Verizon Wireless will allow the customers to use the Internet phone service Skype to make free calls on some phones, an application that wireless carriers have been slow to allow.

Under a deal announced Tuesday at the Mobile World Congress tradeshow, users of some Verizon phones who have a voice and data plan will be able to download a free Skype application in late March. That will let them call or instant-message other Skype users for free or call regular phone numbers outside the United States for a fee paid to Skype. These calls would go over Verizon’s network and would not use up minutes on a cell phone plan.

However, Minutes would be deducted to use Skype to cal regular phone numbers in the US, according to Verizon.

Initially, the mobile application will be available for nine Verizon phones, including several BlackBerry models and Motorola Inc.’s Droid and upcoming Devour handsets.

According to Verizon’s chief marketing officer John Stratton, the application will be able to run all the time in the background. This means other people should be able to contact you through Skype even if your phone is on standby.

Other wireless carriers have blocked the Skype app from running all the time. It’s available on the iPhone only in Wi-Fi hot spots. In October, AT&T said it would relent and let the program work over its cellular network as well, but Skype has not yet released an application to enable that. Verizon’s version of Skype mobile will not work over Wi-Fi, the companies said.

Skype CEO Josh Silverman in an interview said, working directly with Verizon let Skype do things it couldn’t, such as integrating its service with a phone so Skype is built into the address book.

Originally, wireless carriers feared giving customers a way to avoid using voice minutes in their cell phone plans.

Now the companies are recognizing the value of customers who pay extra for data service. When the carriers “see how popular Skype is with American consumers they realize by offering Skype they can attract more customers,” according to Silverman.

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At Mobile World Congress, a cell phone trade show in Barcelona at a demonstration, an engineer shot a picture of a German dinner menu with a phone running Google Inc.’s Android software. An application on the phone sent the shot to Google’s servers, which sent a translation back to the phone.

It translated “Fruhlingssalat mit Wildkrautern” as “Spring salad with wild herbs.” There was no word on when the software would be available.

Software that translates text from pictures is already available for some phones, but generally does the processing on the phone. By sending the image to its servers for processing, Google can apply a lot more computing power, for faster, more accurate results. The phone still won’t order for you, though — you’ll have to point at the menu.

The demonstration was part of Google CEO Eric Schmidt’s keynote speech at the trade show, the largest for the wireless industry. He said phone applications that take advantage of “cloud computing” — servers accessible through the wireless network — will bring powerful changes to the industry.

Schmidt’s speech also featured a demonstration of videos and a game running on an Android phone using Flash, a format that’s ubiquitous on Web pages intended for PCs, but hasn’t worked on many phones, including the iPhone. Support for Flash in Android and a few other smartphone operating systems are expected later this year.

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Anyway, not a big deal see the Opera Mini simulator, or check out these five reasons Opera Mini could become your favorite iPhone Web browser, if Apple approves it:

Super Speed

According to claim made by Opera, its mobile Web browser can cut the iPhone’s Web data traffic by 90 percent, thanks to a method of compressing images and text on its own servers. This would, of course, improve the loading time of Web pages as well.

Home Page

Forget loading up a new browser window with nothing in it. Opera Mini’s “Speed Dial” features lets you customize a grid of nine favorite Web sites for quick loading without visiting your list of bookmarks.

Find in Page

The searching inability within a Web page for text is Safari’s most glaring omission. In Opera Mini, it’s as simple as clicking the Tools icon, then clicking “Find in Page” and typing whatever you’re looking for. Sorry Apple, sometimes Web pages just need to be searched.

Greater Flexibility

Here are some other things you can’t do in Safari, all of which can be controlled or enabled in Opera Mini’s settings menu: Saved passwords, adjustable image quality, full screen browsing, adjustable font sizes and customizable skins.

Free, Presumably

Experts of iPhone might point out that there are already plenty of other browsers to choose from, but the vast majority of them cost money. Opera Mini is a free download for other phones, so I assume it’ll be free if Apple approves it for the iPhone. That alone could make it the most attractive Safari alternative yet.