Soon after Rogers announced the BlackBerry Torch 9800, Telus announced (through Twitter) that they’ll also be offering the Torch on September 24th:

TELUS today announced it is targeting September 24th for the launch of the new BlackBerry Torch™ 9800 smartphone on Canada’s fastest mobile network*. Designed especially for socially connected consumers and packed with the tools business customers love, the new handset offers elegant styling with top-of-the-line features and functionality. It’s the world’s first smartphone to combine a BlackBerry keyboard with a full touch screen experience and the first to feature the new BlackBerry 6.0 operating system.

“Both business and consumer customers will get an incredible mobile experience from the new BlackBerry Torch smartphone,” said Brent Johnston, vice-president of Mobility Solutions at TELUS. “TELUS is pleased to bring the BlackBerry Torch to Canadians, which will allow them to easily stay connected, entertained and informed wherever they are while running on our blazing fast 3G+ network.”

Unfortunately Telus did not offer any info about pricing but they’ll probably offer it at $199.99 to match Rogers. For more info go to telusmobility.com/blackberry_9800 or check out the full press release below.

FULL PRESS RELEASE!

The team over at Xobni let me know that their BlackBerry application is now available in the BlackBerry App World. Those of you that prefer getting your apps from the App World can now take advantage of this awesome address book app. Xobni allows you to effortlessly manage your address book with the following features:

• Automatically created profiles for every person with whom you’ve ever communicated.
• Ranked by importance – The people you email the most are at the top.
• Lightning fast search by name or company name exposes each person’s profile. Complete with photos, contact info, recent emails, calls, texts, info from LinkedIn/Facebook and more.
• Instant access to all your Xobni Contacts in the BlackBerry® compose screen.

Xobni is a Super App with deep integration on BlackBerry smartphones, allowing you to scan emails, create profiles and add contact info real-time, integration with the compose message screen, click to call or email from within the app, schedule or view meetings in the calendar app with one click, LinkedIn/Facebook integration and more.

Xobni Mobile supports most BlackBerry device running OS 4.6 or higher and is available for $9.99 with a free trial. For more info go to xobni.com/mobile or check it out in the BlackBerry App World.

Rogers mentioned in early August that they’d get the Torch “in the coming weeks” and it looks like they were able to stay on schedule. Today they announced on the Rogers RedBoard blog that the BlackBerry Torch 9800 will be available from them on September 24th for $199.99 on a three-year term. If you’d like to receive updates on the Torch from Rogers you can sign up at rogers.com/torch.

In addition to this announcement, Rogers put together a video where they talk to BlackBerry’s Director of Marketing, Michael McDowell, about some of the new features of the Torch including the new web browser, the Social Feeds app, BlackBerry 6 and Universal Search.

WATCH THE VIDEO!

It’s that time of year again where football fans begin recruiting for their fantasy football teams. About a year ago Yahoo! released the 2009 version of their Y! Fantasy Football application, this year they’ve done something a bit different and released a launcher app instead. The launcher app takes you to m.yahoo.com/fantasyfootball where you have access to the following:

• Live matchup scoring
• Roster alerts
• Roster management
• Player projections
• Player news
• Fantasy Football blogs

The Y! Fantasy Football launcher app is available as a free download from the BlackBerry App World and should work on all devices for users in the United States and Canada. I’ve always been a fan of dedicated applications but a launcher app does have its advantages like not taking up as much space and not being limited to what’s available through the app.

Do you prefer the dedicated app or are you ok with just a launcher?

The official and free eBay app for BlackBerry today was updated to version 1.0.1.6, the first update since it went out of beta back in June. There is no changelog for the new version but according to some comments left on its App World page, the app seems to be working a lot better now. Features include:

• Receive alerts when there’s a change in an item’s status
• View and reply to messages sent by buyers
• Get calendar reminders and email notifications for listing end dates
• Pay for an item using PayPal®
• Search by keyword, item number, category, price and more
• Review your sale items, view items that have sold and relist items

The eBay app for BlackBerry is available for all devices but limited to certain countries. For more info and to download the new version go to blackberry.com/ebay or search for it in the BlackBerry App World.

Thanks @ps360wii!