Kindles and iPads have moved into the mainstream, and by the end of 2012 it is predicted that more than 40 million eReaders and 60 million tablets will be owned in the United States. When it comes to traveling, unfortunately, consumers are often forced to use traditional forms of entertainment — physical books and magazines – due to the dated rules enforced by the Federal Aviation Administration. Those rules, however, may be about to change. Laura J. Brown, deputy assistant administrator for public affairs for the FAA, told The New York Times on Sunday that the agency has decided to take a “fresh look” at the use of personal electronics on planes. The last time the administration performed testing was in 2006, long before the iPad was introduced, and it does not plan to include smartphones in the possible revisions. Read on for more.

“With the advent of new and evolving electronic technology, and because the airlines have not conducted the testing necessary to approve the use of new devices, the FAA is taking a fresh look at the use of personal electronic devices, other than cellphones, on aircrafts,” Brown said. The FAA said it’s trying to work with electronics vendors as well as aircraft and avionics manufacturers to figure out a way to allow passengers to use these new devices during takeoffs and landings.

According to Abby Lunardini, vice president of corporate communications at Virgin America, for a device to be approved each model must be tested at separate times on an empty flight with every plane in an airline’s fleet, and again for every airline that wants to allow the use of personal electronic devices. With thousands of different smartphone models, it is no wonder why the FAA has no plans to include them in the possible revisions — testing would take years and at completion, the phones tested would likely be obsolete.

Virgin America would like to perform these tests, but the current guidelines make it “prohibitively expensive, especially for an airline with a relatively small fleet that is always in the air on commercial flights like ours,” Lunardini said.

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The United States Senate on Thursday voted 52-46 in opposition of a Republican bill that sought to block the Federal Communication Commission’s net neutrality rules. Here’s one small example of how a society without net neutrality might work: Say you’re an avid fan of Netflix or Hulu but, since you’re using those services instead of your cable company’s on-demand movie rental platform, your cable company decides to block all access to Netflix and Hulu. Under the FCC’s net neutrality rules, that move by your cable company would be illegal. Instead, cable companies must allow access to all legal content crossing their networks. However, cable and internet companies fear that net neutrality is giving the government too much control over their networks. Verizon moved to appeal the net neutrality rules in January when it said it was “deeply concerned by the FCC’s assertion of broad authority for sweeping new regulation of broadband networks and the internet itself.” The FCC has since filed a motion to toss Verizon’s suit. The rules are set to go into effect on November 20th, Reuters said.

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New intel gathered by enthusiast blog Droid-Life sheds some light on the steps Motorola XOOM owners are going to have to take to make their tablets LTE compatible. Approximately 90 days after launch, customers can send their XOOM units back to Motorola, free of charge, for the promised LTE upgrade. The whole process, according to a Talking Points data sheet, should take six business days. The memo also notes that users “do not have to change their [data] plan when transitioning to 4G LTE.” Hit the jump to have a look at the document for yourself… and let us know what you think.

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The Federal Communications Commission put in place a limited set of net neutrality rules today, and early reports suggest people are not overly pleased. The “Open Internet” order was approved 3-2 in a vote that took place on Tuesday, with FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski and two more Democrats voting in support of the new rules. While the full details of the order are not yet available, the intended purpose of these rules is theoretically to ensure consumers are protected while not imposing too much control over ISPs and content providers. Preliminary reports suggest the rules are more stringent for wired Internet service providers, with wireless ISPs granted more space to work the system.

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What’s better than giving away one iPhone 4? Giving away two of them, obviously. We saw that some of you didn’t like that the winner of the iPhone 4 actually already had purchased one for himself (unbeknownst to us), and since we value every single one of you out there, we thought it would be fair to do another giveaway. That’s right, we’re giving away one more iPhone 4, and the rules are basically the same. Here are the official contest rules:

• To officially enter into the giveaway, drop a comment below explaining how badly you want a new iPhone 4 and why!
• If you use Twitter, shoot us a follow! Our username is @BGR.
• If you use Facebook, become a fan of our BGR Facebook page.
• We’ll run the giveaway for a little over a week, until Wednesday, July 21st at 11:59PM
• Please enter once and only once, multiple entries will disqualify you

Good luck. Again!

First off, thanks to everyone who has sent in pictures so far! Just a reminder to everyone else that the HTC Touch Diamond giveaway is running until this Sunday evening, so you still got time to get that entry in! Quick recap of the official rules:

• Contest will run from now until Sunday June 8th at 11:59PM ET. 
• Winner will be announced the following day, on Monday June 9th.
• To enter, send us a shot of you doing your best BG “gang sign.” Most creative entry wins!
• Send the photo to htctouch at boygeniusreport dot com
• If you’re shy, don’t worry about sending in a picture with your face, we’re accepting all entries!
• You may enter once and only once. We’ll make a gallery with all the entries.
• Commenting does not enter you in the running!
• This contest is open to everyone, including international readers!