»  Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) and Google (NSDQ: GOOG) have teamed up with Taiwanese chipset vendor MediaTek to better appeal to China, India and other emerging markets. [PCWorld]

»  A comparison video of Nexus One vs. iPhone explains why it’s difficult for developers to work with the Google phone. [PocketGamer]

»  Cisco (NSDQ: CSCO) reports global mobile data traffic has increased 160 percent over the past year to 90 petabytes per month, the equivalent of 23 million DVDs. [Release]

»  Next version of Microsoft’s MyPhone service will probably be Silverlight-based and enable syncing among social networks’ status/info. [MobileTechWorld]

»  ComScore (NSDQ: SCOR) mobile research finds BlackBerry is still the leading smartphone with 41 percent share. [Release]

The groundwork has already been laid and now it’s official: RealNetworks (NSDQ: RNWK) is spinning off music service Rhapsody in the hopes of giving both companies a better chance at success. Real will reduce its interest in the Rhapsody America joint venture to below 50 percent to match Viacom’s, giving up control of Rhapsody and making room for more investors. Real will contribute some cash; MTV Networks (NYSE: VIA) will put in advertising. The new company, which will operate independently, will be known as Rhapsody.

The SEC filing comes scant weeks after the resignation of founder Rob Glaser as CEO but was well in the works before he gave up the operating role, keeping that of chairman. Acting CEO Robert Kimball described the decision to remove Rhapsody “as a significant first step in making RealNetworks a more focused and profitable company”—stressing that the digital music service is, from Real’s perspective, being given everything it needs to succeed as “the largest pure play digital music service in the market.” I’m sure he means it but in reality that may be a stretch. What would give Rhapsody the ability to succeed on its own when it hasn’t been able to thrive under so many other circumstances?

SpinVox’s CEO Christina Domecq had to pay back £125,000 to the company after an investigation in to her use of corporate finances, according to a detailed 70-page filing made by new owner Nuance to the SEC.

The investigation was ordered by SpinVox’s board in July, when, after paidContent:UK lifted the lid the company’s financial troubles and heard such claims from staff, a dossier of complaints was handed to the board by shareholders, advisers and suppliers.

The SpinVox accounts released by Nuance are brutal; they are a sea of red ink, showing little inclination to protect the managers of the company it acquired in December. Amongst other things, they reveal the conclusion on CEO’s unaccounted expenses: “The company did not adequately capture all necessary information to administer PAYE properly and to identify expenses that were personal to the CEO.”

Google (NSDQ: GOOG) is trying once again to make a social play with the introduction of a new service that makes it easy for users of its products to post and share updates online. A new tab in Gmail, called ‘Buzz,’ which will roll out over the next several days, lets users share status messages, videos, photos and links. The updates can be shared across the web (they appear on a user’s Google Profile page and are indexed by Google) or just with select contacts. A mobile version of Buzz lets users tag their locations when they post—and quickly see Buzzes sent from locations near to them.

U.S. consumers are continuing to base their phone-buying decision on how well the device sends text messages, which is leading to an increase in the number of Qwerty keyboards and touchscreens sold, reports NPD Group, a market research firm. “Regardless of whether they opt for a data plan, consumers want richer user interface options; the humble keypad is losing in the race to optimize a handset’s surface,” said Ross Rubin, executive director of NPD. Release.

In fact, in the fourth quarter of the top 10 best-selling mobile phones, all came equipped with a touch screen, a QWERTY keyboard, or both:

1. RIM (NSDQ: RIMM) BlackBerry Curve (all models)
2. LG (SEO: 066570) enV3
3. Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) iPhone 3GS
4. Apple iPhone 3G
5. Motorola (NYSE: MOT) Droid
6. LG enV Touch
7. RIM Blackberry Tour
8. Samsung Intensity
9. Samsung Solstice
10. Samsung Impression

—InMobi/hi5: Mobile advertising network InMobi has signed an exclusive deal with social media site hi5 to serve ads for its mobile site in Thailand. Hi5 - which bills itself as a “social entertainment” site specialising in games and virtual goods - claims it is the country’s biggest social media property. Overall it has 50 million monthly visitors worldwide. InMobi says it now receives 5 billion ad requests a month from Asia, a growth of 400 percent in the past six months.

—Nexage/CPX Interactive: The mobile ad technology developer Nexage has launched a new solution that lets online ad networks source inventory simultaneously across mobile web sites and mobile apps. The ad network CPX Interactive is Nexage’s first customer for the service, called AdMax.

It’s not exactly a great leap from publishing an iPhone app to offering one on the soon-to-be-released iPad - not only will the former run on the latter; the skillset for developing the latter won’t be significantly different.

So publishers who have already found a degree of incremental revenue from iPhone are now looking for another increment from its bigger brother…

When Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) announced its Nook e-reader in October, the ability to pursue a dual in-store and online sales strategy appeared to be one of the clear advantages it might have over Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN). But, as we first reported then, the chain didn’t plan to sell Nooks to go in all its stores for the 2009 holidays—and, as it turned out, the combination of demand and distribution issues kept the device from store shelves. Instead, most people who bought Nooks at B&N stores were placing online orders for delivery weeks or months into the future—not buying them for same-day use. I watched in one store as someone changed his mind pre-Christmas about buying a Nook because he wouldn’t get it until February.

But B&N says that’s all about to change now, at least in some stores. Hoping to get a retail boost from Valentine’s Day, the chain plans to stock most stores with Nooks by mid-week—even promising to update an in-store locator chart daily starting Wednesday. The popular themes in response to the news? Too little, too late or Nook meets Godzilla aka iPad and inevitably loses. Both are short-sighted.

Location-based social net Foursquare is on a roll when it comes to netting high-profile media partnerships. The latest is restaurant reviews guide Zagat, the NYT reports. By hooking up with Foursquare, Zagat may be hoping to bid up its own cool cache. The reviews site’s image suffered a bit among media industry observers when it failed to find a buyer who would meet its for-sale price. The timing of this partnership comes right on the heels of deals of Foursquare’s deals with NBC Universal’s Bravo and Canadian commuter daily Metro.

Huawei, a China-based wireless infrastructure and handset maker, will pre-install Opera Software’s mobile browser on a range of mobile handsets. Opera said in a release that Huawei will use the Opera Mobile 10 browser, which is developed for OEMs and operators. Jiang Huabing, Head of Huawei’s handset and R&D department, said: “China represents unique growth opportunities in the mobile market, and we hope that with the addition of Opera Mobile to our handsets, more of China will soon be online.”

The two companies did not say how many handsets will be shipped with the Norwegian-based browser, but last year Huawei shipped 30 million mobile phones. Opera has other reseller partnerships, including with AT&T in the U.S.

Sprint (NYSE: S) Nextel, which already owns the Boost and Virgin Mobile USA (NYSE: VM) brands, maybe mulling whether to buy MetroPCS Communications so that it can dominate the prepaid wireless space.

The idea was floated by Greg Miller, an analyst for Collins Stewart in a note he wrote to investors, reports Bloomberg. He reasoned: “It helps Sprint continue to consolidate its position in the increasingly competitive prepaid marketplace in densely populated major metro centers while allowing MetroPCS shareholders an avenue to continue to participate in the market from a position of greater strength.”

Miller’s theory comes only a week after reports surfaced that Leap Wireless had hired Goldman Sachs to look into selling the company or merging with rivals. In that scenario, MetroPCS was considered a likely candidate. Miller did not address the likelihood of Sprint doing a complete roll-up, where it would buy both MetroPCS and Leap.