In a growing effort to keep costly CSRs from spending entirely too much time trying to explain how to activate a speakerphone over the, um, phone, T-Mobile has inked a deal with Nuance Communications to bring an on-device application to select mobiles. Essentially, the Mobile Care software will rear its head whenever someone with one of the aforementioned handsets dials up customer service; from there, an "intuitive, user-friendly" guide attempts to walk users through "issues such as diagnosing and repairing configuration problems as well as with making account and billing inquiries." T-Mobile asserts that trials of the service have shown that customers actually prefer this over a live human, which probably has everything to do with the wait times that invariably come with calling a fellow Earthling. Still, we can imagine quite a few smashed phones deriving from frustrations with this computerized service, at least one of which we hope to get captured on video for posting.

[Via RCR Wireless News]

Quite a few Instinct owners were giving Samsung / Sprint one option: crank out a firmware update to show that they cared before the 30-day test period expired, or deal with all that messy RMA paperwork. Unfortunately for the aforesaid firms, the handset's first update is coming ten days after that date (at least for the earliest of adopters), and initial reports suggest that glaring problems still exist. Some users are suggesting that Sprint TV is less pixelated than before and that overall snappiness is improved, but the patently awful browser still remains at 1.0 (and thus just as awful). Look, when the change that gets most people jazzed is the battery meter's newfound ability to hit 100% (and not just 90% as in the past), something is seriously wrong. Anyone else find any nuggets of goodness in the new update?

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Update: A bigger, more life-changing update looks to be planned -- hang tight, Instinct owners!