Twitter on the Blackberry

Everyone who has a smart phone is on the iPhone or something running Android, right?  Wrong.  As of early 2010, roughly 20.8% of the worldwide smart phone market—that’s about 22 million users—check emails during boring meetings and tedious, family dinners, on none other than the ubiquitous, Blackberry.  Even with that enviable market share, the options for Twitter on the Blackberry are considerably fewer than its more glamorous kin.

Since Twitter is an important part of effectively using social media, finding a good client for my Blackberry was critical and not nearly as easy as I thought it would be.  For several months, I relied on TinyTwitter.  TinyTwitter is an adequate application, but its flaky authentication errors, odd interface, and general lack of development left me wanting more.

The more that I found is a Blackberry application called ÜberTwitter.  Elegant and stable, it’s available in a free, ad supported version or ad free for US$4.99 per year. Yes, per year.  Interestingly, the ads are simply a tiny banner at the top of the timeline screen.  It’s hardly noticeable and seems to be quite innocent.  Still, I plan to pay them US$4.99.  It seems only right for something this good.  How good?  Here’s a partial list of ÜberTwitter’s features.

• Full list functionality
• People search
• New and old retweet methods gracefully done
• Update your Twitter profile right from the phone, including adding a picture
• Easily report spam
• Fully controllable geo-tagging
• Friend picker for easy tweeting
• Zoom in on Avatars
• Use TwitLonger to send longer tweets
• Examine trends and follow the hottest news
• Multiple styles of timelines
• Easy picture posting
• Verified users icon 
• Send video from your phone
  
• Enhance network connection logic (this is huge!) 
  

Enough words; now some pictures. 

In order, the original style timeline, a tweet, showing user detail, and the web interface for the geo-tagging tools.  Please note that these images are copyright by ÜberTwitter.  Please visit their site to see the originals and to view larger versions.

If you’re serious about social media and you have a Blackberry, go to ÜberTwitter now and try out this app and then come back here and let me know what you thought of it.  If you think you have a better choice, leave a comment telling me what and why!