Nokia accused of faulty 8210s

A class-action lawsuit is being put together against Nokia in California, reports Nordic Wireless Watch. The suit alleges that Nokia knowingly sold faulty screens in many of its mobile phones, including the 8210.

The complaint claims that Nokia was "deceptive and misleading" in its advertising and knowingly sold mobile phones with defective displays. It contains allegations that some of Nokia`s most popular mobile phones including the 32xx, 51xx, 61xx, 82xx and 88xx series carried a common design defect.

According to the complaint, the alleged defect causes the phones` screen displays to fade or disappear with "substantial regularity" and that Nokia has been aware of the defect since at least 1998.

Nokia has released its latest market research on perceptions of multimedia messaging service (MMS)-based mobile services in the UK, Japan, US, Germany, Singapore and Finland. Nordic Wireless Watch reports that the study shows that the majority of respondents are excited by MMS - which is set to ape the roaring success of SMS.

Three-quarters of UK respondents regard MMS as exciting. Their positive expectations mirror actual mobile multimedia usage trends in Japan where these services are more developed than in the UK and the other four countries surveyed.

Among the research`s key findings on UK perceptions was that the potential of downloadable picture-based services is greater than previously thought. UK respondents expressed interest in travel information, news, games and screensavers. The study suggests that the popularity of these MMS-based services will capture traditional media spending for specific services - such as breaking news, travel and weather reports - from television, the Internet and other media.

Cram 65 000 people into a convention centre, add the sounds of aliens being shot and race cars being crashed at rock-and-roll volumes, then sprinkle in a few women dressed in costumes just this side of indecency. What you get, reports Reuters, is E3, the Electronic Entertainment Expo, the video game industry`s annual convention that starts this week in Los Angeles and represents the favoured forum for deal-making and promotion in a business expected to generate $30 billion in sales in 2003.

The show floor opens on Wednesday, but the festivities kick off tonight when Microsoft holds a press conference at which it is expected to announce upgrades to its Xbox Live online gaming service.

The next day, Sony and Nintendo will have back-to-back events to showcase the latest games for their consoles, the PlayStation 2 and GameCube. The afternoon will feature new games from Konami and the latest on Nokia`s N-Gage phone/game device.