Retailer FNAC is now selling free-of-contract iPhones in France, apparently a result of this month's ruling by the French competition agency that deemed Apple and Orange's exclusive deal illegal. Though the injunction is just a temporary measure -- and has been appealed by France Telecom (Orange's owner) -- if you want to get one now, well, you can.. Those expecting a decent price will be sorely disappointed, however -- an 8GB model costs €799 and the 16GB runs €899 ($1,123 and $1,263, respectively).

[Via Apple Insider]

You probably weren't expecting yet another luxury model of Nokia's long-lived 8800 fashionphone, right? Well, the company continues to prove its dedication to the crazily expensive slider with its newest model, the Gold Arte. This precious puppy is dipped in 18-carat gold and has white leather on the front and back -- just in case the gold wasn't enough to prove its owners are living on the edge of obnoxious ostentation. Other than its looks, you can expect the newest 8800 to be pretty much identical to its Carbon Arte predecessor, with 3G, 4GB of flash memory, an OLED display and a 3.2 megapixel camera. We don't know exactly when it's slated for release in Europe, but we expect it to carry a pretty "impressive" price tag.

[Via Phone Arena]

Feeling the hurt of endlessly dying batteries on your BlackBerry (or iPhone, if that's what you're into)? Atif Shamim, a PhD student at Canada's Carleton University might have the medicine for that pain of yours. He's cleverly hacked such devices, removing all the wires that connect the electrical circuits to the antenna, and developed a module for the connection to operate wirelessly. The result, he estimates, is that his modified devices use almost 12 times less power than they normally do -- which of course means longer battery life. A paper about the device has won an award at the European Wireless Technology Conference, and Shamin has filed for a patent in both the US and Canada. There's no indication of when we might start to see tech like this on actual commercial devices, but we're pretty sure plenty of companies are going to want to get a hold of this technology like, yesterday.

Folks with capacitive touchscreen devices like the G1 and the iPhone who miss the glorious days of the stylus should be happy to hear this news. InPlay Technologies has announced that they've developed tech for a new RF pen called WriteSense which eliminates the necessity for a separate digitizer -- it communicates directly with the capacitive touch sensors. Essentially, this will mean smaller and cheaper RF pens, which is probably a good thing since capacitive touchscreens will likely continue their assault on resistive touchscreens (cough, Nokia). The pencil doesn't stand a chance.

[Via Gotta Be Mobile]

We heard a good while back that the WiFi-loving BlackBerry Curve 8320 would be making its way to AT&T, and here it is. The stunningly conservative Sapphire Blue shade might draw you in if the WiFi enhancement wasn't enough to convince you to upgrade from your 8300. Of course, this is all a bit less enticing now that options like the Bold (and the likely arrival of the 8900) exist, but hey -- better late than never, right? It's going for $149.99 with a two-year contract and a mail-in rebate, or $399.99 if you're just dying to pay full retail and have stacks and stacks of cash lying around.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]