The press release doesn't get any more specific than that, but seems to lend authority to the previous leak, which indicated that the 18th would be the day. [BGR]
Sprint's now officially holding up the tail end of the BlackBerry train in the States (though hopefully not for long) now that T-Mobile has announced that the thoroughly modern Curve 8900 is hitting the lineup. Like the 8320 before it, the 8900 does WiFi for UMA-based HotSpot calling service and a 3.5mm headphone jack, but the similarities end there; besides arguably becoming the hottest BlackBerry in RIM's stable, the 8900 features a 3.2-megapixel cam with image stabilization and a glorious 480 x 360 display that'll put anything shy of a Storm to shame. Look for it next month -- T-Mobile hasn't committed to a date, though we have no reason to doubt the 11th rumor at this point.
The good news: odds are decent your local T-Mobile store has a Curve 8900 locked away somewhere. The bad news: you can't have it. Word on the street is that T-Mob staff are under strict orders to keep the 8900 out of shopping bags until February 11, the last rumored launch date we'd heard, so keep saving your pennies... to, you know, bribe a store this week.
newVideoPlayer("/RedEyeContiPiven.flv", undefined, NaN,""); Two things apparently distract Jeremy Piven, according to CNET TV host & CBS correspondent Natali Del Conte who was on Fox's Red Eye last night: her breasts and Gawker.
She says this was back in the spring. Perhaps in March, when we asked what the hell he was doing at a Microsoft party and noticed him touching himself a lot during photoshoots. But whenever it was, while Del Conte tried to get an interview with him started, he was furiously checking his BlackBerry mumbling that he'd been on Gawker. He then started looking at her tits.
Natali's tale is in clip form above. And to indulge our number one fan, here's a brief roundup of his post-mercury-poisoning antics.
You won't hear much talk about corporate IT at Apple's MacWorld Conference this week, but the maker of the iPhone and the Mac is nonetheless making steady progress in the enterprise technology world.
More companies are bringing Macs within their networks and increasing support for the iPhone, recent surveys show. Macs are generally pricier than Windows PCs but an increasing number of companies are letting employees choose their own desktops and many of them are choosing Macs, says Pund-IT analyst Charles King.
"We're seeing an increasing number of companies that are allowing their employees much broader latitude in the computers they use for business," King says. "Personally, I'm seeing more and more Macs on the road when I travel."
Several surveys back up King's statement. In one report Forrester Research chided Apple for not having an enterprise strategy, but said Mac usage among Forrester clients has still quadrupled since October 2006, moving from 1.1% to 4.5% of desktops.
"Apple's singular focus on user experience has resulted in some success in the enterprise -- without even trying to break into the market," Forrester analyst Benjamin Gray writes. Gray says the success of the iPhone is driving desktop operations professionals to seek better end-to-end experiences with the Mac, and younger, tech-savvy workers are choosing Macs because they feel the Apple computers enhance productivity.
While Macs represent fewer than one in 20 corporate desktops, more than two-thirds of companies responding to a survey by ITIC analyst Laura DiDio say they are likely to let users deploy Macs within the next year. Nearly one-quarter of the 700 survey participants had at least 50 Macintoshes in their organizations, DiDio writes.
Moreover, 50% of ITIC survey respondents plan to increase integration with Apple consumer products such as the iPhone to give users access to corporate e-mail and other applications, DiDio writes.
When the iPhone first appeared, analysts at Gartner warned enterprises that the device lacked crucial security features and support for widely used e-mail systems such as Microsoft Exchange.
King says he's not convinced the iPhone offers productivity benefits over the BlackBerry, but says concerns about merging the iPhone with existing e-mail systems seem to have disappeared.
Forrester predicts that 10% of small and midsize businesses (SMB) will deploy iPhones in 2009, but adoption won't be as strong among large enterprises, which have stricter IT requirements.
"Now that the iPhone 3G supportsMicrosoft Exchange ActiveSync, push e-mail, contacts and calendar, and can be remotely wiped if lost or stolen, it does indeed address key business mobility requirements," Forrester analyst Michele Pelino writes. "As a result, we believe that the iPhone will make a more significant dent in the enterprise mobility market, primarily among SMBs, which typically don't have as strict IT requirements as large enterprises or widespread line-of-business application deployments."
Apple has not had as much success with its line of business servers, including the Mac OS X Server, the Mac Pro and Xserve.
Apple's server revenue market share was just one-tenth of one percent in the third quarter of 2008, with revenue of $13 million on 7,403 server shipments, according to Gartner data. Apple's number of shipments was higher than in 2007 but revenue still dropped slightly.
Apple recently lured server expert Mark Papermaster away from IBM, where he had worked for 26 years and was the company's top official working on Power microprocessors and the vice president of IBM's blade server development unit.
IBM sued Apple to block it from hiring Papermaster, saying he had signed a noncompetition agreement and that Apple competes against IBM in developing servers, PCs and microprocessors. (Compare server products.)
The case is still working its way through court, but Apple says it hired Papermaster not to help it develop better servers but to lead engineering for iPods and iPhones. Apple may want to tap Papermaster's market and partnering expertise to broaden the reach of the iPhone further into the enterprise, says Gartner analyst Jeffrey Hewitt.
In terms of servers, Apple has made multiple attempts over the years to penetrate that market with limited success, says Forrester analyst James Staten. The servers are attractive for needs such as video and photo editing and publishing, and video game development, he says. IT folks who already use Mac desktops sometimes want a "Mac-like server" that's easy to use and install, Hewitt adds.
But while Apple servers are competitive in terms of horsepower they don't meet typical enterprise standards, according to Staten, who notes a lack of integration with remote management tools that make it easier to identify failures and potential fixes.
"It's a big leap to assume an Apple would be able to become a Tier 1 server provider," he says.
Although I dabble from time to time, I don’t often run Linux distros. (Does that make me a “distro dabbler”?) And I don’t have a BlackBerry. I’m betting however, that there’s more than a few of you out there that run Linux and use a BlackBerry. Someday I’ll join your faction and when I do, [...]
Reuters - Research In Motion Ltd is suing Motorola Inc, alleging that the mobile phone company improperly blocked the BlackBerry maker from hiring current and laid-off Motorola employees.
PTT, or Push To Talk, is pretty common for business teams that are spread out and I can see why. You may need instant information from a peer who’s at another job-site, for example. Using PTT, your phone is essentially a half-duplex, walkie-talkie so you can have a semi-real-time conversation. Well, that’s assuming you can [...]
Research in Motion is suing Motorola for not allowing laid-off employees to seek work with the owner of the Blackberry brand, who is hoping to scoop up some cheap engineers now that Motorola is shedding so many.…
Clearly, Mike Lazaridis has the chops when it comes to running a business. What he clearly lacks, however, is a firm definition of the term "netbook." To his credit, we still feel the exact boundaries for netbooks have yet to be determined (fret not, Psion Teklogix is hammering out those details), but calling a BlackBerry Storm one is -- how do you say? -- a bit of a stretch. During a recent sit down with RIM's president, CNET Asia heard the bigwig answer like so when questioned about viewing netbooks as competitors: "No, I think I can put netbooks in here [referring to the BlackBerry Storm]. These are netbooks. They are just smaller." Wait, Mike -- don't you think smartphones are more like MIDs or UMPCs? Or do we just have you all wrong here?[Via phoneArena]
We're not really sure where to begin with this one, because the awesomeness is so thorough and so intense that we're basically at a loss for words; we'll see what we can do here, though. In brief, a HoFo poster has thrown up what appear to be slides from a Rogers event detailing the carrier's release plans for the better part of 2009, and seriously, if you name a badass handset, odds are it's here. Samsung will apparently be bringing the 8.1-megapixel Pixon, for starters, and Sony Ericsson will be throwing its name into the huge-cam hat with the C905. Turning our attention to Windows Mobile, the X1 is scheduled for release "around August if not sooner," Motorola brings the lowly Q11, and HTC adds the Touch Pro, the Touch Viva (an unusual choice considering HTC's intention to send it to emerging markets), and possibly the Touch 3G. Nokia will be offering the 5800 XpressMusic in the middle part of the year, Moto will be bringing a pair of 5-megapixel phones in the VE66 and ZN5, and finally, it seems RIM is signed up to bring the all-GSM 9520 Storm and a 3G remix of the 8200 Pearl series flip that'll have a front-facing cam for video calling (yeah, no joke, they offer it up there). So look, AT&T, you have two options here: either crib off this presentation and make it happen, or we hope you get bought by Rogers. Your choice.[Via Engadget Spanish]
Product delays are the greasy, disgusting lubricant that keep the wheels of the consumer electronics world turning, so when we hear of something being pushed back a week, a month, or a quarter, we really don't think much of it. Moving a launch up, though -- well, that's a totally different ball game, and it always brings a smile to our faces. Word on the street had been that T-Mobile USA would take delivery of the luscious new Curve 8900 come February 18, but now we're hearing it's actually coming a week earlier on February 11, just in time to stuff RIM's latest hardware in your loved one's box of chocolates, bouquet, or gift basket of sundry sausages, cheeses, and jams. 'Course, WiFi and 3.2-megapixel cam might be enough to get you to dump your life partner flat on his / her / its ass, so don't blame us if this thing wrecks your otherwise happy home.[Via PhoneDog.com]
It's hard to be a geek at Christmastime. Sure, there are lots of cool tech toys and gadgets on display on store shelves, and a few may have landed under your tree this year. Perhaps Absolutely Mad: 50 Years of Mad Magazine on DVD, a MicrosoftXbox 360, an AppleMacBook Pro 2008 edition, a Garmin Nuvi 880, and one or more of the hot smartphones: the Apple iPhone 3G, the Palm Treo Pro, the RIM BlackBerry Storm, or the T-Mobile G1.
But it takes a geek to know what a true geek really wants, and chances are your friends and family aren't all that geeky.
So which true-geek items might they have given you? InfoWorld's band of mad scientists -- a motley crew of software, networking, datacenter, and hardware experts that habituates the InfoWorld Test Center -- offers recommendations on what they lust after ? and know their fellow geeks do, too. Christmas may be over, but you can still give the gift of geek tech to yourself
Have a Blackberry, just don't feel the need to check in with it often enough? Thanks to Xbox 360 updates on your mobile device, you can break eye-contact more regularly than ever before!
Zumobi, a partner of Microsoft, brings Xbox 360 news, video, audio clips, community updates, gamertag status and "more" to a range of Blackberry devices. It even comes with a snazzy New Xbox Experience look and feel, for maximum brand synergy. It's avaialable for Blackberry 81xx, 83xx, and 88xx models for those of you who know what that means.
Oh, it's also available for the iPhone, iPod Touch and Windows Mobile devices, if you weren't already aware.
A supposed 2009 Blackberry Roadmap posted on TmoNews Forums suggests that we'll not only be seeing the Curve 8900 next year, but also a touchscreen Bold and a Storm with a slide-out keyboard.
Forum moderator Godzilla posted the roadmap, which offers minimal details actual specs. It only says that the touchscreen Bold (9900, codename "Pluto") will maintain the same form factor and keyboard, and that the Storm slider is unconfirmed and targeted towards Europeans. which in addition to the aforementioned phones, also makes reference to HSPA and EV-DO versions of the 8900 (referred to as the 9220 and 8930, respectively), a 3G Kickstart, as well as an EV-DO/HSPA Bold. There was also talk of a refreshed line of Pearls with the new UI. The EV-DO products are due for a release in the first half of 2009, while the potential heavy hitters are slated for a release at the end of 2009. [TmoNews Forums]
Well that was a neat little progression: 
The good news: odds are decent your local T-Mobile store has a 
Have a Blackberry, just don't feel the need to check in with it often enough? Thanks to 
A supposed 2009 Blackberry Roadmap posted on 
Well, the year has come and gone, and with it, our 365 -- or in this case, 366 -- days of posting. We've seen some pretty amazing stuff, gotten to play with a stack of awesome gear, and watched the site grow by leaps and bounds (we just had our biggest day ever in October). We thought we'd cap the year off with a look back at the posts that got the most heat. One thing that's clear? People really love (or hate)