I resisted getting a BlackBerry for years. Which is odd only because if you ask any of my friends I’m always the first the have the latest gadgets. But for some reason, the BlackBerry was too much of a trade off. The always on, instantly reachable, tether to the office seemed too much. As things at work got busier, meetings outside the office increased, and I suddenly started feeling like I was missing e-mails. Driving all the way back to the office to “check e-mail” started to get more cumbersome. Slowly I began to think a BlackBerry might be worth it. Knowing if I had e-mails, and specifically needing to get back to clients quickly became more of a priority, so I caved. Off to Verizon Wireless I went.

Looking back on that now, I’m amazed. Amazed because I really think you would have to pry the BlackBerry from my fingers. (Seriously, ask anyone who knows me.) I’m right up there with our new President- the BlackBerry is an integral tool I use constantly throughout the day and can’t live without. Once I figured out that getting an e-mail doesn’t mean you have to respond to it right away (ok, I’m still working on that one), I felt more in control of my “always on” world. I started with BB for e-mail, but soon realized it was more than that. It’s a great mobile internet device, and I probably read more news on that now than I do through a traditional browser.

Recently, though, I’ve grown increasingly frustrated by all the iPhone hype. I don’t mean that as any knock on Apple, they have an amazing product with both the iPhone and the iPod Touch (which I have and love), but why can’t those of us in the BlackBerry world have similar toys? The iPhone App store is a wonderful collection, I just want versions I can use on my BlackBerry. I felt myself thinking things like, “I have a 3G connection too, why can’t I stream radio?” Certain websites (ESPN, NY Times, LA Times, Boston.com) have done a nice job adding shortcuts to the BlackBerry home screen, which take you directly to their BB optimized site. Nice, but that’s a glorified shortcut. Points for effort, and I love having them, but still not an App Store. That’s about to change.

5 minutes after walking into the BlackBerry booth, it was obvious that the times, they were a changin’. A variety of app style content providers were on hand to show off ways to extend your BlackBerry and make it much more of the multi-faceted communications device I was craving. I have to hand it to these guys, everyone in the BlackBerry booth was eager to show off their product, and jumped right in to help you get it set up properly on your device. This wasn’t a conceptual display where they talk about what you can do, this was about doing it yourself right now!

First I wandered over to Nobex. A friendly rep said he could provide me access to 2700 radio stations in a matter of seconds. No way I said. (I also live in constant fear that any cool new BB app won’t work for me- either because of the strict restrictions Verizon Wireless places on their network, or the fact that my World Edition 8830 doesn’t seem to support all BB features. More on that in a second.) That fear jumped to the forefront of my head as I heard the concept- 300 streamable stations, 2400 stations with access to “now playing” style information. After a quick download of their “Radio Companion”, he popped on K-Rock, a popular rock station from LA. Live on the convention center floor, we were listening to live radio, for no additional cost. Now we’re getting somewhere!

Unfortunately, the vast majority of stations only provide access to text lists of recently played songs, which is a major bummer. But what you do get, is still pretty cool. Say, for example you’re listening to Kiss in LA, and you hear a song you like. You can pop over to Nobex, and in one click, have an e-mail sent to you with title, artist, lyrics, along with direct links to buy the song on iTunes or Amazon. A neat feature for anyone that doesn’t necessarily know all the titles of songs, or who sings them. More streamable stations are “in the works”. Let’s hope they arrive soon, because this is great! If you have Bluetooth streaming in your car, you can even play the stations over your car audio system. Can’t wait to try this with Sync in my Ford Edge! Oh, and that “friendly rep”, turns out he was President/CEO Gadi Mazor. I love a company whose founder loves his product and talks about it with such deep passion and obvious excitement. They’ve had 250,000 new users since their launch last April. NobexRC.com to download

(In further testing, the Radio Companion app seems to be a buggy. Maybe I’m doing something wrong, because Gadi made it look so easy. But when I scroll through stations, my cursor isn’t highlighting selections. It just scrolls, and I don’t know what I’m about to select. Quite odd.)

Flycast is a similar program- a radio tuner for the BlackBerry. Unfortunately it’s only available for the Curve, Storm, or Bold- so I was out of luck. I do have Flycast on my iPod touch, and it’s fantastic. Not only can you listen live, but it somehow allows you to skip backwards during live radio broadcasts, a cool feature. So if the version for BB works nearly as well, you’ll love it. I heard how the company was founded by a guy named Sam, who years ago was frustrated he couldn’t watch SportsCenter on his cell phone. So he started rigging equipment to try and make it happen. After some not so successful attempts, his vision morphed into Flycast and became audio based. Love the entrepreneurial spirit! Flycast.fm to download

Moving past radio tuners, we got to Viigo- a lifestyle application, that best I can describe, seems like a whole new interface for your BB. It’s a great example of how much can be done on such a small screen. It’s a free mobile companion for breaking news, blogs, finance, sports, RSS and more. Once you download, you customize what you want by adding “channels”- basically whatever interests you. Then you have a unique application finding content you want. The interface is fantastic. Very fast- much faster than to navigate than anything I’ve seen before on the BB. It seems to preload a lot of info, making it easier to jump forward and backwards, but eating up a bit of memory. A great example of convergence on your mobile phone. getviigo.com/bb to download

Sling for BB is the long awaited BB version of the popular Sling Media Player. If you’ve never heard of Slingbox, it’s a magical box you easily pair with your home TV/DVR/cable box to watch your home TV anywhere in the world with an internet connection. It’s fantastic- once you buy the unit, there is no monthly fee, because it just uses your existing home high speed internet connection. It’s been a treat for me for years- saving me from missing Patriots playoff games while skiing in Switzerland last year. But I’ve always needed a laptop to watch it. I had heard about the Windows Mobile version a while back, and was jealous I couldn’t get it on the BB. The Sling Player for BB is out now as a free public beta for GSM phones (AT&T & T-Mobile). A CDMA (Verizon Wireless & Sprint) version is in the works. So I was immediately bummed that I would have to wait longer, but excited for my AT&T / T-Mobile brothers & sisters. The demo looked clean and clear, a bit choopy at times- because of network overload in the convention center I was told. But the prospect of watching my home TV (including all shows I’ve DVR-ed) from anywhere on my BB still excites me. mobile.slingmedia.com to download

Poynt brings local search to the BlackBerry. Movies, restaurants and the like are all a click away and easily searchable. It was launched last June and they had 5,000 downloads from June – September. Since then, they have jumped by an additional 35,000 users. They won a Best in Show award at BlackBerry Challenge, and feature great ways to find things to do close by. For example, if you are in a new neighborhood, you can search for movie theatres around you, then buy tickets right from your BB. Note, unfortunately, Verizon Wireless locks down their GPS so you won’t get full functionality from VZW, but it’s still a great new app. m.mypoynt.com to download

If you’re a fan of the Wall Street Journal, but don’t like paying for their on-line content, download the WSJ Reader. Available since August, it opens up all of WSJ’s paid subscriber content for free to BB users. wsjmobilereader.com to download

Now we come to one of the coolest technologies I saw at the whole show. The ability to unlock your front door using your BlackBerry. Oh, and not just that, the ability to see who is standing in your doorway. Schlage has developed system called Schlage LiNK- a new wifi enabled locking mechanism that allows you remotely unlock your door from your BB. The starter kit is $299 and comes with a lock, light and bridge device (which wirelessly connects to your lock to your existing home router). If you’ve ever had to deal with repair men, house guests, housekeepers or delivery men, you know what a pain it is to remember to leave a key. Now you don’t have to worry about it. When they get to your house, you can remotely unlock the door. If you’re worried about security, you can even log into a webcam that’s been installed above your doorway to see who is standing there waiting to be let in.

The lock is actually even more sophisticated than that, you can assign codes lasting only for 1 day for people that need one time access or give you a rundown of what codes were used at what time that day- hello parents of teenagers. Now you can see what time your kids got home from school every day. Or set it to send you txt message updates to be notified when someone used a particular code. You can also do time based lock code so a certain code will only work from 3-6pm. Neat stuff. If you’re now thinking, wow that’s a lot of stuff to control from a BB, they have a web based application you can use as well. You can do the same things I just described from your computer at work, a friends house, any internet enabled computer. They will soon be unveiling a thermostat component so you can control the heat in your house while away from home. link.schlage.com for more info

If you love Brickbreaker on your BB, you’ll probably like some of the offerings from EA- Electronic Arts- the huge computer game maker. They are up to 40+ games for BB now, and demoed a great version of Trivial Pursuit. Unfortunately it was on the new Storm so I can’t get it, but it looked great. Games that are available for mine included Tetris, Monopoly and Yahtzee. Prices are around $10 / game. Eamobile.com to download

The AP has a fantastic app called “AP Mobile News”- pulling together a great looking app to help you sort through a wide variety of news. Right up there with Viigo for maximizing the small screen space, it allows you to browse Top News, Local, Sports, Showbiz, US News, Wacky, Tech, Politics, Finance, Business, etc across the top of the screen. Then it gives you the headlines for each underneath. Scroll through, then click to read the full story. Looks much better than repurposed text with only a few graphics that other news sites do. apnews.com to download

Ticketmaster is launching a new BB app in April- basically the same look and feel of the full size Ticketmaster.com, but on your BB. If you’ve ever purchased tickets through their main site, you’ll recognize the same menus, selection buttons, seating charts, etc. All the same as the main site. You’ll never have to rush home to be in front of your computer when your favorite band’s concert goes on sale at 10am again! Look for it in April.

With more and more states passing laws that ban txting or sending e-mails while driving, it’s amazing a device like iLane hasn’t come out sooner. It reads your txts & e-mail to you over a Bluetooth earpiece. The audio sounds like the computer voice you’ve heard for years, but text was easily understandable. It will even alert you when a new message arrives, ask you if you want to hear it, then if you do, read it to you. When it’s finished reading the message, it asks if you want to respond. If you do, it will accept your dictation and send your reply. Pretty amazing. It’s all contained in a small box that can easily fit under your car seat. It’s small enough, though, that if you want, you can take it with you to the office and use it for dictation outside the car. The price is a big downer, unfortunately- $599, with a $7.99 monthly fee + a one-time activation fee of $39.99. That gets you what you see here- translating box, cigarette power cord and Bluetooth earpiece. If you’re lucky, though, it will pair with your car’s existing Bluetooth system. Manufacturers it currently definitely works with include BMW, Acura & Mercedes (you see who the target is for this, if not from the price then from those car companies), with more coming as soon as they can certify them. I love this device. iLane.com for more info

Finally we come to NIM, a service that you probably already know by another name, depending on your carrier. For Verizon, it’s called VZNavigator. I thought it was simply turn by turn GPS directions, but it actually takes things much farther. I ended up realizing it’s bringing an element of social networking to your BB. Say I’m meeting 5 friends for dinner. If I look up the restaurant’s address on my VZNavigator, I can then send it to my other 4 friends, who will have it instantly come up on their VZNavigator and all of us will be guided to the restaurant from our respective locations.

You can search for restaurants, movies even the cheapest gas around you, and the system will guide you there once you select the destination. If you call 411, the service can shoot the info to your phone, and again, start routing you automatically. You can speak directions over Bluetooth in your car (usually, some old Bluetooth systems won’t support it). You can even originate the planning of a trip on VZNavigator.com, and then push the results to your phone, rather than tinkering on the smaller device. The map data & POI (points of interest) are updated every 3 months, which is a nice touch if you’ve ever had a car based GPS system that requires you to pay $200 for a DVD update after a year or so. It also ties in with your BB’s address book so you can navigate to any address you already have. Service is $9.99 / mo- not bad for $120 / year if you consider some of these features would require you to buy a stand alone GPS system costing several hundred dollars or more. VZNavigator.com for more info

A quick note that some of these apps zap a fair bit of memory, so be careful as you go. The ones that pre-load content have options to set a limit on how much memory it can use. But I quickly found myself much lower on memory than I was before. Not a big deal if you have a more recent BB with plenty of free space, but just something to keep an eye on.

With these few (compared to the iPhone App Store) offerings, I have already moved from the realm of “gee, I wish there were more apps” to “I can’t play with them all”- which is a good thing!

--Peter Szabo