Blackberry Phones

Hot on the heels of releasing its new device arsenal, RIM is prepping to roll out a brand spanking new BlackBerry App World. Scheduled to launch Monday, version 3.0 features a retooled interface for quick perusal of apps, games and themes — if the beta release is any indication. Another added feature is the My World storage folder that keeps all of your downloads on the home screen and lets you wirelessly reinstall them should you accidentally delete one or upgrade devices.

Sure, there are rumblings that the BB music service will be a part of this release, but as Reuters reported, that announcement isn’t expected until early September. Although, this update would complete the new smartphone trifecta rather nicely: new device, new OS and new app store. Well done, RIM, now if you could just get your advertising in order, you’ll be all set.

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Research In Motion has announced a new version of Twitter for BlackBerry that includes a number of noteworthy enhancements. Twitter for BlackBerry version 1.1 is officially out of beta and offers the ability to tweet your location using the “Add location to tweet” option. The app also includes push notifications for @mentions, and will auto-complete #topics as you type them out, along with several other minor enhancements.

RIM also said the UI has been tweaked with updated graphics and includes a streamlined layout of the Add Photo and Add Location options. Lastly, the app has added language support for simplified Chinese, traditional Chinese, Polish, Czech, and Thai. Twitter for BlackBerry is available in BlackBerry App World now. Hit the jump for more info.

We were alerted to a blog post on Kik’s site just moments ago, and it seems that Research In Motion has not only removed Kik Messenger from its App World portal, but it has also disabled push services for existing users. We reached out to RIM for comment and here is the company’s official statement:

RIM became aware of a number of issues and customer concerns regarding the Kik app and service. Following discussions with Kik, the app was removed from BlackBerry App World on November 12. Upon further investigation, RIM concluded that Kik had breached contractual obligations. Based on the broad scope and seriousness of the issues and concerns, RIM terminated its agreements with Kik and withdrew RIM’s support for Kik’s service.

I remember way back when everyone was going crazy about the Facebook app. The rumor of highly anticipated updates kept us on edge for weeks. Well today RIM has finally released an update for Facebook for BlackBerry to bring things up to speed a bit. The new app has some overhauled features that make it a bit more manageable. New features include support for Facebook Places, a dedicated inbox, Facebook search, navigation updates, friends list page and more. You can grab the new version now from BlackBerry App World.

Note: The latest version isn’t showing on the web for everyone, so check App World from your device for the update.

If you’re on the hunt for a new house, apartment or just some space to rent or buy then the perfect BlackBerry app for you is now available in BlackBerry App World. Rent.com has come up with a great application with a ton of features built into it. Let’s look at the description:

The free, user-friendly app lets users search for apartments, call or e-mail property owners and manage their favorite listings, right from their mobile phones. The app automatically syncs with each user’s Rent.com account and apartment-hunters can even attach their own photos and notes to listings to help them remember the details of a property after they visit. Plus, once you find the apartment of your dreams through Rent.com, you can report your lease through the app in order to claim your $100 Visa debit rewards card.

Pretty cool app for those on the go and possibly rushing to find a place. It’s never really an easy task so anything that helps with that process is just fine in my books.

It’s been over a year since it hit 2,000 apps, but it looks like BlackBerry App World  has finally hit its biggest milestone yet — RIM has announced via Twitter that it’s now “10,000 apps strong and growing.” For those keeping track, that still leaves it well behind Apple’s App Store and the Android Market, which by some estimates boast roughly 250,000 and 70,000 to 100,000 apps, respectively, and each of which also took less time to hit the 10,000 app mark. Even still, the fact that a smartphone platform “only” has 10,000 apps speaks quite a bit to how far we’ve come in just a few short years.

As we’ve known for a while now, BlackBerry App World 2.0 was set to arrive eventually. Today as it turns out, happens to be just that day. BlackBerry Beta Zone participants have been sent out invites to the all new BlackBerry App World 2.0 release and can now sign up for the download if you are indeed eligible.

Lots of new features have been built into version 2.0 as well, the layout of how things are displayed has also changed for users. We’ve outlined a lot of the changes previously in our “What’s coming in BlackBerry App World 2.0″ so that is certainly worth a look over. We’ll get a better review up here in a bit for you all but, right now it seems as though the downloads have slowed Research In Motions servers to a crawl. Stay tuned folks. If you managed to get it downloaded, please feel free to leave your comments on what you think about it. Full press release now available after the jump.
RIM Announces BlackBerry App World Updates

New BlackBerry App World Features to be Available for Beta Testing in the United States and Canada This Week

WATERLOO, ONTARIO–(Marketwire – July 29, 2010) – Research In Motion (RIM) (NASDAQ:RIMM)(TSX:RIM) today announced updates to BlackBerry App World(TM), the official application store for BlackBerry(R) smartphones. BlackBerry App World provides BlackBerry smartphone customers with an intuitive, integrated service for discovering, downloading, recommending and managing mobile applications for personal or business use. BlackBerry App World now supports new payment options, includes enhanced discovery and search features, and introduces a new user identification system called BlackBerry(R) ID.

New Payment Options

BlackBerry App World will support new payment options in addition to PayPal. Customers will be able to purchase applications using major credit cards, including Visa and MasterCard, in various countries around the world. RIM is also working on integrated billing with various carriers to enable BlackBerry App World purchases to be applied directly to the customer’s monthly bill from those carriers.(i)

Easier Application Discovery

BlackBerry App World adds new tabbed sections for various lists of applications. Users can horizontally swipe or scroll to quickly view the Top 25 Free Apps, Top 25 Paid Apps and Top 25 Themes, as well as lists of Newest Apps and Recently Updated Apps.

QR barcode scanning is also supported, allowing users to scan a QR code associated with an application from anywhere – the web, print ads, brochures, etc. BlackBerry App World will quickly find the related application and automatically open the application’s information and download page.

BlackBerry ID

BlackBerry ID provides customers with a device-independent user identification (ID) used with BlackBerry App World. It enables new payment options, including credit cards and integrated carrier billing(i), and allows customers to seamlessly transfer their personal library of free and purchased apps when they switch to a new BlackBerry smartphone.

“BlackBerry App World continues to grow with a rich catalog of personal and business oriented applications that further enhance the BlackBerry smartphone experience,” said Alan Brenner, Senior Vice President, BlackBerry Platform at Research In Motion. “The new features in BlackBerry App World make it even easier for customers to find, purchase and maintain applications for their BlackBerry smartphone.”

Nearly 30 million BlackBerry smartphone users have downloaded BlackBerry App World and an average of over one million applications are being downloaded each day. Available in more than 65 countries, BlackBerry App World allows users to discover, download, recommend and manage the applications that help them get the most out of life while on the go.

The newest version of BlackBerry App World is available for beta preview to customers in the United States and Canada from BlackBerry(R) Beta Zone (www.blackberry.com/beta).

(i)Availability of integrated billing with specific carriers to be announced at later dates. Requires a carrier post-paid service plan.

Time for a new round up. Just a slight change however, until we get things fully sorted out for you all. James is working on a different project so I’ll be filling in, just for a short while. As we run into the weekend after Canada day, folks are recovering from their partying. That said, folks in the US have Independence Day on July 4th to look forward to. So, let’s get on with a look at some cool stuff for your BlackBerry this time around.

Freebies of the Week: Unibrowse, Photo Bucket Mobile, JConverter

In Case You Missed It: Lending Tree Mortage Fee Rate Finder, ePrayer Team, Carbonite for BlackBerry

New This Week: Memo Mailer, Spitfire RSS and Blog Reader

Cool at BlackBerry App World: Receipt Organizer

PayPal for BlackBerry has just been updated. BlackBerry App World recently gave out the notification for users to go ahead and download the update. As noted in the release, it is just simply bug fixes for the application. Personally, having used then app since its intial release I’ve never really had any issues with it. If you frequent using the PayPal from your BlackBerry, you’ll want to grab the update in case it covers some bug you may have noticed that I have not. Keep in mind it may not as of yet, filtered all the way through BlackBerry App World so if it’s not showing yet, just check back later. Oddly though, BlackBerry App World online shows .309. Might just be an error in the listing but I’m not certain. When the download is done, it does show as .301

Hot off the tipline, users are slowly reporting the release of BlackBerry App World version 1.1.0.35 being available for download. While I was not personally able to get it to show up in BlackBerry App World as a download, I was however able to directly download it using the BlackBerry website. As of now, I’m not exactly sure what has changed. I’m guessing it’s just bug fixes as we are awaiting the release of BlackBerry App World 2.0 as the next big jump. Hit up the download in BlackBerry App World if it’s showing. If not just use the direct link off the BlackBerry website. Thanks to everyone who sent this one into us.