According to the investigative findings of Apple Insider, Apple appears to be stealthily planning its annual Worldwide Developer’s Conference for June 5th – 9th at San Francisco’s Moscone West convention center.

Speculation first arose when a mysterious “convention/tradeshow” suddenly turned up on the Moscone event calendar for the June dates referenced. The Moscone West facility is where Apple typically holds its WWDC. In the past, similar mysterious calendar listings have regularly – but not always – proven to be Apple’s annual event under cover.

This year’s event is expected to feature the introduction of Apple’s next-generation iPhone. Rumors of the so-called iPhone 5 have picked up steam in recent weeks, suggesting that Apple is exploring the inclusion of an RFID near-field communications chip to use the handset as an electronic wallet.

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Although the app marketplace is booming in lockstep with consumers’ growing appetite for any and all mobile applications, Google is admitting disappointment over app sales in its Android marketplace.

Google’s Android platform manager Eric Chu is pleased that the number of Android smartphone users is on the rise, but purchases of paid apps in the Android Market continue to disappoint.

Chu made what have since become controversial remarks during a question-and-answer session with app developers at the Inside Social Apps conference in San Francisco yesterday.

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The Mobile Marketing Association has has announced the formation of the MMA Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Committee.

The announcement came during the MMA CBP Forum (Consumer Best Practices) this week in Florida.

According to the MMA, the Committee’s objectives are both straightforward and practical given the evolution underway in mobile marketing. Consequently, the goals of the committee are vested in educating the marketplace, creating best practices and building standards around the effective use of interactive voice services in mobile marketing.

By the MMA’s own admission, interactive voice response services are being used with greater frequency and, as a result, the MMA wants to help “guide its use” in an effort to support and benefit both marketers and consumers.

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This year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was dominated with tablets — nearly 80 to be exact.  While we’d love to cover them all, I’ve hand-picked the ones that stood out from the crowd and the ones I see making a huge splash in the coming year.

Here’s our favorites…

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The stage is set to see some pretty impressive mHealth technology debut at CES next week, and we’re already getting a preview.  A company called AliveCor has created an iPhone app and sensor technology that combine to produce “clinical-quality cardiac event readings,” otherwise known as a Electrocardiography or “ECG.”

The system is relatively simple; it uses a slim, low power sleeve with electrodes on the back to get readings, and communicates with a corresponding mobile app installed on the device.  It also works wirelessly via Bluetooth to track and organize readings without being attached to the device.

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To cap off the MMA Forum in Los Angeles last night, the 2010 winners of the Global Mobile Marketing Awards were honored in each of the regions the MMA serves — North America; Central & Latin America; Europe, Africa and the Middle East; Asia Pacific; as well as a “global” category.

As the MMA’s highest honors, these awards recognize companies and their campaigns for “spearheading the adoption of the mobile channel for marketing purposes.”  The MMA received hundreds of submissions from companies across the globe. Winners are selected by the MMA Awards Selection Committee comprised of global industry leaders from wireless carriers, technology and content providers, agencies and industry publications.

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Today at the MMA Forum in Los Angeles, executives from mobileStorm — a digital communications company — detailed findings of a recent mobile healthcare report the company commissioned as well as an impressive pilot program for Kaiser Permanente.

Talking about the complicated nature of today’s healthcare system and how mobile innovation can dramatically help nearly all areas of the ecosystem, mobileStorm founder and CEO Jared Reitzin, together with Ric Hattabaugh, mobileStorm’s EVP of Client Services, talked about why it’s difficult to innovate within the healthcare field, in addition to current market plays within mHealth and future trends.

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