This week, WES 2010, the big BlackBerry event of the year, kicked off with a boom. And another boom, followed by a POW! RIM officially announced 2 new phones, the Pearl 3G and the Bold 9650. The Pearl is just like you saw it before, except it has RIM's new optical TrackPad instead of the TrackBall (kinda makes the Pearl's name silly now), but in addition to the SureType keyboard, RIM has an option for a standard T9 based number pad. The Pearl is going to be GSM based only for now it seems, but don't worry Sprint and Verizon fans, the next one is for you. They also announced the Bold 9650, a CDMA follow-up to the Tour. Again replacing the Ball for the Pad (no jokes about this please), and adding WiFi and an internal memory boost to ease complaints of Tour customers. More importantly, RIM also announced BlackBerry 6, the new operating system that will allow for both multitouch use and non-touchscreen. It looks just like what we said last week, but last week we didn't have Will.I.Am playing in the background. Hit up the video above for that.
Next up, Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, may be considering a name change to Jobs. Microsoft has come out and said that Android has infringed on all kinds of patents of theirs, though they wouldn't say specifically which ones. Unlike Apple, they aren't going to take this to court (yet), and instead has offered to let HTC, the main/pretty much only company behind Windows Mobile and the upcoming Windows Phone 7, license the use of Android to them. That's right: HTC will be paying MICROSOFT so they can make GOOGLE'S phones. Seriously? I know that Matt has touched on this before, but the US Patent Office needs to be burned to the ground. The fact that companies can just patent vague ideas and common sense concepts and then get pissed when someone else makes a product that makes sense for human use. And more importantly, where the hell does Microsoft come off by saying that HTC should pay THEM for work they didn't do? If I were HTC, I'd say "Fine! Good luck with your LG and Dell WinPhone7SeriesWhateverTheHellIt'sCalledToday phones! Remember how those two companies suck? HA!" and then go make millions off the EVO 4G.
And finally, 2 short tidbits. The first is that Apple has set the date for the Worldwide Developer's Conference. It'll take place on June 7th, and if it's anything like last year, we'll see the "unveiling" of the new iPhone, along with some refreshed everything else they sell. Also today, Mozilla has released a pre-alpha version of Fennec, the mobile version of Firefox, for Android 2.0 and above devices. The browser is definitely pre-alpha, so if you have a Nexus or a Droid and do get it, don't judge it yet. I'll most likely post a video demo/review some time tonight or tomorrow to go more in depth.
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