Unwilling to have HTC and Samsung steal all of the headlines from Mobile World Congress, BlackBerry has announced that a new version of BBM will be rolling out to BlackBerry 10 and Android users today, followed by an iOS release “soon.”
While this will not be news to BBM beta testers, BlackBerry states it has “made tweaks and squished bugs” that will bring “the fastest and smoothest BBM experience yet.” The main attraction, however, are the new monthly subscriptions for BlackBerry to monetize its messaging service, specifically custom BBM PINs and the option to remove ads from your feed.
Those that do update to the latest version will see a new menu that offers sign-ups for ‘No Ads’ and ‘Custom PIN’. Eliminating ads will cost you $0.99 USD per month, which will eliminate sponsored posts from BBM advertisers. As for the custom PIN option, it will cost $1.99 (USD) per month, and can be anything you desire as long as it’s between 6-8 characters.
In addition, this update will also bring support for Android Wear smartwatches. BBM for Android Wear allows users to receive alerts, read and respond to messages, and also accept BBM invites.
[source] BBM [/source]
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