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Despite recent analyst downgrades that suggested the smartphone maker should be bankrupt within 9 month, Palm has announced some good news today, stating their Pre Plus and Pixi Plus phones are headed to AT&T, making the smartphones available via Sprint, Verizon and AT&T, the three largest carriers in the U.S.

The phones will be available in the "coming months," and will cost $150 for the Pre and $50 for the Pixi with two-year contract.

Data plans will be mandatory but the unlimited plan is "recommended" meaning buyers can pay for a cheaper non-unlimited plan.

Palm's shares have slightly rebounded but still hover around the 52-week low mark.

Amazon has introduced their Kindle software for the iPad today, looking to actively compete against the Apple iBook store and Barnes & Nobles rival iPad app.

450,000 books are available via the Kindle store, giving iPad owners a plethora of options when they receive their tablets on April 3rd. As is standard, the app will use Whispersync to sync the last page you were reading if it was on another device such as the Kindle device or an iPhone or BlackBerry.

Additionally, you can customize the background color and the font size of the book you are reading, as well as adjust brightness.

According to GameStop, recent PS3 and Wii hardware shortages will continue for some time, both in store and online.

"I am not exactly sure that I have a total answer, obviously, it is a question that we ask the platform holders," said the company during their recent earnings conference call. "Consequently, I can tell you that we do anticipate that we will be in that situation for the PS3 for another couple of months, unfortunately, because we could sell a lot more hardware than what we have on both that and the Wii platform."

Fortunately for would-be Wii buyers, the retail store says it expects the Wii to be back in stock before the PS3.

As for why both consoles are in shortages? The "unprecedented demand" has left the companies "still scrambling to catch up from the December surge of hardware that occurred." In December, the Wii set an all-time record for most consoles sold in a month in the U.S.

India, one of the world's biggest film markets, also has one of the bigger piracy rates in the world and the Hollywood and Bollywood studios want to try to put an end to it.

The MPAA and seven Indian companies have signed a coalition intended to fight piracy, with the group working with movie theaters to try to shutdown camcorder recordings, as well as working with ISPs to shut down the ease of Internet piracy.

The industry group would not reveal the budget but did say it would come from its members, the major studios. The MPAA has anti-piracy coalitions in the U.S., the EU and Hong Kong.

"People are becoming more of the same mind," adds Dan Glickman, the chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America. "The Indian film industry now understands their product is getting stolen at significant rates."

According to an Ernst & Young study, piracy cost the Indian economy $959 million and 571,000 jobs in 2008.

Sony recently launched their highly-anticipated motion controller, the PlayStation Move, a system that should rival the Wii and Microsoft's upcoming Natal motion system.

The Move is used in conjunction with the PlayStation Eye camera and allows for real-time tracking of the player's body movements.

Standalone prices are still not confirmed but the company says that a "starter bundle" including a game, the PS Eye and the Move will retail for under $100.

Yesterday, Engadget Live showed off the Move in action, including 'Minority Report'-esque augmented reality and multi-touch.

There is not too much to explain that isn't in the video, but Sprint has started a new ad campaign for their 4G Mobile Hotspot, giving iPhone, iPad and other smartphone users the ability to connect to a 4G data connection.

4G is available in 25 cities currently, with more (such as NYC) promised "for the near future."

Download speeds with 4G are usually around 5 Mbps, about 400 percent faster than average 3G speeds from carriers such as Verizon and AT&T.

Vodafone Spain has confirmed today that they accidently shipped 3000 smartphone handsets with MicroSD cards that were infected by the "Mariposa" malware.

Those affected are users who were shipped HTC Magic phones.

The carrier came clean after a meeting with Panda Security. The story of the infected memory cards began when a Panda technician was shipped an HTC Magic phone. He immediately recognized the malware, which is used to steal information.

Vodafone says the infection is "isolated and local," and that users in other parts of the EU should not be worried.

For those that read Spanish, the original posting is here: Movilzone.es

Bharti Airtel, India's largest mobile carrier has announced that it will begin selling the Apple iPhone 3GS in the upcoming months, bringing the popular smartphone to 124 million Indian subscribers.

The iPhone 3G model has been available in the nation through Bharti and Vodafone since late 2008, but no carrier had struck a deal for the 3GS until this week.

Earlier in the week, Bharti submitted its bid to participate in an auction for 3G bandwidth in the nation. India has no commercial 3G services currently but successful bidders will be allowed to begin selling 3G data plans commercially in September.

Just two days after a jury found that Microsoft had violated patents of small company VirnetX and fined the software giant $105.75 million USD, VirnetX has filed suit again, trying to get the jury to prove that more Microsoft products infringe on their patents, as well.

The jury had found that Windows XP, Vista and Office Communicator infringed the patents, but the suit was filed in 2008, so the new lawsuit now claims that Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 also infringe on the patents.

"This is a tactical and procedural post-trial action to ensure and protect our property rights as we proceed to final resolution with Microsoft," says VirnetX CEO Kendall Larsen.

Microsoft has already vowed to appeal the first ruling, and challenged this latest suit as well. Says MSFT spokesperson Kevin Kutz (via AllThingsD): "Microsoft respects intellectual property, and we believe our products do not infringe the patents involved. Moreover, we believe those patents are invalid. We will challenge VirnetX?s claims."

Tracy&Matt is reporting today that struggling smartphone maker Palm may be offering the Palm Pre Plus (and the Pixi Plus) via O2 in the UK.

They site received a message from a "credible tipster" which reads as follows:

O2 are following up the Palm Pre with the Palm Pre Plus and the Pixi Plus. The Pixi is new to the UK having a fixed qwerty keyboard like the RIM devices it shares the 8Gb storage of the original Pre but with a shortened display of 320 x 400 dropping 80 lines from the Pre. The Pixi Processor is a Qualcomm instead if the Omap of the Pre, albeit running at the same clock speed. The Palm Pre Plus is like the original Pre but without the centre button and comes with the matt TouchStone enabled back previously having to be purchased separately allowing the wireless charging of the phone on the induction TouchStone charger. The Pre Plus has 16Gb of storage and a double the ram also. The build quality is said to be better than the original Pre with the keyboard being much more responsive with a definite click. In tests it has been seen to run 50 apps at the same time. The expected launch date is April 2010 shortly after the App Catalogue comes out of Beta for European users allowing access for paid applications.

AndroidCentral is reporting that the Sprint models of the Samsung Moment and the HTC Hero will be receiving Android 2.1 in the near future, citing an internal Sprint memo.

Reads the memo:

What you need to know:

-With all the anticipation of Nexus One joining the Sprint Android family of great devices, customers with the HTC HeroTM and the Samsung MomentTM with GoogleTM may wonder about the Android 2.1 platform that supports Nexus One.

What you need to do:

-We know that technology has enabled greater productivity and spontaneity in our lives,and because of this we have become very dependent on staying connected. Customers don't only expect more from their wireless phones -- they demand it.

-Let your customers know we are actively working on having the Android 2.1 platform available to our Hero and Moment customers over the coming weeks.

Sex.com, the domain name that was expected to go up for auction with a minimum $1 million bid, has seen that auction taken down by its creditors.

Escom LLC., the company that bought the domain name for $14 million just 4 years ago, has filed for bankruptcy protection, saying they are owed $10 million. The three creditors, Washington Technology Associates, iEntertainment Inc, and AccountingMatters.com noted that the auction "would have diminished the value of Escom's assets."

When a company files for an involuntary bankruptcy protection, lenders are temporary prevented from seizing assets.

Cablevision, the cable and Internet service provider for 3 million users in NY, NJ and Connecticut has announced that it will telecast the NY Rangers hockey game on March 24th in 3D, the first live 3D sportscast in the U.S.

Mike Bair of MSG says the cable company is planning many more 3D events in the coming months.

"We would consider additional playoff games if the equipment is available," adds Bair, via Variety. "We'll do more games next season and we would like to do a live concert for FUSE, our music network, later this year."

MSG will get its own separate 3D channel eventually as well.

Citing the fact there are very few users out there with 3D HDTVs, the company will offer a viewing party at Madison Square Garden for $20, including bigscreen, RealD projection and full 3D.

Shigeru Miyamoto, the man behind the Mario franchise has said today in an interview with the AP that he is trying very hard to get Nintendo's DS handheld into schools as teaching tools or educational aids.

"That is maybe the area where I am devoting myself (the) most," Miyamoto adds.

He notes that the DS is already used in museums and aquariums and that the gaming giant will begin to release the DS "in junior high and elementary schools in Japan starting in the new school year."

Additionally, the designer, when asked about new motion control systems Natal and Move, simply said he was "honored" that Microsoft and Sony were following in the path of the Wii, for which Miyamoto also has design credit.

Palm, the struggling smartphone maker, has taken a giant hit again today after blowing earnings and receiving multiple downgrades from analysts.

Shares of Palm stock are down 26 percent to a new 52-week low after the company posted a loss of 61 cents a share, outdoing the expected 43 cents a share loss expected by analysts. After the earnings, two analysts downgraded the stock to "sell" from "neutral/hold" and added a price target of $0, implying they believe the company will be bankrupt within 12 months.

With the earnings report, Palm emphasized high volume of shipments for their Pre/Plus and Pixi/Plus models, however it appears the carriers selling them are having trouble getting customers to buy, even with extreme price cuts.

Ilya Grozovsky of Morgan Joseph & Co., said "Palm is essentially an accelerating death spiral," and cut his price target on the shares to $0. "They have had a tremendous problem selling their devices even at carriers like Verizon with 80 million subscribers."