It's bad enough when exams have to cater to horrific spellers due to their SMS-based vocabulary, but we're doing everything we can to make ourselves believe this latest report simply isn't true. Reportedly, a social analyst in Australia somehow believes that the wide range in spellings in a few popular names is due in large part to the fact that we spend way too much time as a whole conjugating and hyphenating in order to get text-based messages across. Said analyst was even quoted as saying that "the use of a 'y' instead of an 'i' has hit epidemic proportions, as has the use of 'k' over 'c'." Realistically, we're not about to believe the SMS craze is actually affecting children's names en masse, but please, do your next born a favor and give him / her the vowels they deserve.

[Via textually]

As the ongoing battle between the naysayers and the paranoid continues, Neil Bullock is making sure that those situated squarely in the latter camp have a way to "protect" their unborn child(ren). MummyWrap is a "sleeveless, loose-fitting garment for pregnant women made from a light-weight copper-based cotton fabric known as Swiss Shield," and according to its creator, it can "minimize the risk of electro-magnetic radiation (EMR)" warping your kid's brain before he or she ever sees the world. 'Course, we're not going to step in and suggest that you do / don't need this, but for those who'd rather be safe than sorry, you can order one now for $69.95. As an added bonus, it should go great with your Isabodywear underwear.

[Via Textually]

Believe it or not, we've seen something like this before -- out of Japan, naturally -- so we're a bit surprised to see a patent app roll in from Samsung for a phone capable of tracking a woman's fertile periods. The idea is to keep the user updated on her "baby" and "no baby" times of the month when she places a call by measuring distance to the eardrum (using either ultrasonic or laser sensors) combined with infrared to get a temperature reading. This corresponds to a woman's basal body temperature cycle, which in turn maps to her menstrual cycle. In Japan, the concept was intended to boost birth rates by keeping couples in the know on exactly when they might have success -- but elsewhere we imagine the intent might be just the opposite. We'll leave it to our readers' active imaginations to decide just when and how the user should be kept abreast of said information.

[Via Unwired View]

If there's two thing we know Japan has, it's a steadily declining birth rate and insanely advanced mobile technology. Doesn't it seem like one could be used to solve the other? (No?) Leave it to the good folks at NTT DoCoMo to have a crack at it, releasing the new D702iF FOMA clamshell from Mitsubishi. It seems innocent enough, but a few keystrokes allows the user to track his or her (hopefully her) menstrual cycle and be notified during the most fertile times of the month. The somewhat unusual function, along with the phone's bullet-shaped design and pastel colors, are the brainchild of Japanese designer Momoko Ikuta. The decidedly feminine phone also features a built-in recipe database (which we hear features a mean white bean chicken chili) and a "camouflage melody" function -- a fancy way of describing a fake ring for those times when you want to completely ignore the people around you.

[Via CNET]