Here at the BlackBerry Developer Conference we got a sneak peek at the upcoming Xobni app for BlackBerry. The app features a ubiquitous search bar that is seamlessly integrated into your mail, contacts and social networks. The app gives you a great deal of data about each contact including basic contact information as well as updates from that contact’s social networks. The app will also show you possible connections from within these networks.
One of the most impressions features is the way Xobni organizes your contacts across all your email services. The Xobni demo showed how easy it is to take a common name, for which there could be tens of entries, and efficiently move between the Xobni app and your email. Also, for those names which could have multiple entries, Xobni uses a ranking system that means your most interacted with contacts are at the top.
Xobni isn’t currently available but it looks like they are very close to a launch. Stay tuned because this app looks great.
The BlackBerry Cool LinkedIn has some of the brightest in the industry. If you’re looking for a job in the smartphone industry, interested in networking with other professionals, or you simply want to support the group, we would like to welcome you to the group.
Xobni is a must-have application for those using Outlook. Simply put, it connects your Outlook contacts and emails with the major social networks, thus giving you an additional layer of detail to your mail and contacts. The service also provides better search functionality to the Outlook platform. Bill Gates called it “very, very cool. The future of social networking.”
With Xobni Plus, you get all the functionality of the free version, with some new features including:
Advanced search query builder
Ability to search within conversations and networks
Support for phrases and Boolean queries
Xobni Rank-powered autosuggest
Advanced conversation and network filtering
I’ve been told by the company that Xobni for BlackBerry will be available this summer. I’ll get some updates about the BlackBerry product as soon as possible, and you can register to be notified when it launches.
DubMeNow is an easy way to exchange contacts with business partners on the go. DUB sends your contact information from your BlackBerry directly to the address book of your recipient’s BlackBerry.
Recently, DubMeNow have gone version 2.0 with their product and have added a new interface, ability to send LinkedIn invites, faster downloads and more. Version 2.5 will be coming in September and it will include the ability to connect via GPS (no email or phone number needed to send card), add photos and over twenty social media fields to your card, plus a Groups tab so you can see and connect with any member of any Group you join from your device.
XING is very much akin to the social network for enterprise, LinkedIn. The site has a similar look and feel while clearly targeting the same demographic.
The site has launched a free piece of software that keeps track of all the user’s contacts, and makes phone numbers and email addresses available online. Your contacts are automatically updated online by the members themselves.
XING has done a great job of recognizing their target market are on BlackBerry, while I still haven’t seen a BlackBerry app for LinkedIn. This app is sure to please XING users, and ideally help them better network in their industry.
The XING app requires an Internet-enabled BlackBerry smartphone running OS Version 4.2.1 or later with at least 64 MB internal memory and 170 KB of available memory.
Xobni has partnerships with Facebook, LinkedIn and a host of other social networks to complement your Outlook experience. Click an email and watch all the personal data for this individual come alive. You can also get statistics such as when and how often this individual emails you.
The app will make you BlackBerry device’s address book even better. Xobni users will soon be able to have access to many of the relationship management features they already love on their desktop from their BlackBerry as well.
A few months ago we started a BlackBerry Cool group on LinkedIn, to connect BlackBerry power users with colleagues in the wireless industry. We then promptly forgot about it. Despite our total disregard, however, the BlackBerry Cool LinkedIn Group has slowly gained a larger membership, passing the 500 user milestone earlier this week.
We thought it was time to remind everyone about the group and to promise some interesting things to come in the near future, thanks to new LinkedIn features. Let’s fill ‘er up to 1000!
Considering that RIM has pimped out their Facebook application across all carriers in North America, it’s likely that you’ve accessed a social network via your BlackBerry (although we prefer m.linkedin.com, and are patiently waiting for a native BlackBerry app). Analyst ABI Research speculated earlier this week that by 2013, there will be more than 140 million mobile social network subscribers worldwide, and generating subscription revenues in excess of $410 million. To put these numbers in perspective, that’s more than the current worldwide unique visitor numbers of either MySpace or Facebook, which hover somewhere around 115 million.
The question to be asked is where all that money will come from — both MySpace and Facebook currently have mobile web-accessible versions of their sites, and the aforementioned BlackBerry Facebook app costs you nothing but time and data. ABI Research speculates that the revenue come not via advertising, but through a subscription model for social network access, likely in the emerging markets of Brazil, Russia, India, and China.
Here’s a question (or two): how much would you pay to use a BlackBerry Facebook app per month? How much for a LinkedIn app?
BBCool is all about the Web 2.0 bandwagons, and LinkedIn is no exception. For those who haven’t heard, it’s a place where professionals can network, list qualifications, get recommendations, and generally get all the jollies of Facebook while still pretending to work. We’ve got a BBCool group set up so you can get in touch with all the other hep industry types that read BBCool. Of course, you can still hook up with other readers through our Facebook fan page.
The popular business social network, LinkedIn, will be getting a mobile makeover in the next couple of weeks, making it accessible via BlackBerry. Some of the other big additions include additional language support and news that you can share with colleagues in your company. It wasn’t too long ago that RIM boss Jim Balsillie was giving enterprise social networks like LinkedIn and Plaxo a thumbs up, and clearly they recognize the power of the mobile world just as much.
The popular business social network, 
