Worst of the Week: Wireless explosions

Hello!
And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRNews.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We hope you enjoy it!
And without further ado:
So Nokia announced that it will replace up to 46 million faulty cellphone batteries because a small portion of those batteries (around 100) have overheated and popped out of the phone. Nokia said no injuries or handset damage occurred during the incidents, but the issue is significant enough to warrant a replacement program.
(Seems Nokia’s battery supplier, Matsushita, will foot a portion of the bill for the replacements, according to a Reuters story.)
This news is just the latest in a long line of faulty-battery incidents. Indeed, every year or so there’s a news story that pops up from Vietnam or China or somewhere about someone getting burned by an exploding cellphone battery.
Now, I’m not one to enjoy the suffering of others (unless that other is my arch-nemesis Dan Meyer) but I think it’s high time for more stories about exploding stuff in wireless.
See, as a journalist in the wireless industry I get to cover a lot of interesting news-new product announcements, multibillion-dollar mergers, company bankruptcies, the iPhone-but I really think we need more explosions in wireless to really make things interesting. Let me be clear: I’m not hoping for serious injury, or even minor injury (again, unless it’s Dan Meyer), but I think we can all agree that explosions are awesome, and there are not enough explosions in wireless.
For example, I think it would be great if phones exploded when they dropped calls. That way, you could easily find out which carrier has the worst network because you’d hear, “Argh! Darn (insert carrier name) phone dropped my call!” every time someone’s phone exploded.
“Argh!”
Or, in another example, Bluetooth headsets would explode when people use them. I guess I’m just hoping for that one because I don’t like Bluetooth headsets.
Or maybe phones would explode every time someone uses an annoying Mariah Carey ringtone. I suppose that one is self-explanatory.
Here are some other good scenarios for explosions:
–When someone answers a call in the bathroom (which is gross), the toilet explodes.
–When an MVNO flames out, Dan Meyer explodes. (I like this one because there would probably be a lot of explosions.)
–This column makes you explode. Sucker.
Anyway, I guess the point is that Nokia is a pretty great company because they sell phones that overheat (which is kind of like exploding, but not really.) Go Nokia!
OK! Enough of that. Thanks for checking out this Worst of the Week column. And now, some extras:
–It seems 3 (the Euro carrier with the unfortunate name) recently upgraded its comedy service. The carrier, along with partner Mobile Streams, said the improved comedy service is “tailored to the humor of its customers.” So, based on my own sense of humor, I’m guessing 3 now offers humor categories including: potty, puerile, childish, excrement-oriented, aberrant, boorish, trivial, uncouth, coarse, ill-mannered, infantile, deviant and microwavable. Yessir.
–Qiao Xing in China announced it will begin selling the new “W100 Wrist Watch phone.” The phone is shaped like a wrist watch and features a touchscreen, up to 1GB of memory, an FM radio and a camera. Wow, huh? Unfortunately, the phone/watch doesn’t look like one of those awesome calculator watches from the 1970s. This is too bad, because those calculator watches served as excellent nerd-markers. (Important Disclosure: I had one of those calculator watches.)
–Software company Zetetic announced a new service called PingMe, which uses e-mail or text messages to help keep users up to date with their changing schedules. According to the company’s announcement: “Users create tasks and reminders, called Pings, that are sent via e-mail or SMS on a defined schedule.” This news is excellent. I am planning to set up constant reminders for me to get my finger out of my nose. Hilarious.
–Boost Mobile is now selling an updated version of mobile social-networking application “Crush or Flush,” which allows users to “meet, maintain friendships and express themselves through their mobile phone.” Specifically, if users find someone they like, they are able to “crush” them. If users find someone they don’t like, they are able to “flush” them. Personally, I’m not interested in getting crushed or flushed; both sound painful. But what do I know?
I welcome your comments. Please send me an e-mail at mdano@crain.com.