Loaded: Voda-iPhone Video

Loaded: Voda-iPhone Video Transcript

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>> Vote a Phone gets the iPhone. Test your IQ on NBC's new coverage portal, and Sports Illustrated wants to join the new millennium. It's Tuesday, May sixth, I'm Natalie Del Conte, and you're getting loaded. Might as well ring in Vote a Phone to vote a iPhone, as the borderless carrier picks up the iPhone in ten different countries. Rumors of the deal have been floating around for a few weeks. The carrier didn't really mince words, as the statement was only two sentences long. No word on pricing or official release dates yet either. Vote a Phone already carries the iPhone in Germany. It also has a stake in U.S. carrier Verizon Wireless, where it does not have the iPhone. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Sprint is seriously looking to spin off Nextel, less than three years after acquiring the company. According to the journal, Nextel may be spun off as a wireless network for public safety agencies, such as police and fire departments. Sprint bought Nextel for thirty five billion dollars, but it has been kind of a dud ever since. Then again, so has Sprint. So it was a bit of the blind leading the blind. Maybe they both do need a good clean break. It didn't take T-Mobile long to extend its 3G service beyond voice. The company rolled out more 3G capabilities this week, but only in New York City. The problem is that most T-Mobile New Yorkers won't really be able to take advantage of the high speeds that come with 3G. That's because T-Mobile phones have limited support for UMTS, or universal mobile telecommunication systems, and no support for HSDPA, or high speed downlink packet access. Those are the protocols necessary to really take 3G for a ride. T-Mobile says that it will get more HSDPA phones soon, so hopefully this 3G thing will become a real reality. We've waited long enough. Meanwhile, you can still use it for voice calls. Yay. Now for some more positive news about Yahoo. The company has added security features to its search results. Now when you search in Yahoo, a technology called Search Scan will warn you about any results that appear to have Malware. Yahoo will search for browser exploits, dangerous downloads, or sites that send unsolicited email. Search Scan will be on by default in all of your Yahoo searches, but you can control it or turn it off in your personal preferences. NBC launched an online educational portal this week called iCUE, not I letter Q. It's a free online learning environment built around videos, games, and discussion. It has news story archives from NBC stations of course, and quizzes about the content. You can also socially network, and save information called Cue Cards. The Cue Card is actually a really cool thing. It's a video player, but it also lets you see related images and documents, take notes, and open the transcript of the actual videos. Now this is not a sexy site, and may not turn a lot of heads in the Web 2.0 community, but you will definitely learn from it. Sports Illustrated wants in on the fantasy sports game. The company said it will develop fantasy games and sports content for its own site, as well as for Facebook. Sports Illustrated was pretty forthcoming with the Wall Street Journal on Monday, admitting that they are well behind where they should be in the market for online sports. The site only had around eight million unique visitors in March, compared with over nineteen million each for ESPN and Yahoo Sports. They could very likely develop a compelling product, but it does feel like they're entering the game in the fourth quarter, or period, or inning, or whatever sports pun you prefer. I might say that their brand name recognition would get them somewhere, but don't people just think of bikinis when they think of Sports Illustrated? Those are all your headlines for today, thanks for tuning in. I'm Natalie Del Conte with CNET TV, and you've just been loaded. ^M00:03:30 [ music ]