What sort of sick, twisted world did we just wake up inside where NTT DoCoMo is getting rehashed has-been phones launched many, many months ago elsewhere? We're kidding -- sort of -- but we do find it a bit strange that Japan's favorite omniscient megacarrier is just now getting around to announcing its own LG Prada after the original KE850 model entered our hearts and minds almost a year and a half ago. Some of that embarrassment is salvaged in the form of NTT DoCoMo-specific changes and upgrades, or so they allege, anyway; all we're really seeing is the presence of 7.2Mbps data, even though the press release insists that the new model has been "redeveloped specifically" for 'em. Otherwise, fashionistas of the Far East will be treated to a 2 megapixel autofocus cam and a 3-inch wide QVGA display when it launches next month.

Reaction to NTT DoCoMo's new logo has been mixed, but when it comes to the carrier's phones, there's still very little to not love -- and when we say "love," we mean "feel sorry for ourselves that we don't have access to these things." The recently-announced (and copied) Raku-Raku F884i from Fujitsu is now available in three delicious colors, featuring the same one-seg mobile TV tuner and gargantuan display present on the majority of modern handsets for the Japanese domestic market. Other goodies include a configurable orientation sensor that, by default, fires up the TV when tilted in one direction and the camera when tilted in the other (clever!) and upgraded voice recognition that allows for complete email dictation by sending the user's voice to a server and text back to the phone in real time. Oh, and this one does global roaming, too, so we'll take one of each, please.

Our mommies always used to tell us that in life, there are only three sure things: death, taxes, and NTT DoCoMo's stylish logo. Well, how very, very wrong our mommies were! Japan's megacarrier officially unveiled its new look today, which will go into use beginning July 1 alongside its catchy new slogan, "Unlimited Potential, in Your Hand." We're told that the red in the logo signifies the company's "energy and dynamism" -- which we're pretty sure is their way of saying "our phones still make yours look like neanderthalic tools hewn from rock." So, thoughts on the makeover, everyone?

Is there really such a thing as too much signal strength? For residents of Tsushima in Japan, the answer is a solid "yes." Folks in the area are a mere 33 miles from the South Korean shore, and NTT DoCoMo customers with international roaming enabled are finding themselves roaming on those powerful airwaves across the Korea Strait -- naturally leading to some rather unpleasant charges. The carrier reports that 38 models are affected by the problem (presumably every handset that's capable of roaming in South Korea), and unfortunately, their only solution is to have affected customers manually configure their phones to use the local network. It'd be awesome if they just juiced the towers to be, like, ten times more powerful, but we suppose that maybe that's not the healthy thing to do.

[Via IntoMobile]

NTT DoCoMo had a pretty lavish setup here at CTIA, though no new product caught our eye. However, they did have the results from the Super 3G / LTE shenanigans they've been up to in Japan, and the results show serious speed. They're touting Super 3G / LTE as 3.9G -- wow, that extra .4G seems to be making a huge diff -- with theoretical downlink and uplink speeds listed as 70Mbps and 300Mbps. Compared to current HSPA speeds this is a monstrous leap, can you say kiss your cable goodbye? Hit the gallery below for more pics.

Just think -- this time next year, we'll all look back at this milestone and wonder how on Earth we thought it was impressive. For now, however, we wouldn't blame you for high-fiving everyone around, as NTT DoCoMo has stretched the boundaries again with a recent Super 3G field test. Reportedly, the outfit was able to record "a downlink transmission rate of 250Mbps over a high-speed wireless network in an outdoor test of an experimental Super 3G system," and while it's not quite the 300Mbps we'd heard about before, you won't find us kvetching. If all goes to plan, the firm is hoping to "complete development of the technologies required for the eventual launch of a Super 3G network" by 2009, but who knows how long we Americans will have to wait to indulge after that.

Remember the Sound Leaf? Unless you live in Japan, there's a very good chance you don't, so let us refresh your memory: it's a rather interesting Bluetooth device that looks a bit like a miniature handset and functions as a bone-conduction receiver for taking calls in noisy environments. It's a cool idea -- Bluetooth headsets are very, very rarely as loud for the wearer or as noise-free for the person on the other end of the call as they should be -- but for whatever reason, the technology really hasn't taken off in full force. Again, that's unless you're in Japan -- because NTT DoCoMo's just released the Sound Leaf+, a new take on the original that looks almost exactly the same but trades an all-white color scheme for a more in-your-face black getup and apparently features improved reception. It'll go for about 15 hours on a pair of AAA batteries, and the mouthpiece folds conveniently away when not in use. We'll take a dozen, NTT; you can float 'em across the Pacific in a bottle, if you like.

[Via Slashphone]

Perhaps stinging a bit from its severed ties with Mitsubishi and a Sony Ericsson relationship that's on the rocks, Japanese megacarrier NTT DoCoMo has said that it'll be making key changes to its standard, cross-manufacturer platform that makes it easier for its partners to simultaneously offer awesome phones domestically and meh phones abroad. Apparently, DoCoMo's thinking that its extraordinarily complex, high-function platform makes it difficult for companies like Sony Ericsson to offer the same (or even remotely similar, for that matter) models both in Japan and elsewhere -- and with a Japanese phone market that's saturated and extremely difficult to profit from at the moment, the carrier would love to help manufacturers make a buck or two by reusing designs in other parts of the world. High on its list of features DoCoMo wants to make removable are i-mode (its branded mobile internet service) and FeliCa, the infrastructure behind its contactless payment system; in other words, the best stuff. Will we still want NTT DoCoMo's goods after they've been watered down? It's thinking that it wants to start offering stripped versions of its phones at home, too, so there just might still be an exotic appeal to it after all.

[Via mocoNews]

It's fairly commonplace for Chinese manufacturers to crank out clones of other popular wares, but apparently, things aren't brushed off as easily when the cloning gets done by a mega-corp like Toshiba. Granted, quite a bit is lost in translation here, but the long and short of it is that NTT DoCoMo and Fujitsu are suing Tosh for creating and selling its 821T -- which, as you can see above, looks an awful lot like Fujitsu's RakuRaku handset. Reportedly, the plaintiffs have demanded that Softbank Mobile withdraw the 821T from the market, but it seems there's quite a bit more back-and-forth left to go down before the dust settles on this one.

[Via GearFuse]

What the heck is going on here? Despite the overwhelming popularity of gizmo-heavy mobile devices in Japan, working with megacarrier NTT DoCoMo must be a losing proposition for many of its manufacturing partners, because just days after Mitsubishi's announcement of its withdrawal, a fresh Nikkei report indicates that Sony Ericsson is raising the white flag as well to divert attention and resources to less saturated and more profitable markets. Apparently, DoCoMo will bear the brunt of the downsizing, while Sony Ericsson's partnership with KDDI -- a CDMA carrier -- will continue. [Warning: subscription required]

Update: It turns out that Sony Ericsson intends to continue working with DoCoMo by initially delivering new models through mid '08, at which point it will start buying handsets from other manufacturers and rebranding them. In other countries this would be truly egregious, but as our Japanese bureau points out, DoCoMo lays out very strict requirements for each of its lines that would probably make it difficult to distinguish a true Sony Ericsson model from a rebranded model sourced from, say, Sharp or Toshiba.

Update 2: Sony Ericsson's Japanese PR folks have denied Nikkei's report, although they did mention that they are "reevaluating" their DoCoMo line without going into any detail. Whether the report was actually false or Nikkei just managed to out the info well before Sony Ericsson wanted it out, though, remains unclear.

Update 3: The official Sony Ericsson response, and while it says that they're taking a good, hard look at their DoCoMo business, it also mentions that they'll continue to develop new handsets for the carrier. Clear as mud? Good!

Read - Nikkei report [subscription required]
Read - Sony Ericsson response

Think of it like myFaves, but where your faves have to be relatives (a nightmare for some, yes, we know). NTT DoCoMo is now offering free calls to family members when both are subscribed to the Japanese carrier's "Fami-wari MAX50" plan, in addition to a nice 60 percent off video calls. There's also this bizarre clause that allows for free family calling for folks that are subscribed to either "Family Discount" or "Office Discount" in addition to the new "Ichinen Discount" service and have contracts of at least one year in length -- and, oh yeah, have been DoCoMo subscribers for at least 10 flippin' years. The simple flow chart above should help explain it all.

Separately, DoCoMo is raising pricing on its i-mode mobile internet service from 210 ($1.95) to 315 yen ($2.93) per month, which we figure is still dirt cheap compared to pretty much anywhere else in the world. That's on top of packet data charges, though those remain unchanged.

Read - DoCoMo to Offer Free 24/7 Domestic Calling to Family Members
Read - NTT DoCoMo to Revise i-mode Monthly Charge

Not to be outdone by a powerful Android presence, the boys and girls at the LiMo Foundation have brought it strong with a series of announcements at Mobile World Congress. Yeah, the SDK is en route, but that's just the beginning; first up, and perhaps most notably in its effort to fight the Android juggernaut, LiMo has managed to sign up a slew of new partners. Most notable on the refreshed roster include ACCESS (which just hooked up with MontaVista, itself a LiMo member), Samsung, and carriers Orange and SoftBank.

The foundation is backing up its talk with some walk, too, in the form of several production-ready handsets: the U9, Z6w, Z6, E8, RAZR 2 V8, and RAZR 2 V8 Luxury Edition from Motorola (all devices that have previously been launched using MOTOMAGX, Moto's own special flavor of mobile Linux), the Samsung i800 which is destined for Orange's airwaves, and the N905i, N905iu, N705, N705iu, P905i, P905iTV, P705, and P705iu -- a mouthful of models from members NEC and Panasonic for Japan's NTT DoCoMo. Also rocking out at MWC are prototypes from LG and Aplix along with the Purple Magic low-cost flip from Purple Labs. Is it all enough momentum to give some balance to the mobile Linux landscape and serve as the yin to Google's yang? Seems like a strong possibility, but we'll have to hold our horses until developers are playing with the final tools and handsets are in wide circulation.

Read - LiMo Foundation unveils first LiMo handsets
Read - New LiMo Foundation members introduced

On one fateful day in December of 2005, Japan's NTT DoCoMo erected a tower -- the most sinister of towers, in fact -- in a Kawanishi bus station. Ever since, the dastardly cell station has been emitting blast after blast of electromagnetic radiation, allegedly causing a host of health problems for the area's residents: sleeplessness, headaches, high blood pressure, even cataracts and diabetes -- you name it. Happily, a coalition of concerned citizens filed a complaint against the carrier earlier this year, which has finally agreed to remove the evil structure and return the immediate vicinity to its pre-cellphone days (although it made a point of not admitting that the tower caused any health issues in the process). Personally, a lack of signal is likely to cause us high blood pressure just as much as tower radiation is, but perhaps that's just us.

[Via textually.org]

Nikkei reports that NTT DoCoMo is poised to integrate Google's suite of mobile services with its own i-mode goods, following KDDI's lead and offering a direct competitor to Softbank's Yahoo!-branded apps in one fell swoop. Overall, Google continues to trail Yahoo! in the hearts and minds of Japanese searchers, so the move positions Google to take advantage of DoCoMo's incredibly large user base while bolstering i-mode's existing offerings when it allegedly hits next spring. The market seems to agree that the deal's a really good idea, too, with DoCoMo stock rising 3.3 percent on the news.