He did it, British climber Rod Baber made a cell mobile phone (apparently using a MOTORIZR Z8, not a satellite phone) call from the top of Mount Everest. In fact, he made the record breaking call twice: the first to a voice mail account, the other to his wife and children. He even sent a text message to Moto which read, "One small text for man, one giant leap for mobilekind - thanks Motorola." Real cute, Rod. The Motorola sponsored "world record" was made possible by a Chinese mobile base station installed with a line of sight to the north ridge. Officially, the calls were made at 29,035 feet (about 8,848 meters) in temperatures of -22 degress fahrenheit (-30 degrees centigrade) -- so cold that Rob had to tape the batteries to his body just to keep them active. We're not sure where he stored the banana-shaped Z8. Of course, anyone who has ever made a call from a commercial aircraft (hey, it happens) knows that it's really not a record, but who are we to argue with Guinness?

[Via BBC, thanks Mook]

We're pretty happy with just being able to get a clear cellular signal at our desk during the day, but a British mountain climber named Rod Bader seemingly won't be satisfied until he's able to gobble up some airtime minutes on top of the highest mountain on Earth. In a rather silly publicity stunt sponsored by Motorola, Bader will attempt to climb Mount Everest in late May, and, weather permitting, place a phone call from the summit through a tower located in China that has a clear line of sight to the north side of the peak. However, this means that world record holder Bader (he's climbed more of the world's highest points than anyone else, apparently) will need to follow a more difficult route to the top, and although he will have a support crew tagging along, the lack of Powersauce bars may prove to be his undoing. Oh, and if Bader emerges triumphant by asking someone "Can you hear me now?" for the record-breaking call, we've already hired some sherpas to ensure that he never makes it down from that mountain.