Ring-back tones offers consumers yet another way to customise their mobile phone service. Yet despite this - and the revenue opportunities that can be generated - many network operators don't provide ring-back tones.

In today's special feature we talk to Florent Stroppa of OnMobile to discover why the UK doesn't really seem to be bothered about ring-back tones... and whether the next-generation of interactive ring-back services could change this.

It’s time for another round-up of mobile industry news headlines from the past seven days.

As well as paying tribute to Steve Jobs, our podcast covers BlackBerry’s problems, 3G cross-network roaming on Everything Everywhere, 4G in the UK, Swype’s acquisition by Nuance, the mystery of Alien Dalvik, dodgy advertising and a new Nokia ringtone.

Italian DJ Valerio Alessandro Sizzi has won the Nokia Tune competition to create a new ringtone for the company.

As well as receiving a $10,000 prize, he’ll also potentially become one of the world most listened-to music artists because his ‘Nokia Tune Dubstep Edition’ will be preloaded on more than 100 million handsets. Each of the five runners-up will win $1,000 each, with their tunes made available on the Nokia Store.

It's a match made in an odd kind of dictionary: Vringo and Zlango are getting together.

Vringo provides software platforms for mobile social and video applications - video ringtones, for example - while Zlango is a mobile messaging company that can add multimedia content to standard text-based messages.

A study from the Alcatel-Lucent Global Youth Lab – young people aged 18 to 26 from eleven countries – has revealed that 81% showed a strong interest in using their mobile phones as wallets, with 89% willing to pay a monthly fee for the service. The acceptable median monthly fee was $7.77 (£4.92) per month.

Mark Windle, head of marketing at OpenCloud, predicts that this year’s reduction in the number of traditional telecoms operators in some countries will provide an opportunity for other operators to innovate and capture market share in 2016.

He says next year will be a year of rapid change for telecoms… whether it’s MVNO disruption, competitive tariff pricing or simply defence from the ‘dark art’ of hacking.

Mark Bridge writes:

The most memorable moments in life often go unrecorded. You don't have your camera in your hands. Your finger is still hovering over the 'pause' button on your audio recorder. Or you were simply too busy experiencing whatever was happening. It's all about the one that got away.

That's where Kapture can help.

Mark Bridge writes:

James Rosewell shows me a colourful roll of paper that's the width of an iPhone but well over three metres long. When I look closer, I can see it's a printed copy of the Wall Street Journal's mobile website. That's a lot of scrolling to do... and a pretty unfriendly user experience for anyone reading the news online. Why does it work so badly?

Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge return with their first mobile industry podcast of 2014.

This week they're looking at new Samsung, Sony and ZTE products from CES, they're talking about Android embedded in cars, they're catching up with the latest news from BlackBerry, they're discussing cheque payments by smartphone, they're revealing complaint data from Ofcom and they're investigating quite a few other stories as well.

It's our last podcast of the year, which is the traditional time for us to predict what'll be happening in the mobile phone industry during the next 12 months... from forthcoming consumer technology to deals between network operators.

As well as making our 2014 predictions, we'll also be reviewing those we made last year and discovering how accurate our forecasts for 2013 really were.

This week we're talking about a UK government deal to prevent bill shock, good news for some UK consumers visiting the USA, a court threat to HTC sales, new high-speed satellite broadband, mobile search, mobile shopping and much more.

Join Iain Graham, James Rosewell and Mark Bridge for an informed and entertaining look at all the major mobile industry news stories from the past seven days.

It's been a week of diverse mobile headlines in which Jolla started selling its Sailfish smartphone, mobile shopping broke records and BlackBerry's CEO looked to the future.

We're also talking about smartphones for seniors, battery life, a looming spectrum shortage, phone theft and Sony's Smart Wig. Something for everyone, surely!

In today's programme we're talking to James Atkins, co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer of smartphone manufacturer Kazam.

The company launched earlier this year and has just announced its first seven Android-based handsets. James explains the story behind Kazam's creation, the company ethos, its product range and its plans for the future.