Many years ago the Informer sat in a university lecture room doodling on his notepad. Back then this was an actual notepad, the whole concept of portable computers being nothing but a geek fantasy. After all, this was a time when you had to be accompanied by an IT student into their baffling department if you wanted to have a look at something they kept there called The Internet.

You may or may not know, readers, that there is an album that falls into the easy listening musical category by a lady called Robin Avery entitled: ‘The way that you hold me.’ It is described thus: “[The record] is a smooth jazz album that expresses love in many ways, at times adding pop, Caribbean, and R&B flavours.” It sounds like a dreadful prospect and, the Informer can confirm based on a quick online sampler, lives down to all expectations.

So the new iPhone is here—the iPhone 4. It’s a thing of beauty, no doubt about it—and it has behind it a short but very impressive line of forbears. The iPhone lineage has changed the way that people perceive, define and use mobile phones. It has had more positive impact than any other device on consumer enthusiasm for mobile data. And it has been the interface for one of the most important and influential developments the industry has seen in recent times; the App Store.

It sounds like the plot of one of those eerie Japanese horror films that seem to always spawn inferior US remakes: Bulgarian mobile operator Mobiltel, part of Telekom Austria, has discontinued the phone number 0888 888 888 after the three people to whom the number was allocated have all died early or violent deaths.