ITU 06 diary - Reindeer, Green hardware and the digital divide at home

Although ITU is still officially on on Friday, the show was definitely shutting up shop yesterday.

Before the doors closed, I decided to have a look at some of the hundreds of stands around the conference. With so much competition, some of the exhibitors have gone all-out in an attempt to win eyeballs.

Aside from the usual 'booth babes' - Motorola's are wearing candy-coloured bin bags, for some reason - the show has some oddball offerings designed to catch the eye. One company has erected a 20-foot abacus, a fellow has a Hummer parked up front and another has a man dressed in furry reindeer suit, complete with shades and trainers, doing the rounds.

One exhibitor that's gone overboard is Alcatel-Lucent. The combined company is just days old but it's got a double-decker stand complete with chandeliers and shrubbery to announced the completion of the merger.

Despite touring the fluff, I spent some time talking mobile Linux with Trolltech, which recently launched its Greenphone - a project designed to foster application development on its mobile platform.

A spokesman tells me the company is considering pursuing the same model for other embedded devices, including a media player and a VoIP phone.

Another session deals with how to live in a digital society. The CEO of Japanese systems company OKI Electric Industry floats the idea that, as we become increasingly dependent on ubiquitous mobile and internet services, we'll have to take new steps to protect our devices.

He suggests the way forward could be a counterpart device which might take the form of a dog tag worn on the person, continuously connected to the user's mobile. If the phone and its counterpart are separated, the user could be warned with an alarm, for example - handy if the user leaves a café without taking their mobile with them.

Then you might throw GPS into the equation. If a GPS-enabled counterpart device detects the mobile is moving and the counterpart device is not, it assumes the mobile is being stolen, so locks up the mobile and deletes information on it.

I also got to listen to some public sector figures from around the world talk about connectivity. Even those in more connected nations such as Canada and Hong Kong warn that there's another digital divide opening up.

In countries where broadband, HSDPA, mobile email and e-government services are common, there still remain many people that are excluded from such online services and information, notably the elderly and those in lower income families. It's an interesting consideration to close the day on.

Read more of Jo Best's ITU 06 Diary:

• Day 4: BT's bacon sock, mobile medicine and 3G backlash

• Day 3: Wi-fi on 'the beach', what's hot in mobile search and a long tail with legs

• Day 2: Buzzword bingo, too much text and a one-on-one with Negroponte

• Day 1: Big ideas for developing economies - and a spot of mobile porn