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Check Out The BlackBerry Javelin

Research In Motion has been on a tear with good-looking devices lately, but an upcoming model will make Crackberry addicts drool. Alas, there is a catch.

While the upcoming BlackBerry Bold and the touch-screen Thunder are sure to draw some fans, the BlackBerry Javelin is the fairest of them all.

The scamps at Engadget Mobile have an impressive gallery of images of this gorgeous device, as well as a video.

This pretty handset is still in the prototype phase, but it's expected to feature a 480-by-360 LCD display and integrated Wi-Fi, run the 4.6 OS platform, and sport a 3.2-megapixel camera. So what's the problem? It's not expected to have support for the high-speed 3G networks, only EDGE support. As nice as this one looks, the lack of 3G makes it a definite pass in my book.

On a quick note, I want to apologize to Sprint Nextel. I was a bit peeved about reports that Nextel didn't charge government subscribers early-termination fees, but, it turns out they weren't allowed to because of federal procurements regulations.

Sprint spokesman John Taylor chatted with me about the company's early-termination fees and said the company will implement a prorated policy that's similar to Verizon. He also mentioned efforts that Sprint's taking to make sure customers are aware of ETFs, including a 30-day return window for new.

Like I thought, he said ETFs are needed to cover some of the subsidy costs, and that there has been some misinformation out there about how much that actually is. Some have said the average subsidy for Sprint is $14.33 (PDF), and Taylor said the math just doesn't work on that.

According to the company's latest 10-K filing, it spent $2.4 billion on equipment subsidies in 2007 for its 54 million subscribers. This would mean that that each customer purchased at least three phones in 2007, Taylor said.

"If we had sold 169 million wireless phones last year, our stock would much higher," Taylor said with a laugh.

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