That was fast. Just one week after Google posted an advertisement for a phone support program manager, the company is offering telephone support for Nexus One customers—but will only answer questions about the status of their phone orders and shipments.

Nexus One customers who want to inquire about the status of their order or shipping can call Google at 1-888-48-NEXUS (63987) between the hours of 7 a.m. and 10 p.m., Eastern Standard Time, according to the Google Nexus One support page.

Google won’t directly handle technical support calls or inquiries about repairs or returns. For those calls, the support page refers customers to High Tech Computer (HTC), the Taiwanese company that manufactures the phones for Google.

Customer support has been a sore point for Nexus One customers.

When the phone first began shipping last month, there was no one for customers to call when a problem arose. Google only offered to support customers through its support Web site or by e-mail. Some users tried calling HTC and U.S. operator T-Mobile, which subsidizes the cost of the handset when users sign a two-year contract, but they complained that one company would often refer calls to the other.

A Google spokeswoman could not immediately be reached for comment.

In addition to offering phone support for the Nexus One, Google also cut the termination fee for users who returned the handset after the two-week grace period. Google reduced the termination fee by $200, which means users will now have to $350 in termination fees to Google and T-Mobile instead of $550.

The best things in life are free. The trouble is tracking down all those wonderful free things.

It’s no different on the App Store, which—let’s be honest here-is bursting at the seams, thanks those 140,000 or so apps that Apple’s so fond of talking up. Little wonder, then, that one of the more interesting features introduced in the latest version of App Popular—an app that exists to help you find other iPhone and iPod touch apps and sends you push notifications to alert you of price changes—is a new promo code streams section. Users in the U.S. can use App Popular to find promotional codes supplied by developers for free downloads of their apps.

Here’s how it works: In version 1.2 of App Popular, go to the Promos Stream section, which lists all the apps available for free along with the number of codes remaining for each app. (Codes are available on a first come, first served basis.) Tap the cell row of the the app you want, and App Popular lets you view more details or grab the code. From there, you enter your e-mail address, and the app will send you the promo code along with instructions for redeeming it. Only one free code per app per phone, please.

App Popular now features a section that lets you access promo codes for free downloads of paid iPhone apps.

App developers can submit a minimum of five promo codes for paid apps in exchange for a week’s placement in this section of App Popular. Not surprisingly, the response from app makers to this new feature has been very positive, App Popular co-founder John R. Haigh told me via e-mail. “Developers have very openly participated and some have provided us with 15-20 codes per app and/or have submitted codes for multiple apps,” he wrote.

Access to promo codes isn’t the only addition in App Popular 1.2. The update, which arrived on the App Store late last week, also introduces an alternative hybrid search engine that includes price filters. App Popular also improved list viewing in the My App Lists section, while adding alert badges to the My Tracked Apps feature for tracking app price changes.

App Popular runs on any iPhone or iPod touch running the iPhone OS 3.0 update.

ZoomMediaPlus has announced the ZoomIt, a dock-connector accessory that lets you use SD memory cards with the iPhone and iPod touch.

The ZoomIt, which is essentially a compact SD-card reader that plugs into the dock-connector port on the bottom of your iPhone or iPod touch, works with its own free iPhone app to let you access documents and media stored on SD cards; for example, photos from a digital camera, video from an SD video camera, or documents transferred from a netbook.

According to the company, the ZoomIt software will let you view any file supported by iPhone OS 3, including images, audio files, video files, and PowerPoint, Excel, Word, PDF, and other document types. A built-in media player will let you view video and listen to audio, and a document viewer will let you view images and other documents. From within the app, you'll be able to create hierarchical folders in the app's storage space on your iPhone and then move files to and between those directories—including transferring files to and from any SD card. You'll also be able to move photos from a camera's SD card directly to your iPhone's camera roll, and vice versa. Finally, the app will let you share files via email or social-media sites such as Flickr and Facebook.

ZoomMediaPlus claims the ZoomIt app will eventually be able to handle copy-protected content; the company hopes content producers will distribute SD cards pre-loaded with video and audio.

The ZoomIt's official price is $60, although you can currently pre-order the device for $50, with initial orders shipping in April.

If you demand more from your GPS turn-by-turn directions app than simply finding the way to your destination, Navigon will oblige this spring when it releases the latest update to its MobileNavigator iPhone app (which, as you might recall, was one of the top-rated entries in our recent roundup of navigation apps). In addition to all the standard features you know and love from earlier iterations, version 1.5.0 will add three major new features: In-App Social Media, MyRoutes, and Panorama 3D.

For the plugged-in set who want to let their friends know where they are without having to call each and every one, In-App Social Media allows you to post your current position, your destination, and your estimated time of arrival to Facebook or Twitter, all with a simple tap of a button—and all without leaving the application.

If driving optimization is more your speed, MyRoutes (pictured) can help by providing customized routes based on your individual driving data. It presents you with up to three options for routes, based on information like the time of day, day of week, and your driving habits, and then gives you distance, ETA, and an overview of the route on the map.

Finally, what’s the fun of an update if doesn’t include some shiny new imagery? Panorama 3D uses information from NASA’s height and terrain database to provide a rendered 3D version of your surroundings, complete with shadows, geographic images, and elevations. Though Panorama 3D works without using the phone’s data connection, the feature isn’t included directly in the 1.5.0 update, but rather available as an in-app purchase for $10.

MobileNavigator North America is normally available in the App Store for $90, but you can snag it for the cheaper price of $70 until February 15th. The 1.5.0 update will be free to current owners of the software. (Versions for other locations are available at a variety of price points between $50 and $140.) The software works with the iPhone 3G or 3GS’s built-in GPS systems; it also runs on an original iPhone or an iPod touch, but you’ll need add-on GPS accessories to use it.

Update: Clarified that while MobileNavigator 1.5.0 was announced today, it is not being releases until this spring.

Editor’s Note: The following article is reprinted from GamePro.com. For more gaming news, visit GamePro’s news page.

Hudson’s turn-based military strategy game, Military Madness, hits the App Store today in the form of Military Madness: Neo Nectaris. The game appears to be based on the 3D Military Madness: Nectaris that came to Xbox Live Arcade last year.

For those of you that didn’t own a TurboGrafx-16 back in the day, the original Military Madness stood out among other strategy games for having a hexagonal grid instead of a square grid. The remake for Xbox Live, PlayStation Network, and WiiWare features fancy 3D graphics in addition to the same hardcore tactics gameplay emphasized in the original.

Military Madness: Neo Nectaris runs on either an iPhone or an iPod touch. Get it for $5 from the App Store.

If you’re outside Moscone Center for this week’s Macworld Expo, and someone hands you a “Lost iPhone” sticker, don’t toss it away. It could help you track down your phone, should it ever go missing.

Using the iHound Website, you can send push notifications to any iPhone or iPod touch you've misplaced.

The stickers, from iHound Software, go on the back of the iPhone or the phone’s case. They feature a unique ID number so that anyone who finds a misplaced phone can go to iHound’s Website and punch in the nine-digit number along with a message to the phone’s doubtlessly frantic owner.

“We believe most phones are lost, not stolen,” Gary Moskoff, one of the founders of iHound Software told me Monday, as we talked about his company’s mobile security offering.

Of course, to take advantage of that lost sticker, you’ve got to use the iHound app for the iPhone. But iHound has an Expo-timed special there too: for the month of February, the app—normally a $3 download—is available for free. (After the 10-day trial period, you’ll still have to pay a recurring service charge, which Moskoff says costs less than $1 a month.)

iHound takes advantage of the iPhone OS’s support for push notifications to help you track down a missing phone. When you lose your iPhone or iPod touch, you can send it a notification via iHound’s Website. The notification can feature a message as well as a customized sound that plays for a full 30 seconds at maximum volume. Activating an idle phone after such a notification launches iHound, which ten transmits your phone’s location to the iHound server.

“More people are getting smartphones,” Moskoff said. “It’s our responsibility to remind people that as you put more data on your phone and integrate it into your lifestyle, you want to protect your phone and your data.”

These are busy times at iHound, which just hired a full-time customer service rep in response to user requests for more prompt service. iHound is also working on a Website redesign and has a second product coming out in a few months. It’s also planning to bring the iHound service to more smartphone platforms.

A class action complaint against Nokia alleges the company committed securities fraud when describing its operations in 2008.

The class action complaint was filed on Friday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. It names some of the company’s executives, including CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo.

Between January and September 2008, Nokia allegedly failed to disclose manufacturing and supply shortage problems, according to a statement from law firm Coughlin Stoia. The complaint was filed on behalf of the City of Roseville Employees’ Retirement System and others who bought shares between Jan. 24, 2008, and Sept. 5, 2008.

Nokia also allegedly failed to communicate that it was losing market share due to intense price cuts by competitors and had to slash its own ASPs (Average Selling Price) to maintain market share, Coughlin Stoia said.

When Nokia lowered its market outlook on Sep. 5, 2008, the company's share price dropped by about 8 percent. The plaintiffs are looking for damages attributed to the drop. Nokia believes the claims are without merit, according to a statement issued by the company on Monday.

Nokia is currently locked in a different legal battle with Apple. The cell phone maker sued Apple in October claiming that ten aspects of iPhones shipped since 2007 infringe on its intellectual property. Nokia has since asked a federal court to block Apple from importing any of its current hardware into the U.S. and filed a patent complaint with International Trade Commission. Apple has responded by countersuing Nokia and filing its own complaint with the ITC.

In other Nokia news on Monday, the company said it plans to cut up to 285 employees at its manufacturing plant Salo, Finland. The cuts are being made as the plant is modified to only manufacture “high-value smartphones,” Nokia said in a statement. Currently, the Salo plant employs about 2,200 people.