Some people have nothing better to do than send those inane text messages to whoever they fancy. Second hand quotes they believe are enlightening, and recycled jokes that they think are funny – when will these imbeciles realize that aside from wasting their money on ill-used mobile phone credits, they also are invading and desecrating other people’s privacy each time they flood the airwaves with those silly text messages.

There are days when I would receive a text or two about how something good would happen to me if I only would send those SMS to 12 other people I know. Yeah, right. Like losing 12 pesos worth of air credit would make me into a business tycoon, or suddenly bring me some good fortune.

But these joke-forwarders are rather benign compared with another breed of mobile spammers. More like purveyors of fraud, these petty cellphone criminals would fire off huge numbers of text messages telling their recipients they have won prizes worth thousands, even millions, of free-falling pesos, in contests they have no recollection of joining.

Their favorite agencies and organizations include the PCSO, DSWD, and some other less known entities, such as the Organization of Pickpockets and Snatchers in Quiapo and Baclaran. I guess by now nobody would fall for such ploys, although we can never be too sure.

After all, a huge number of Filipino voters are set to elect as their next president the candidate with the catchiest TV jingle.

Symbian Free

Nokia’s Symbian Foundation announced that it is making the Symbian mobile operating system available for free for anyone to use. Nokia’s move is inline with the Finnish mobile phone vendor’s efforts to make the software more popular with other handset manufacturers.

Earlier, the organization announced it had completed the conversion of the proprietary software into an open source platform. This means that everybody will now have access to the software’s source code or blueprint. According to Nokia, the Symbian software is used on more than 330 million mobile phones around the world.

Sony Rebounds

Japan’s consumer electronics giant Sony Corp. reported $870 million in net profit for its fiscal third quarter. Rebounds in sales of game consoles, LCD TVs, and other electronics helped the company in reducing its losses. Of course, some serious efforts to reduce operating expenses also added much needed boost to the company’s turnaround initiatives.

While the IT sector still has to fully emerge from the economic recession, the market has seen some signs of better things to come. I guess, that would be nothing short of a perfect timing for Sony.

That’s all for the meantime, folks. Join me again next time as we keep on watching IT.