More on chip and pin - "A leading security expert has warned that new chip and pin credit and debit cards could be open to fraud".

I thought the justification for C&Ps security was particularly poor: "We don't think they can use fake machines because the machines themselves are engineered to read the chip so they must be reading the chip very carefully". Yeah but no but yeah but...

So - what's to stop me buying or stealing a real machine and altering it to record PIN numbers? Even if the cards themselves are difficult to forge (something which doesn't traditionally discourage forgers of, say, currency or digital set-top-box smartcards), the authentication data needed - your PIN number - is weak because it (a) will usually serve 2 purposes: to identify you when you're making a transaction, and when you're using an ATM, and (b) is far more easily faked than a signature.

MobileGirl: "It's about allowing someone to touch what you are doing right now. It's about allowing someone a little peek into your daily life."

IANAL, but I didn't realise that you can launch a lawsuit, then work out who you're suing later...

Young and mobile - should we be worried: "It's exploiting children to make money. It's normalising and glamourising five-year-olds having cellphones."

Yet I remember exactly this from when I, and my sister, were children - and some of my 4-year-old nieces favourite toys include a (fixed-line) toy telephone, on which she enjoys long and fascinating conversations with her imaginary friends. I don't see anything unhealthy about children becoming acclimatised to telephone conversations (in much the same way that I doubt we'd see anything unhealthy about children learning about cars and playing with toy cars at an early age).

Communication is a pretty universal human drive, even at an early age...

StrapYa - an online store for those dangly little mobile straps.

One of my favourite "features" of the 7610 is the little strap it came with - I think because it gives me something to fiddle with when I'm not doing anything with my phone, and turns the rounded yet plasticky device into something a bit more organic...