This week we discuss the UK government's forthcoming mobile spectrum auction, BlackBerry problems in the Gulf states, universal mobile chargers, the new Amazon Kindle ebook reader and the 'religion' of Apple. There's also an interview with Milly Allen, who's planning to broadcast her London talent shows via mobile phone.

Motorola has appointed Daniel M Moloney as the president of its Motorola Mobility business. He joins Motorola Mobility after serving as CEO of electronic component company Technitrol, having previously been executive vice president at Motorola and president of Motorola's Home and Networks Mobility business.

Research In Motion has announced the new BlackBerry Torch 9800 smartphone, the first device that’ll run the BlackBerry 6 operating system. It’s also the first BlackBerry handset to combine a slide-out QWERTY keyboard with a 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen.

Security technology company McAfee is to acquire Singapore-based tenCube, the provider of the WaveSecure mobile security service. It'll add WaveSecure’s locate, lock, back-up and wipe technology to the capabilities of Trust Digital, which it agreed to acquire in May. McAfee also plans to offer a child locator service using technology from WaveSecure.

Last February the European Commission said it wanted to see a universal charger introduced for mobile phones. It's a move that was supported by the GSMA, the ITU, the CTIA and a number of manufacturers.

The EC now says it expects the micro-USB socket to be used for charging on new phones from 2011. This will be standard on all new phones that are fitted with a mini-USB socket for data transfer with a PC.