I read books on my BlackBerry all day so when I got an email from S4BB that they are beta testing BlackBerryBooks.com I got excited. It has over 25,000 public domain books for downloading and they are all compatible with the free Mobipocket eBook reader.

Check it out by pointing your browser to www.blackberrybooks.com and let us know if you find any gems. Don’t expect any recent books since this is mostly classics such as Thoreau’s Walden.

Otterbox have just made available their new case for the BlackBerry Bold. 

I have not got one of these yet but from the looks of the pictures they certainly look to enhance the already slick lines of RIM’s newest baby. They are available in 2 color choices, Black or Yellow and rest assured as soon as we get our hands on one of these rugged looking cases, we will bring you all the results of a full testing regime.

You can see more images or order one from OtterBox at this address: BlackBerry Cases and at only $49.95 do you really want to risk that nice brushed aluminum finish of your new BlackBerry?

I don’t know how this flew under the radar but Ed @ Brighthand managed to catch it. We mentioned the Agendus for BlackBerry beta back in July but the full version has now been released to very little aplomb. Iambic really needs to do some PR & advertising. The application looks stunningly well designed and the price point of $19.95 is perfect. Any previous Palm or Windows Mobile user can tell you about Agendus so I wont go into detail. There is a trial available so definitely check it out before you buy.

From the description:

Agendus for BlackBerry brings to BlackBerry phones the pragmatic features and functions that have made Agendus our flagship title on the Palm OS based Treo/Centro so successful, as well as Windows Mobile and Symbian UIQ phones: It tightly integrates the built-in calendar, tasks, and contacts, and is intuitive to use.

Agendus for BlackBerry: PIM Meets RIM.

Our award winning PIM (personal information manager) has paired up with RIM’s (Research in Motion) BlackBerry devices to provide a fully integrated, productivity enhancer that’s easy to deploy and intuitive to use. Enthusiastically embraced by Palm OS and Windows Mobile users, Agendus has been especially tailored to work seamlessly on BlackBerry devices where it taps into the built-in data storage to pull information into the Calendar, Contacts and Tasks. Agendus also smartly adapts to your BlackBerry’s look, taking on the colors, styles and themes already being used. Like Peanut Butter & Jelly, or Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Agendus and the BlackBerry are two great tastes that taste great together!

The following is a quick rundown of some of the things that make Agendus Shine.

• Calendar, Contacts, and Tasks Integration. Agendus ties together the most frequently used applications on your phone, so you get more things done using fewer (in most cases half) button presses. Because personal information is readily accessible, you won’t be bogged down switching in and out of applications to get to the Calendar, Contact and Task information you need.
• Many Viewing Options. Agendus has always offered users a number of options for how information and activities are displayed. The BlackBerry version includes an at-a-glance view of the day ahead that includes Meetings, Tasks, recent messages and calls, and OTA information such as Weather and Quote of the Day. There are also views for one day, a week (list and grid mode), a month (expanded), as well as views for Tasks and Contact information (list and expanded). All of these options let you tailor Agendus to work in a way best suited for your needs
• Plug and Play. Simply download the software and you’re good to go! No additional set-up is required. The application immediately populates with the data already found on your BlackBerry once installed.
• Data Safe. Rather than completely replacing the Calendar, Contact and Task applications that come equipped on your BlackBerry – Agendus taps and enhances them! By reading/writing to the same data storage location that the built-in applications use, all the same personal data found in Agendus can also be found in the built-ins and vice versa.
• Sync Easy. This powerhouse works hand-in-hand with the synchronization set-up you currently have established, so you can seamlessly replicate the personal data within Agendus on your mobile to your desktop mail client by performing routine syncs.
• Desktop Companion Available. If you enjoy using Agendus on your BlackBerry, you’ll also enjoy using Agendus on your PC.
• Filter. Sort. Find. Fast! Get to the information you want, when you want. Adjust your view display or quick filter by entering letters for a keyword search.
• Wireless Capabilities. While on-the-go, retrieve weather forecasts, Quote of the Day, and This Day in History facts all through your wireless network connection.
• 100% Theme Friendly. Agendus automatically adjusts itself to conform to the theme (color, styles) already in use by your BlackBerry.

I was just reading a writeup on Flurry by Doriano @ Mashable and thought it was worthy of mention. Flurry has just announced a new free mobile application analytics service for developers letting them know more about their users. I am not sure how intrusive this is to users but the idea seems pretty cool. Especially since Flurry is cross platform and supports JAVA ME, Android, and the iPhone OS.

Any developers want to chime of if this service is of any use to BlackBerry J2ME developers?

Check it out at www.flurry.com

Last week MyPoynt updated their application for the Bold with some new features and an cool new user interface. Tom let me know that the UI changes have now made their way to non-Bold devices with the release of v0.9.6. They also added some new options for mapping multiple results in Google Maps. This application just continues to improve upon a good thing!

Check out the latest version at m.mypoynt.com

When we mentioned that 16GB MicroSD cards were starting to appear online I could not find a RIM specification letting us know what sizes are supported by each OS. Viscafe kindly supplied us with a link to a RIM knowledgebase article detailing which OS supports what size. Did you know that OS 4.5.0.81 supports 8GB & 16GB cards??? It also confirms that the Bold supports 16GB cards.

From the knowledgebase article:

The following table lists BlackBerry Device Software versions and the supported media card size.

Media cards that use Secure Digital 2.0 (SD 2.0) flash memory format, MicroSDHC, can support data storage up to and above 2 GB.

File this one in the rumor category. Michael @ BBNews is reporting that a high level insider confirmed to certain employees that T-Mobile will not be carrying the Bold anytime soon. They may carry a later edition like the 8100 to the 8120 but not the plain old 9000 version.

This is not surprising with the way the Bold launch has been fumbled in the US so far. You must also take into consideration that the Bold would anyways have to be customized for T-Mobile since the current version of the Bold is only Tri-Band 3G and does not support the 1700MHz frequency that T-Mobile runs 3G on.

It looks like T-Mobile will be focusing on the 8220 and the 8900 Javelin (November?) for their upcoming BlackBerrys.

And the bad news keeps rolling in for those of us in the US waiting for a Bold…

AT&T really needs to get its act together with releasing the Bold. I caved and got one from Canada but most people want one direct from AT&T. Marc @ TBGR managed to score some screens of Best Buy’s internal system showing that the Bold is scheduled to come in stock on October 26th.

Since Best Buy is an authorized retailer they usually get devices 1-2 weeks after the AT&T stores. Does that mean that maybe AT&T will release the Bold this week or next? Who knows anymore.

Personally I would not put it past AT&T to release the device in 2009 the way things are going. When I plugged my AT&T SIM card into my Rogers branded Bold I noticed some small things missing. For example all of the junkware homescreen icons that AT&T pushes out do not have icons ready for the Bold. Also Push To Talk is noticeably absent. (Anybody care?)

Read more at the Boy Genius Report

Thanks to everybody for sending this one in!