Loopt, a location-based social networking service
, will be the first third-party iPhone service to work in the background while the app is not running.

Via a deal with AT&T, and with your permission, Loopt will be able to access your location all the time you have a network connection, even when you're not actively using the iPhone app. (The app isn't running in the background; it's working server-to-server.) Loopt cofounder and CEO Sam Altman tells us that it's been users' most requested feature.

The basic idea behind Loopt is a map showing where your friends are at the moment, and some other location-based social networking features, like a "who's nearby" list. But because Apple's iPhone doesn't yet support background processing for third-party apps, Loopt ordinarily only knows where you are when you're actively pinging its servers
. That's not as useful. (And a limitation Loopt doesn't have to deal with on other platforms.) But that's changing via this new deal.

Now that the iPhone 3G S is out and available half of the premium smartphones coming to us this Summer are ready for people to purchase and try out. The T-Mobile myTouch 3G is coming next month, the HTC Touch Pro2 devices should be coming in July too, and the BlackBerry Storm 2 will be coming at some unknown date. We do have the Palm Pre, iPhone 3G S, and Nokia N97 and I personally purchased all three of these devices with one being returned so far. One of my evaluation criteria for a smartphone is its ability to work with my Exchange account. Windows Mobile sets the bar for Exchange support since Exchange is a Microsoft client and this is one area where Windows Mobile does things right. A bit surprisingly, the new iPhone 3.0 OS found on the iPhone 3G S offers the second best Exchange experience with only one thing left to add for me to be truly happy and no longer reliant on a Windows Mobile phone.

Alone in a room in his home in Bonn, Germany, Friedhelm Hillebrand sat at his typewriter, tapping out random sentences and questions on a sheet of paper. As he went along, Hillebrand counted the number of letters, numbers, punctuation marks and spaces on the page. Each blurb ran on for a line or two and nearly always clocked in under 160 characters. That became Hillebrand's magic number -- and set the standard for one of today's most popular forms of digital communication: text messaging.

Yesterday, at a "strategic update meeting," Microsoft Chief Steve Ballmer said the company will release Windows Mobile 7 -- Microsoft's OS for smart phones -- in 2010. That statement is a little surprising when you consider Microsoft just last week introduced Windows Mobile 6.5, which isn't slated to ship until later this year.