other releases include a desktop cradle for the HTC P4350, and the Styra stylus for the O2 XDA Orbit.

Spb Software House has released Spb Diary 2.5, an update to the award-winning Pocket PC PIM Today plug-in. Spb Diary is a feature-rich Today plug-in for your Calendar, Tasks, Contacts, Notes and Messages providing users with the highest level of functionality and usability.

The new version provides more than 40 improvements requested by users during the last months. The most noticeable changes are the ability to put any Today plug-ins in a form of Spb Diary’s tabs and the new horizontal tabs, which made it possible to show all your PIM information in full screen while keeping the rest Today plug-ins one-click accessible. Other improvements cover many different usage scenarios making this upgrade of use to every user of Spb Diary.

After the recent re-install episode with his Verizon XV6700 Pocket PC, Senior Editor James Booth quested for a method to clone his setup. What he found was Spb Backup from Spb Software House. Does it fit the bill? You’ll have to read further to find out.

Read this Computing Unplugged article.

Research In Motion finally offered some details late Thursday about what caused a severe outage of its BlackBerry email service from Tuesday evening until Wednesday morning.

The company said in a statement that it had ruled out security and capacity issues as a cause of the outage that left millions of so-called “CrackBerry” addicts without access to their email for several hours. The company also said the incident was not caused by any hardware failure or core software issue.

Ruling out those causes, the company has “determined that the incident was triggered by the introduction of a new, noncritical system routine that was designed to provide better optimization of the system’s cache.”

Microsoft is prepping a new service from its Developer Division to attract the MySpace.com generation.

In a little more than a month, Microsoft is slated to unveil a new effort from the company’s Non-Professional Tools Group. John Montgomery, a program manager on the team, has been tasked with coming up with new ways to empower nonprogrammers to be able to customize their experiences on Microsoft’s platform technologies. That effort is coming to a head, officials of Microsoft told eWEEK.

T-Mobile USA and Research In Motion introduced the BlackBerry 8800, a slim, performance-driven handset aimed at users who want a phone with both power and style. The BlackBerry 8800 allows users to stay connected and productive while on the go.

The BlackBerry 8800 complements the popularity of the BlackBerry Pearl, providing customers with a proven mobile experience in a slim design with a full QWERTY keyboard. The BlackBerry 8800 includes support for up to 10 work and personal e-mail accounts (including the most popular ISP email accounts), a built-in multimedia player for music and video, and full HTML web browsing. Premium features also are included such as Bluetooth 2.0 support for hands-free use with headsets, car kits and Bluetooth peripherals, RIM’s user-friendly trackball navigation system, noise cancellation for enhanced audio performance, and a microSD expandable memory slot for storage.

A fifth defendant pleaded guilty in connection with a piracy ring that used BitTorrent technology to distribute copyrighted movies, software, games and music over a peer-to-peer network.

Sam Kuonen, 24, of Columbus, Ga., pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit criminal copyright infringement and criminal copyright infringement in violation of the Family Entertainment Copyright Act, according to officials at the U.S. Department of Justice. The plea was entered in U.S. District Court in Kansas. Kuonen faces up to five years in prison, a fine of $250,000 and three years of supervised release when he is scheduled to be sentenced on July 16.