a T68i a T68m The Ericsson T68m (often called simply T68) was a candy-bar style

mobile phone A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...

Ericsson Mobile Communications Ericsson Mobile Communications AB was a subsidiary of Ericsson, entirely focused on development of mobile phones (handsets). The major offices were located in Lund, Kumla, Raleigh, North Carolina and Lynchburg, Virginia. History Under the command ...

. Launched in time for the 2001 Christmas season, the T68 was the first Ericsson mobile phone to have a colour screen, a passive LCD-STN with a

resolution Resolution(s) may refer to: Common meanings * Resolution (debate), the statement which is debated in policy debate * Resolution (law), a written motion adopted by a deliberative body * New Year's resolution, a commitment that an individual mak ...

of 101×80 and 256 colours. Despite its diminute size (3.94×1.89×0.79 in or 100×48×20 mm, 2.96 oz or 84 g), it was one of the most feature-rich mobile phones at the time, with

Bluetooth Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limi ...

IrDA port The Infrared Data Association (IrDA) is an industry-driven interest group that was founded in 1994 by around 50 companies. IrDA provides specifications for a complete set of protocols for wireless infrared communications, and the name "IrDA" also ...

, GPRS 3+1, tri-band compatibility (900 MHz, 1800 MHz and 1900 MHz),

SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

with

T9 (predictive text) T9 is a predictive text technology for mobile phones (specifically those that contain a Telephone keypad, 3×4 numeric keypad), originally developed by Tegic, Tegic Communications, now part of Nuance Communications. T9 stands for ''Text on 9 keys ...

, EMS,

WAP WAP or Wap may refer to: Music * "WAP" (song), a 2020 song by Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion Organizations * Weatherization Assistance Program, for US energy costs * Western Australia Party, a political party founded in 2016 * Western A ...

, and customizable monophonic

ring tone A ringtone, ring tone or ring is the sound made by a telephone to indicate an incoming call. Originally referring to and made by the electromechanical striking of bells, the term now refers to any sound on any device alerting of a new incoming ...

s. A simple bitmap image editor was provided, allowing the creation of monochrome pictures by guiding a cursor around the canvas and setting or unsetting individual pixels (several 'brush' sizes were selectable to make this easier). These images could be set as the phone's background image in standby mode, and sent to owners of EMS-compliant phones. With EMS soon to be succeeded by the superior

MMS MMS may refer to: Science and technology Network communication protocols * Multimedia Messaging Service for mobile phones * Microsoft Media Server, a content-streaming protocol (mms://) * Manufacturing Message Specification for real time proces ...

, few owners made much use of this feature. At its release, the phone cost around

€ The euro sign () is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists o ...

500, GBP299 in the UK, in either two-tone grey or all-gold. In 2002, after a slight cosmetic redesign and a software upgrade, the T68m was re-released as the Sony Ericsson T68i, as by then Ericsson had created a joint venture with

Sony Corporation , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

to produce mobile phones as

Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications Sony Mobile Communications Inc. ( ja, ソニーモバイルコミュニケーションズ株式会社) was a multinational telecommunications company founded on October 1, 2001, as a joint venture between Sony Group Corporation and Ericsson. I ...

. The upgrade, also available to owners of the T68, provided a built-in e-mail client, SyncML support, and, for the first time ever, two-way

with full SMIL implementation. The underlying hardware remained unchanged. The T68i is known for being a highly effective example of

stealth marketing Guerrilla marketing is an advertisement strategy in which a company uses surprise and/or unconventional interactions in order to promote a product or service. It is a type of publicity. The term was popularized by Jay Conrad Levinson's 19 ...

. Before being released Sony Ericsson paid actors to pretend to be tourists and asked people to take pictures of them with the T68i. The previously included Tetris game was not present in the firmware of the T68i. A camera was not present, which was sold as an add-on (MCA-25 CommuniCam) and, at the end of the model life cycle, was offered with the phone. Calendar items, wallpapers, screen savers, contact pictures and ringtones can be sent to the T68i through the Bluetooth protocol, or infrared. The T68i was the first Ericsson (Sony) free from

brominated flame retardant Brominated flame retardants (BFRs) are organobromine compounds that have an inhibitory effect on combustion chemistry and tend to reduce the flammability of products containing them. The brominated variety of commercialized chemical flame retardants ...

s (BFR). It was featured in the

James Bond The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...

film ''

Die Another Day ''Die Another Day'' is a 2002 spy film and the twentieth film in the ''James Bond'' series produced by Eon Productions. It was produced by Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, and directed by Lee Tamahori. The fourth and final film starrin ...

''.

Variants

* T68m * T68i * T68ie * T68a

References

External links

Official T68i specifications on the Sony Ericsson website

The T68i as a James Bond movie gadget
{{Sony Ericsson phones T68i Mobile phones introduced in 2001 Mobile phones with infrared transmitter