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Feeling overloaded with BlackBerry news and rumors? We know the feeling. We hear new things almost every day, and it can be tough to keep up with it all. that’s why we’re bringing you BlackBerry News from the Wire every Thursday.

We’ll catch you up on everything ‘Berry that happened over the course of the week. Not only that, but we’ll rank ‘em by importance, so you can more easily skim the items and read the ones of most significance. If you only have time to read one article, for instance, you might want to head down to our 5-star section. It’s All the BlackBerry News Fit to Geek.

LTE, 9630, 1GHz processor rumored for WES
We’re entering the most abundant BlackBerry rumor season of the year: the months leading up to WES. For this unfamiliar, this is the Wireless Enterprise Symposium, a yearly gathering of BlackBerry geeks to discuss the future of the device — and more importantly, to unveil new developments. Boy Genius Report runs down the early rumors of WES announcements. The slam dunks are BES 5.0 and the Curve 8900 on AT&T, and the BlackBerry “Niagra” 9630 is a near lock as well. There is no certainty about this, but there’s a possibility RIM could unveil its work on an LTE BlackBerry, plus one with a 1GHz processor. Both of those would be good for “wow” factor, though neither will probably be released even by the end of the year. Still, it’s cool to get cracking on these rumors. We’ll discuss them a bit further on the BBGeekcast tomorrow.

Is RIM’s consumer focus hurting the bottom line?
It’s often taken as a given that RIM’s foray into the consumer market, thereby straying from their enterprise-focused roots, is a good development for the company. It has surely impacted their subscriber numbers: they’re growing rapidly, much quicker than they had in the pre-consumer device days. However, it has led to a short-term instability issue, as profit margins are down from about 50 percent to 40 percent. There’s still plenty of long-term hope for RIM, though, which is the hope of the company. Jim Balsillie noted as such in September: “So we could have a sweeter margin for a couple of quarters and we might not torque the growth quite as much and then we will rue that for the next 20 years, that we gave up the key land for a little bit of interim gratification.”

Skype coming to BlackBerry in May
We’ve waited a long time for Skype to hit the BlackBerry, and it looks like it will finally happen in May. There have been attempts at this before, but apparently battery usage has been a bit issue. Apparently Skype has overcome this. Many wonder how much this will catch on — after all, carriers probably aren’t happy at the notion of an application which bypasses their proprietary calling systems. However, Skype claims that they can boost consumer spending on cell phones. We’ll get a chance to test out that theory in May.

Full TV episodes coming to BlackBerry
Some big news from CTIA: QuickPlay Media is bringing full length TV episodes to the BlackBerry. The downside is that it will only be available on the Bold and Curve 8900 at first, because it will only transfer over Wi-Fi connections. However, this allows the service to run over any network, which is a plus for everyone. QuickPlay has deals with NBC, CBS, and MTV, so there will be plenty of content to go around.

MobiHand unveils its own on-device app store
Not to be done by RIM’s App Store, MobiHand, which powers the BBGeeks Store, has released their own on-device application center. It has many of the features of the Web app store, including category browsing and detailed product descriptions. The major advantage, of course, is the ability to do things right on the device. With plenty of awesome BlackBerry applications available from MobiHand, this could be a viable alternative to RIM’s own application store.

Mike Lazaridis speaks at CTIA
CTIA was blessed this week with a Day 1 keynote speech from RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaridis. Ever the BlackBerry addict, Kevin videotaped event, so you can watch it in all its glory — if that’s up your alley. For a preview, or if you don’t have enough time/patience to watch the whole speech, you can read an interview with Lazaridis on Wireless Week.

BlackBerry users can purchase tickets from Ticketmaster
Right up front, I’m no fan of Ticketmaster. No consumer in his or her right mind should be. The ever-increasing fees are a point of grave frustration for many event-goers. Yet they have the distribution, so they call the shots. At least it’s a bit easier to use the necessary evil now, as you can buy tickets from your BlackBerry. So it’s an additional way to get ripped off. Woo hoo.

How to unlock a Bell or Telus Storm
For those out there who want a bit more control over their BlackBerry Storm Experience, BlackBerry Cool has a bit on how to unlock a BlackBerry Storm on Bell or Telus. Not for the faint of heart.

Wake up to multiple alarms. For some, waking up is hard to do. Remedy that by trying these ways to set multiple alarms.

Google now has voice search. If your thumbs are hurting, you can now speak your search into Google.

The complete guide to listening to music on your BlackBerry. Okay, maybe complete is misleading, but we encourage you to let us know how you listen to music on your Berry.

BlackBerry launches App World. RIM started off CTIA with a bang by announcing their long-anticipated on-device application store. Much fun will be had with this.

Theme Review Wednesdays. Check out this week’s crop of premium BlackBerry themes, torn apart and reviewed.

Bolt browser gets another update. They have 300,000+ users in their public beta, and here is the first round of updates based on feedback. This thing is going to be superb once it hits an official release.

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