T-Mobile announced the October 31st release of Shadow, which apparently isn't just a handset but a franchise of phones under the Shadow brand ... "a name that will become synonymous with playful, easier and richer communications experiences offered only by T-Mobile." Apparently T-Mobile is planning a slew of handsets that combine smartphone style features with simplified user interfaces - something I'm all for, and something I wrote about last week while perusing the "entertainment smartphone" offerings at CTIA.
The Shadow will be an HTC-made Windows Mobile 6 smartphone featuring WiFi, a 2MP camera, enhanced myFaves features, and some sort of "enhanced user interface integrated with WM6." TMob is also promising Address Book integration with your Yahoo!, GMail, Outlook, and other contact lists, and a myFaves-based reminder function.
As depicted in spy pics over the fast few weeks, Shadow is a slider phone and features a SureType-style keypad with a QWERTY layout spread over 20 buttons. And despite the lack of 3G data speeds, the Shadow website claims the phone will have a "Blazing-fast web browser" (guess that's over WiFi, then).
Shadow will cost $200 with a two-year voice contract, or $150 if you add unlimited data ($20/mo) to your voice plan, and you can pre-register for the phone now - pre-registration is apparently all the rage with the kids these days. And it looks like Shadow will be available in two colors - silver and brown as best I can make out.
