Blackberry unveils NFC sharing with ‘Blackberry Tag’

Possibly to prove that there is still some life left in its Blackberry, Research In Motion (RIM) will introduce its NFC sharing option, “Blackberry Tag” to its compatible phones with its next OS 7 update.

Jim Balsillie, RIM co-CEO at a presentation at the GITEX in Dubai said, “BlackBerry Tag is an exciting and innovative feature that makes sharing contact information and multimedia content effortless and seamless. BlackBerry Tag opens a new dimension to the BlackBerry platform that is powerful, simple and intuitive and we think it will be welcomed by both users and developers.”

With the OTA Blackberry OS 7 update, RIM has said that users will be able to “share contact information, documents, URLs, photos and other multimedia content by simply tapping their BlackBerry smartphone’s together. BlackBerry Tag will also enable friends to instantly add one another as contacts on BlackBerry Messenger.”

It must be noted that the Blackberry Tag NFC option will be subject to availability on certain networks, therefore it may not be globally available.

Blackberries with NFC support include the Bold 9900 and 9330 as well as the Curve 9350, 9360 and 9370. They will also be the first phones to support Blackberry tag. RIM has further plans to push the Blackberry Tag API’s on its developers. This is to allow software publishers access to NFC features within their applications.

Current phones with NFC features include the Nokia N9 and the Samsung Galaxy SII. Analysts predict that Blackberry Tag will be much in line with the “Bump” sharing software available on the Apple iPhone models. Blackberry Tag though, will further bolster these sharing options including such possibilities as wireless payments and faster data transfers. This “effortless tap to share” is extended not only to smartphone’s but to home theatre systems, stand-alone speakers and certain flat-screen TV’s which are yet to be available.