BlackBerry Messenger 5.0 to be Pushed Out October 7th

In a past post, Stay Away from the BlackBerry Messenger 5.0 Beta, I griped and complained about the leaked release of the newest version of the beloved BlackBerry Messenger. Well, in 2 days, it seems RIM is pushing out the official release of the app. Hopefully every kink and bug that was in the leaked version has been corrected in the new official version.

According to CrackBerry.com, the new release will have these features:

• Enhanced SMS -Allows for a conversational chat-like user experience with a single contact list for the most personal mobile-to-mobile communications
  
  
  
  • Note: BlackBerry® Device Software 5.0 and later is required for the SMS functionality.
  
  
• Avatars - Users can choose a picture from the BlackBerry Smartphone gallery and save it as their personal avatar, which will be seen by their contacts. They can also view other avatars in the contact list and zoom in on the avatars of contacts participating in a conversation by selecting "View participants."


• Large Media File Transfer - Users can send/receive large file transfers up to 6 megabytes for pictures, files and audio.
  
  
  
  • Note: BlackBerry Device Software 5.0 is required to receive large media files.
  
  
• Enhanced Group Functionality - Allows for the ability to update, share & communicate with a subset community.


• Bar-code Identity - A user can add a contact to the BlackBerry Messenger contact list by displaying a 2-dimensional bar code that invitees can capture with their device cameras.


• Reliable Contact Backup and Restore - Contacts are backed-up on a server and do not require the need for BlackBerry® Desktop Manager.

I wonder whether or not this will be a forced OTA download. We'll see what will happen on October 7th. What do you think?

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RIM vs. UberTwitter

If UberTwitter hasn't heard, which I'm sure they have, they should know that the word on the street is that RIM is developing their own Twitter app for BlackBerry devices. What they probably don't know yet... that date is approaching sooner than they think. Try November 16th.

According to BlackBerryRocks, the features in this new app is the same like any other Twitter app for BlackBerry except for a couple of major new features: Address book integration and automatic refreshes. If UberTwitter isn't crapping in their pants they should be. Here are other features mentioned on BBNews.pl:

• Notification of number of new tweets on the home screen with icon, like text messages
  
• Main app opens friends timeline
• Ability to view followers
• Follow/unfollow functions
• Create direct messages, replies and new tweets
• Keyword search and saved results
• Tweet photos directly from camera or memory card
• View photos from other tweets
• View trending topics
• Address book integration

One thing I haven't heard mentioned yet is the integration of the GPS functionality in to RIM's proposed app. So far UberTwitter has the edge over that feature and over a period of many updates, they've enhanced it to users' liking. Where UberTwitter has been lacking is their delay in refreshing tweets according to the user's option. With RIM's enormous resources, they have the ability for users to receive new tweets in real-time.

RIM should also look into implementing Twitter's new Lists feature that should be out any day now. No BlackBerry tweeting application to date has this feature that will put members into groups. As soon as this feature becomes more popular in Twitter, my hopes is that RIM will capitalize on this.

With RIM being the parent company to BlackBerry, they have a major advantage of UberTwitter, which in the end, UberTwitter can say that, "It was fun while it lasted."

What's your take on this latest news?

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UberTwitter: Your End May Be Near

Today, rumors have been swarming that RIM, BlackBerry's parent company, could be developing their own Twitter client for BlackBerry users. Indeed, this is a smart idea. While BlackBerry has been able to capitalize in the Instant Messaging world and even social media apps like Facebook and Myspace, RIM were missing out on a key demographic that they could've easily targeted earlier: CrackBerry addicts who tweet. If the rumors deem to be true, RIM could loosen the strangle that UberTwitter has on other BlackBerry tweeting clients.

Earlier this summer, UberTwitter was able to gain attention from Orangatame's TwitterBerry with great reviews. While TwitterBerry seemed like a great solution for users to tweet, at the time, they were lacking great features that UberTwitter had plus, it was a memory hog. BlackBerry users quickly jumped ship to UberTwitter, an app that didn't use up as much memory, that had excellent GPS features, notifcation features, followers and following count, intergration with Google Maps, a list of the Trending Topics and on top of all of that, the refresh rate was exceptionally remarkable. Although the app had its tiny flaws that were fixed with many updates, users were willing to ignore them.

Then came the DDOS attack this past summer that had Twitter on its knees. UberTwitter's API issues came where the refresh rate to receive and send out Tweets lagged. Since then, the UberTwitter experience changed and unfortunately for UberTwitter, with possibly no fault of their own (according to them,) they jumped the shark. But still even, UberTwitter happened to be the best temporary solution for BlackBerry users. You were either forced to stick with UberTwitter or just wait until you logged on to the web or desktop client.

Now we wait for the war to begin. Will UberTwitter become diligent and begin to improve on the issues that users complain to them about and fight head on with RIM or will they become less popular like TwitterBerry and let RIM become the premier client for BlackBerry? At any rate, this should make UberTwitter sweat and have the looming concern over their heads that their end could possibly be near.

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