Technology site The Future of Things reports that a research team from Israel’s Ben Gurion University has found that mobile phone usage affects reaction time. 48 men were given a number of tests in an experiment. A third of the participants were subjected to a working phone on the right side of their head, one third on the left side and one third to no phone at all. The subjects didn’t know which one of the phones (if any) was active during the experiment.

Last week Sony Ericsson was in Rome with Ana Ivanovic and Victoria Azarenka, encouraging them to play tennis on the roof of the Villa Miami to promote the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour. The company's now taken Elena Dementieva and Caroline Wozniacki to Madrid. But a glamorous outdoor location wasn't set aside for them - instead a court was created underground at the Chamartin metro station.

Avenir Telecom and Vodafone have released a statement that draws a line under recent legal action and the termination of their distribution partnership. They say they’ve reached an agreement about the distribution relationship and have “satisfactorily concluded” the “related matter concerning two former employees of Avenir who recently joined Vodafone”. It also points out that “Vodafone and Avenir have enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship over the past fifteen years” and says “both companies will continue to collaborate on other projects”.

The European Commission has published guidance to help the EU’s telecoms regulators (Ofcom in the UK) calculate the wholesale termination rates charged when mobile and fixed-line operators connect calls from another network. Although the guidelines aren’t mandatory, regulators are obliged to take the "utmost account" of them. The EC says national termination rates should only be based on the actual costs, calculating that the removal of artificial price differences could save customers at least €2 billion in the next three years.