Brightkite announced on their blog that the free BrightBerry application was made open source by Chris Hallgren. BrightBerry is for any BlackBerry with OS 4.5 and higher.

BrightBerry currently lets you:

• View and navigate your streams (Friends, Nearby, Universe, Mentions, and User)
• Post a Note to your current location
• Check in to Placemarks
• Send and receive Direct Messages
• View and post comments on a post

Chris Hallgren has made BrightBerry open source in the hopes that other developers will contribute to the project. In addition to GPS and Place Search check-ins, the following features are currently being worked on:

• Posting photos from camera capture and media viewer
• Sending and responding to Friend Requests
• Creation of Placemarks
• Viewing a Place Stream
• Improving load times on streams
• Creating a better GUI based on the iPhone app

BrightBerry is currently in its Alpha stage of development with some bugs that need to be worked out. If you’re a developer who would like to help with BrightBerry you can visit the GitHub project profile for more info.

You can download BrightBerry by visiting bbhn.mobi from your BlackBerry Browser, or with your desktop for more info and a desktop installation link. The desktop installation only works if you visit the site with Internet Explorer.