Hopefully everyone is familiar with vPost. It’s an extremely valuable email multi-media tool available, allowing the BlackBerry user to capture moments with pictures, video, voicenotes, and notes, and GeoTag them as well. All from one email even. It allows you to send to personal emails as well as blogging sites such as Posterous. And now it’s in Personal Beta.

Vayyoo has come a long ways. The first time I tried vPost I was really impressed and excited, but the phone I was using at the time had blocked GPS through my wireless carrier to a third party. So I wasn’t able to utilize the GPS portion of it, but as the months have gone, vPost has increased the size of videos, and numbers of pictures, allowing you to save everything from concerts to your family moments. I have a phone in which I am able to utilize the full features of vPost including the GPS. VPost has been available in the BlackBerry Sync Store for $9.99, but they have announced their Personal Beta which is free for now. This one is also available in the BlackBerry Sync Store. Let me list the description of the app as listed in the store:

Whether you are out with friends, having fun on vacation, or at the scene of breaking news, vPost is a tool that you need on your BlackBerry. vPost makes capturing and sharing moments simple by integrating the camera, location, & email features of your BlackBerry. Share photos and videos of concerts, sporting events and fine dining in a whole new way.

By using vPost you can send pictures, video clips, and audio notes to your friends, family, and online communities quickly and easily. Include a map link with your GPS location for travel memories and geo-tagging. Create personal widgets for single click sending to individuals, groups, and popular sites like Facebook, Flickr and many more. Publish multiple photos, text, video, and even voice memos to your blog in a single step. With vPost the only limit is your imagination.

IMPORTANT: Set a convenience key to vPost and recording anything is just a click away. Download vPost today and capture the moment.

Here are the key features of vPost:

So these are pics I’m sharing with the set up. It’s been a little more thorough, much easier to set up, and there’s no real limitations on the size. I’m impressed. I chose some concert event moments from the U2 360 concert sponsored by BlackBerry since BlackBerry loves U2. I sent the entire email out and it includes the maps and all. It sends to my Twitter and my Posterous, in full detail, as well as anyone else that I choose to share with. And GPS is clearly working.

Pro’s: I love vPost, it’s one of my favorite apps since you can send so many files and be creative, sharing the moments that count. Whether it’s sharing a belated birthday wish, missing your loved one, a moment you want to keep a snapshot of, or a milestone. It’s all around incredible. GPS Geotag your event, so you can remember where you were. You can list several sites to post to. All from one app. It saves you time from sending one file at a time and you can do it live.

Cons: I really can’t find any con. Especially since the app is currently free in Beta. I didn’t have any problems setting it up.

I really have to give this app five stars. Easy to use, navigate, and set up. It does just as it says it does, it virtually posts for you. Enjoy your moments and share them too, without sharing one at a time. What have you got to lose when it’s absolutely free? Don’t miss out, go check it out for yourself!

You can grab your free copy of vPost Personal Beta by Vayyoo, Inc from the BlackBerry Sync Store here >

Compatible with BlackBerry OS: 4.5, 4.6, 4.7, 5.0

Compatible with BlackBerry Devices: 81xx Pearl series, 82xx Pearl Flip series, 83xx Curve series, 85xx Curve series, 87xx Series, 88xx World series, 89xx Curve series, 9000 (Bold), 9500 (Storm), 95xx Storm series, 96xx Tour series, 9700 (Bold)

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

• Post updates to Twitter, including a character countdown from 140 characters
• One-click access to view friends timelines, replies, your favorites, your own timeline, and the public timeline
• Post pictures to Zannel, TwitPic, Twitgoo, or yfrog
• Take a picture with a one-click embedded camera (BlackBerry® Device Software version 4.6+)
• Reply to tweets from each timeline view
• Send and receive direct messages
• Mark tweets as favorites
• Notification icon that indicates the number of unread messages, like new emails or missed calls (BlackBerry® Device Software version 4.6+)
• Cache all avatar images to internal memory, thus saves network access and helps faster loading
• Search Twitter with a keyword or from a list of currently trending topics
• Active text recognition of @usernames and #hashtags
• New Setup wizard
• Two modes of list views: a “fixed height” view and a “variable height” view

You can download OpenBeak by pointing your BlackBerry browser to m.openbeak.com

Loopt announced a major update for its free application for BlackBerry at the BlackBerry Developer Conference. Loopt connects users to the most relevant places and people nearby using background location updating. This new version better enhances a user’s ability to experience more around them by who’s around, what’s going on and where.

From the release:

Loopt now offers dynamically-generated, relevant local content about places and events from some of the best sources on the Web to help users meet up with nearby friends, explore new places to grab food, and find local events happening now.  Feature highlights include:

·    Discover the best places and events, including those rated highly by your friends on Pulse

·    See where your friends are on maps – view their latest updates listed in real-time and comment on them

·    Check-in to instantly share your updates with friends – easily update Facebook and Twitter with your photos and places in one Loopt check-in

·    Browse and rate local places and events – peruse detailed information from Zagat, Citysearch, and the Loopt community

·    Save money through special offers from nearby retailers with local coupons

Loopt is proud to partner with Zagat, the world’s leading provider of consumer-survey based information.  Zagat’s quality, trusted information is based on the collective experiences of thousands of avid consumers.

So I decided to find out just what Loopt is and what I can do with it. I downloaded it from their website and it installed quickly. It installs a cute little blue circle icon with two white circles intertwined, like a blue face with white oogly googly eyes. Logging in, you are able to create your account using your cell phone number. After it’s all set up. On the left side there are six buttons going down. Your main screen displays first in the center. You have a link to link to Twitter and Facebook. The next allows you to change your email, the next to do location sharing. This is nice as you can share, or hide from some or all of your friends. Next is Location refresh, and last My Alerts. Those you can set to be alerted to on by sms, email, or both.

Using the side buttons you have the option to check in with Loopt, Facebook, and Twitter. The next is Discover and this is where you can find hot events nearby and Hot places nearby which is restaurants. If you go to search you can find Bars, Coffee, Food, Gas and Events: all the ways we gather and socialize. Next is Friends. Here you can add friends, find friends, view on the map and see you and your friends. Lately is next, showing what you and your friends have updated today. Settings is the first screen you saw by default to change your settings and how you connect.

I have to admit, this is nice. I was alerted by text to the new friend request. It was easy to accept and message. You can see your friends on the map, and if you leave it running in the background, the location will update for you. I found it easy to use, great way to keep in touch, perfect to enhance social networking on your BlackBerry.

Loopt is available for the Curve 8900, Bold 9000, and the BlackBerry Tour 9630. You have to try this, it’s free, great for keeping track of the location of your friends, and what’s going on in your location. And what’s even nicer, the app is available to other platforms as well, so it’s possible to keep in touch with your friends even if they have a Droid. So don’t wait to be thrown for a loop, get Loopt and stay in the loop.

Grab your free copy of Loopt from here >

Loopt is also available on BlackBerry App  World here >

For more information, read more on Loopt here >

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

Another update once again. Slacker Radio for BlackBerry has updated as well. No changelog is available, but I’m guessing this is to prepare for 5.0. I use Pandora mainly for my Radio fix, but Slackers does have the cache ability that makes it an asset.

You can download Slacker Radio v2.0.91 here >

Pandora updated this weekend officially to v1.1.2. While it was announced, I kept seeing original 1.1.1 until yesterday. Our friend Matt alerted me about it, but we didn’t see it right away. He summed it up perfect saying he’s suffering from “Upgrade Anxiety”. I assured him he is not alone.

As always, please update your apps as your BlackBerry works best with updates. The new version makes it compatible with 5.0 and also remedies the bug where a few seconds before the end of the song, the next one would play.

Update your Pandora For BlackBerry here >

BlackBerry App World has updated, so please update your app world if you haven’t already. I haven’t noticed many differences yet, but here’s a few screen shots to give you an idea.

Download BlackBerry App World here >

RIM quietly updated their Facebook for BlackBerry application overnight. The new version is 1.7 and just updates a few small things, plus enhances performance. You should be able to download the latest version of Facebook either in App World, or by pointing your BlackBerry browser to m.facebook.com or blackberry.com/facebook.

Here’s a list of upgrades:

• News Feed Support – The ability to set the News Feed as the landing page
• News Feed Filters – The ability to toggle between ‘News Feed, Status Updates, Photos & Links’
• Caching Improvements – The application uses the device memory more efficiently.
• Feed Pre-fetching – The user will not be required to wait while their Facebook Feeds are updated
• View Profile Menu Option – Clients may easily view their own profile by selecting ‘View my Profile’ from the menu. “

[via CrackBerry]

Bolt has announced it has dropped the beta tag and has released Bolt 1.5!  This new release is faster, 15% faster than the Beta 3. New features include the ability to stream videos of any length, a dedicated search bar, a download manager that downloads files straight from BOLT, and a caching feature to browse from a previously viewed page.

The description of BOLT is as follows:

Those who beta tested BOLT helped to make this happen quickly. If you have BOLT in the beta version, it will automatically prompt you to update. If you’re interested in downloading BOLT, you can submit to download BOLT from here >

I’m trying out a few applications for the BlackBerry that promise to help with being a responsible driver. One is drivesafe.ly and the other is zoomsafer. I know statistics say there’s quite a few drivers who text, I can make an educated guess it’s more. We all know someone who does it.

We all love our BlackBerry, and sometimes we are so caught up we cannot help ourselves, and it’s hard to draw the line where it is excessive, especially when we are so used to multitasking. Well, today I saw a movie titled “Seven Pounds”, and of course the main character you find out at the end received a message on his BlackBerry and his looking at his phone instead of the road caused his accident which killed seven people. It really affected me, not to mention caused my daughter to look at me with a raised eyebrow since my BlackBerry and I are inseparable. So I went to search for applications that will help me to more responsible. Not that I text while I drive, but I’m usually fortunate to have my daughter as a passenger who is quick to grab my phone when it dings and can answer for me. But this would help make life easier and assure her that I am responsible even when she isn’t in the passenger seat, not to mention show her I want to be a role model and show her I want her to do the same.

The two apps are drivesafe.ly and zoomsafer. Both apps are free or have a free version. Drivesafe.ly is actually available in the BlackBerry Sync Store as well. The description of drivesafe.ly is as follows:

DriveSafe.ly automatically reads incoming text messages and emails out loud so you can concentrate on the road. Eliminate the temptation to reach for your phone by letting DriveSafe.ly read to you and optionally auto-respond for you.
Stay connected by listening to your messages without texting while driving or reading emails in your car. DriveSafe.ly is the answer to texting while driving TWD .

For even more functionality download DriveSafe.ly Pro – also available on BlackBerry® App World. DriveSafe.ly Pro adds the ability to use additional voices, listen to text messages and emails without sponsor messages and much more!

This app is compatible with BlackBerry devices that have OS 4.5 and up.

There is a paid, a one time fee and monthly fee version available.

The free one includes:

Reads up to 25 words per message

Female voice only

Optional text and email auto-responder

Easily upgradable to DriveSafe.ly Pro

The one time fee of $13.95 includes:

Low one-time charge for lifetime of phone

Reads up to 500 words per message

Choice of female or male voice

Auto-select voice by contact gender

Optional text and email auto-responder

The monthly is the same as above, but charges a monthly fee of $3.95.

With ZoomSafer, it’s available by signing up on line, and the text is sent to the phone. You are able to choose 3 designated contacts who may call you while you drive and who can receive notification when you drive and stop. The scary thing is that it’s a proven fact statistics show that 80% of crashes involve driver distraction. It’s a concerning issues, so much that President Obama has banned texting for all Federal employees. We’re making changes, but it’s not enough. We as adults, are the examples to our children and our teens. We need to start paying more attention, and software such as these can make a difference.

ZoomSafer’s description is as follows:

ZoomSafer is patented software for mobile phones that prevents distracted driving by helping motorists make better decisions.  The service automatically activates when you’re driving and applies a policy that determines what you can/can’t do with your phone.  Plus, ZoomSafer leverages psychological and social factors to encourage you to make good choices — and it can even remind you that there may be criminal and financial consequences for making bad choices.

By helping people make better choices when driving – ZoomSafer can successfully:

modify behavior

reduce risk of crash

reduce risk of liability

save lives/money

Right now ZoomSafer is in stage one of the beta and it includes:

Auto speed detection – ZoomSafer detects when you start to drive and automatically activates.’

Safety Announcements – A recorded message plays when ZoomSafer activates reminding you to drive safely.  We’ve pre-recorded several announcements for the Beta, but in phase 2 of the beta you’ll be able to record your own custom announcements as well as choose from several Celebrity Safety Announcements.

Auto-Toots – These are messages sent on your behalf to friends, families, and social networks to tell them when you’ve started and stopped driving.  These updates are OPTIONAL and can be sent via SMS or E-mail to up to three contacts.  You can also update Facebook or Twitter with these notifications.

Keyboard Locking – Your keypad will be locked when ZoomSafer is active (driving mode) except for: (1) the “Close” soft key exits the application when you have stopped driving or if you are a passenger. (2) Calling 911 (on the Storm, this will be a soft key and all other Blackberry models, you can press 9-1-1) and (3) the Voice Dialer left hand convenience key – For this initial Beta, we are allowing you to use the native voice dialing application on Blackberrys to make outbound calls. In the future this feature will only be available as part of the ZoomMate premium service.

Three Priority Contacts – You can enter up to three Priority Contacts who will be able to call and interrupt you while you are driving. If a priority contact calls you while you are driving we will announce the call via a generic ZoomRinger. In phase 2 of the beta you will be able to create custom ZoomRingers for each of your priority contacts.

Inbound phone call management – While you are driving, we will suppress ringer/notification of all inbound callers who are not listed as Priority Contacts.

Inbound email/text message management – While you are driving, we will suppress messaging-related inbound alerts.

Auto-Responses – While you are driving, if people try and contact you via phone, email or text – they will receive an auto-response notifying them that you are focused on the road and driving with ZoomSafer.

I’m going to be alternating these apps and using them, to see what I think about them. I encourage you to try them with me, and make a difference. I’ll be sharing my review by next Sunday on both the ZoomSafer and the drivesafe.ly. If you try them with me, I would really like you to share your comments on this post with me, share your findings and experience with them. Change begins with us, and even if we are not guilty of reading our texts or emails while we drive, we can begin showing the younger generation we care by taking advantage of software that is designed to help us and them. I know I’d feel better if I like the software and have my family using it as well. It’s assurance and relief. I’d really appreciate some comments and let me know if you’re joining me in this assignment this week.

There’s a new software out that is going to make shopping more useful. Especially when it comes to Black Friday and Christmas shopping. And this software is free. The app is edocrab by Steelthorn Software. Edocrab is actually the word barcode spelled backwards, and barcode is what this app works off of besides your BlackBerry.

Steelthorn Software has a few different apps, and you’re probably familiar with them already. They have apps like the extremely useful QuickPull, BerryAnnoying, StormLock, and AutoStandBy to name a few. Some are paid, some are free. Well Edocrab is free. I had to try this app out, free or not, to see what all it could do. I love their moto for this app, “Leave the jungle, hit the beach”, it’s a great concept.

I downloaded and installed it on my BlackBerry Tour 9630. The app downloaded and installed quickly. When you go to find it, the icon sits as a barcode with a little yellow/orange crab in the bottom right. When you click on it, the top ribbon has the crab, the words edocrab by Steelthorn, and then the choices below are Scan, Search, Lists, and History.

Scanning may take a few times. It’s best in very well lit area and trying to avoid any side lines, just the bar code. If the barcode doesn’t show clearly to the app, it will show you how your barcode pic compares to an example barcode pic. If at first you don’t succeed, you’ll try again till you get it right. After a successful barcode pic, the app will search online and the next screen you’ll see is the product, the cheapest price it found for online, and when you click on the top product, it will show you pics, you can click on video if there’s any, and music if any. The next line is the prices and you can click on it to see which online sites are offering the cheapest prices for that product. Next is reviews. Click on reviews to see what other consumers have to say about the product. And then there’s add to a list.

There’s also Search, where you can search a product, Lists which is what you create of what you want, and History where you can pull up previous searches.

For free, you can’t beat it. I like the products Steelthorn has. Pros are that it is fast to search once you scan. It’s accurate in pricing. The app is free, you can’t beat that. I can see this app being very handy for birthdays (provided you give yourself ample time to be prepared to order online), weddings, anniversaries, holidays, you get the picture. Here’s another pro….the product I scanned was for the same price from Walmart as the scan said it was on Walmart’s online site. So before ordering you might want to just stop by the store and see if it’s available there at that price.

Cons are that is that it sometimes takes a few or more barcode scans before it will accept it. The only stores that it lists are those online (which most of us shop now anyways). And the app is currently available only on the Steelthorn site and the BlackBerry App World. Hopefully it will be available in the BlackBerry Sync Store as well.

Keep in mind that the app is Beta, which means there may still be some bugs or issues, so kindly report any if you experience such issues so that Steelthorn and the developers can make this app even better.

The most current version will be downloadable from the Steelthorn edocrab site itself.

You can grab edocrab for free from the edocrab Steelthorn site here >

You can also grab edocrab for free from the BlackBerry App World here >

Compatible with all BlackBerry devices 4.5 or higher. If your BlackBerry does not have a camera, you can manually enter the upc in manually and it will work the same.

Rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars