Android outsmarts Apple's iOS

Android is firmly crushing Apple's iOS in the smartphone ad wars, according to a report released by mobile advertising firm Millennial Media, states The Register.

The report, based on what Millennial Media identifies as "carrier, device and campaign data collected over billions of monthly ad requests", says Android devices accounted for 46% of mobile ad requests in the fourth quarter of 2010. This is the first time Google's open source OS passed Apple's iOS devices on the Millennial network.

Devices based on iOS - including the iPad - accounted for 32% of ad requests, while RIM pulled in 16%.

US retail sales of new video games dropped in 2010, but revenue from mobile game apps and other new formats helped keep the total amount spent on video game content unchanged from a year ago, according to market researchers NPD Group, says Associated Press.

NPD says sales of video games made for consoles, portable gaming devices and personal computers dropped 5%, to $10.1 billion.

However, the research group adds that increased sales of used games, digital downloads, games for smartphones and games played over social networks kept video game content sales at $15.4 billion to $15.6 billion for 2010 - about flat with 2009. The numbers underscore the growing role of mobile devices and social networks such as Facebook.

The still-unreleased Dakota looks pretty much like the garden-variety BlackBerry - except for the touch-screen, reports Yahoo News.

Rumours of the BlackBerry Dakota have been circulating for well over a year now, but Boy Genius Report got its hands on what it claims are the latest specs and a promo image for the 3G handset.

Overall, says Boy Genius Report, the Dakota doesn't look all that different from the BlackBerry Bold, a snazzy BlackBerry handset for 2008 that boasted a 624MHz Marvell processor and the then-new BlackBerry OS 5.0.

A man who broke into Sarah Palin's e-mail has been imprisoned - despite being told he might be spared jail, writes the BBC.

David Kernell, 23, was found guilty last year of illegally accessing Palin's e-mail during the 2008 presidential campaign.

At the time, a judge suggested he should serve his year-long sentence in a halfway house. But after intervention from US government officials, he is now in federal prison, the BBC has learned.