...the KickStart has a lot going for it - bigger display, bigger/easier to type on keyboard and most important to some, OS version 4.6. I find the side by side keyboard shots to be almost comical - the KickStart's keyboard makes the Pearl's look like Mini Me in comparison... the KickStart is a more masculine SureType option in the BlackBerry family.

I dunno though, the KickStart is thicker, too, and that SureType keyboard is still inexplicably slanted.

It'll be interesting to see what the critics say when testing is final. [CrackBerry]

The device registers user profiles so that Smart Berry owners can only send and receive mail from friends. Up to four units can communicate with each other at the same time if they're all within a 10-meter diameter. Additionally, it also has a virtual Tamagotchi-like pet you can play with. The toy costs $97 and is targeted at girls from ages 6 to 9. Boys who want to send emails on a faux-mobile device while raising their own virtual pet are SOL this time around, I guess. [Tech On]

Zumobi Now Offers Innovative Mobile Widgets Application to BlackBerry Users

Award Winning Mobile Widgets Now Give Brands Direct Connect to a Broader Mobile Audience

SEATTLE, WASH. – July 17, 2008 – Zumobi (www.zumobi.com), the innovative mobile widget company, today announced the launch of its application for BlackBerry devices. As the profile of Smartphone users expands to include more than just business users, Zumobi has developed its BlackBerry product to enhance the user experience by providing easy access to small “bites” of customized Web content via mobile device. The Zumobi platform, which is ad supported and gives a fully-branded experience to users, is an ideal medium for advertisers and content providers to directly reach consumers in an engaging and highly-targeted manner.

With an already robust library of widgets (Zumobi calls them “Tiles”) to entice users of Windows Mobile and BlackBerry with news, sports, weather, entertainment, games and more, Zumobi now offers even more new Tiles for users including NPR, AP Olympics report, Major League Baseball as well as social media sites Facebook and Twitter. Users can also create their own Zumobi mobile widgets from just about any Web content with the new Tile Creation Wizard now available on Zumobi's website.

Popular industry weblog BlackBerry Cool will launch a branded Zumobi Tile to extend its brand to the mobile space. “BlackBerry Cool is the first choice for timely news, opinion and reviews of the BlackBerry space, delivered to an audience that expects updates when they are available,” said Douglas Soltys, editor-in-chief of Blackberry Cool. “Until now, there have been few options to do this successfully over mobile. With Zumobi available now on BlackBerry devices, we will be able to reach our audience directly with news that is important to them while they are on-the-go.”

The unique design of the Zumobi application provides the user direct access to what they want, when they want it, with cached content for quicker retrieval of fresh information. This puts content at their fingertips, and allows for a more engaging and immersive experience for brands. In the new age of mobile marketing, this direct contact with consumers is ideal for brands looking to deliver products and services that are tailored to a specific audience.

“By adding BlackBerry as our second major mobile platform, Zumobi significantly expands our reach for brand and content partners. We're thrilled to introduce Zumobi to Blackberry's data-savvy users, and look forward to providing them with a highly-engaging mobile experience,” said Ken Willner, vice president of Market Development.

This announcement follows closely on the heels of the release of an updated application for Windows Mobile announced in June. For a tour of the Zumobi mobile widget platform or to download the mobile widget platform for Windows Mobile and BlackBerry, please visit http://www.zumobi.com or get.zumobi.com on the mobile Web.

Not so shocking: Bold remains the email king, thanks to basic stuff that the iPhone doesn't have like email filters on the go and remote searching. Plus, BlackBerry corporate stuff is much, much deeper, with more hardcore security. iPhone's made enterprise strides, but the Bold is still the win there. Bottom line? "You won’t find many people dropping their BlackBerrys for an iPhone. They’ll carry both as long as they can afford it." [Boy Genius Report]

[All Things D]

CrackBerry also reiterates the past bit that it'll be a glass multi-touch screen with dual tactile feedback—it pushes in just a bit like a giant button and has localized haptics (it vibrates where you push it). However, the BlackBerry button will still be in heavy use to navigate around the OS. No further info on the delayed/not delayed spat, or on the name. We've heard that its carrier name is actually Storm. [CrackBerry]

Until now, the only thing that separated the BlackBerry from the iPhone—apart from the iPhone's better, faster and more powerful operating system—was the push email on the BlackBerry. (Well, and the physical keyboard that some people say they could never part with.) I was a CrackBerry addict myself before getting the iPhone, and the only thing I missed (sometimes not really, because it can get very annoying) was the push email.

With iPhone OS 2.0 and MobileMe (or the enterprise connectivity options) the push email difference is completely gone.

The push mail works flawlessly. Even over international connections: to do the cellphone network test I used a Vodafone Spain SIM card running on the Vodafone UK network here in London. Not a single glitch—the thing just worked almost instantly. Knowing that Apple is using Sun Java Messaging Servers, probably paired with Synchronica or Consilient's over-the-air synchronization modules, I'm not surprised. It feels like they have put together a rock-solid operation.

If you couple that with the fact that both consumers and enterprise iPhone users are going to be able to push sync everything, including calendars, address book and web bookmarks, you can see why Research In Motion is going to have a very tough time defending against the Apple juggernaut on software features. The combination of multimedia, consumer and enterprise features on the iPhone, coupled with the flawless Application Store and its user interface, makes any BlackBerry look like a useless brick.

UPDATE: While we love the push email, Ars has some tests that show why the iPhone may not be ready for primetime enterprise.

The UI has serious scrolling lag and blinks, there's a significant delay after every keypress and the accelerometer goes "bonkers" when you move the phone.

Apparently BGR's source says the phone "won’t be ready for at least another 4-5 months." And, most damningly, people who've got their mitts on it think "it’s a joke.” Real information, or scurrilous rumors? Impossible to say, but BlackBerrry fans may be disappointed by what sounded at first like a good device. Still, those four to five months will give RIM time to work on the firmware. [BGR]

Update: Over at Crackberry they're challenging this rumor, with details from their own insider ninjas. They say "RIM is seriously ramping up the pace of work on the Thunder, which could account for the recent rush of leaks."

They also confirm a number of details about the phone: it does have haptics (that don't work as described in the BGR article,) a full QWERTY keyboard, SureTrue text entry and a glass screen. Plus there's big news: it's got multitouch. Apparently feeling pressure from the iPhone 3G, RIM are "putting serious effort into accelerating the Thunder." Does that mean they'll have ironed out the alleged wrinkles by the time the machine hits the street? I'm betting yes.

You can use either the full QWERTY or SureType keyboard. But, SureType is for portrait mode, and QWERTY is for landscape. Supposedly you can use either one anytime, but if you only want to use QWERTY, you're going to be holding your phone sideways a lot. One thing that isn't confirmed yet is whether or it's multi-touch (we hope it is). It does use WebKit for the web browser engine (same as Safari), so if there's multi-touch, the browsing experience will be similar to the iPhone's.

We won't know whether this really adds up to the best touch keyboard ever until we put our hands on it, but it's pretty reasonable to believe this is one area RIM won't be cutting corners. [Crackberry]

Each song idea gets its own note in the notepad. And you can make my voice, singing a song that I wrote, your ringtone. I carry a spare SIM card with a brand new number in my wallet, in case one of the two supermodels I banged the night before tries to call me the next day. I hope that helps, I'll see you on tour. [John Mayer BlackBerry Summer Tour]

[BlackBerry Sync]

The Centro has proven that a cheap smartphone can sell like hotcakes. Granted the Centro is cute, the Kickstart is not. But $50 (with a two-year contract, natch) puts it in the same mass market as the crappier LGs and Sammys. It's a crazy way to hook the kids, but it might just work. (It'd work better if the phone wasn't so ugly.) [Crackberry via Silicon Alley Insider]

UPDATE: As reader have pointed out, this is not a functioning Blackberry, rather a Pico projector built into a Blackberry shell.

Smaller than the 8800, but bigger than the Curve, it feels really nice in your hand. Well, our hand. The keyboard is solid, as expected—BlackBerries live and die by the keyboard. Sweet design, more features, a great browser and the most consumer-oriented feel of any BlackBerry yet. This is the BlackBerry you've been wanting.

The Gadget: Case-mate's Clear Armor film for the iPhone, iPod touch, iPod classic (80GB and 160GB) or BlackBerry Curve protects against scratches using a military-grade Scotchgard film from 3M.

The Price: $19.99

The Verdict: Yes, yes, we know that the 3G iPhone is here, but if you are anything like me and on the fence about upgrading, Case-mate's Clear Armor will do a good job of protecting against scratches while preserving the natural beauty of your original iPhone, iPod or BlackBerry Curve. However, there is some major bullshit involved with their advertising campaign that put me off. First of all, Clear Armor is basically the same thing that Zagg has been selling for years under the name Invisible Shield. The difference is Zagg uses their own nano-memoryTM technology instead of 3M. However, Case-mate has tried to differentiate by relying on gimmicks like throwing a BlackBerry Curve 8300 wrapped in Clear Armor into a blender to demonstrate its durability. As Giz reader Shaun and others pointed out in the comments on the original Clear Armor post, it appears that the BlackBerry used in the demo is absolutely caked in this stuff.

The other issue I came across involved the application of Clear Armor. The video on the site makes it seem as though it is easy to pull the film off the backing before applying—but the reality is that nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, using my gigantic man-hands I managed to tear off the portion of the film that covers the top of the phone on both sets of rear films. All I can say is that it is a good thing that each set of front and back films comes in doubles, because you will probably need them both to get it right. In retrospect, I probably should have used a pair of tweezers or an X-Acto knife to ensure that I got the film off in one piece.

Again, the technology behind Clear Armor is great. I mustered up enough courage to scratch my keys along the back of my iPhone and it came away completely unscathed. However, if you were foolish enough to put your phone into a blender wrapped in a single layer of this stuff, I can guarantee that it would not survive the beating. That having been said, my advice is to stick with Invisible Shield. They offer a lifetime guarantee on their product, they protect a wider range of devices and they are already taking pre-orders for a 3G iPhone version. [case-mate]

Case-mate's Clear Armor is available now for $19.99. It may not have been released in time for the iPhone case Battlemodo, but look for a review soon. [case-mate]