On Tuesday, Twitter gave a struggling smartphone maker a breath of fresh air. The social media giant is now allowing users to extend their promotional reach across the BlackBerry platform.

“Last month, we rolled out Promoted Tweets in timelines on iOS and Android mobile devices,” Twitter announced on its advertising blog today. “To help brands connect with even more mobile users, today we’re extending Promoted Tweets to BlackBerry devices and introducing the ability for advertisers to target BlackBerry devices, in addition to iOS and Android.”

Twitter, which has more than 140 million active users, says that more than half of this user base is mobile and regularly accesses the service via mobile devices.

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Canada-based Research in Motion has lost its homeland in the ongoing smartphone battle with the likes of Apple’s iPhone.

According to the latest data released by IDC, RIM shipped only 2.08 million BlackBerrys in 2011 inside of Canada. Apple shipped 2.85 million iPhones.

This development marks the first time Apple has trumped RIM in the smartphone race in RIM’s native Canada. And, once again, it points to ongoing struggles for the BlackBerry maker that show no signs of relenting.

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According to its freshly released February MobileSTAT report, Jumptap says Android and iPhone devices now “hog” 91% of the mobile operating system share.

In other words, if you’re competing with these two platforms… good luck.

Based on data from the Jumptap network of more than 95 million monthly users, both operating systems reached new heights in January; Android hit 58.8 percent and iOS reached 32.2 percent market share respectively.

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Got a small pile of unwanted electronics that have been replaced by new models and gadgets in your life?

If you opt to get rid of them, you could be making one or more cybercriminals very happy.

Although the average mobile user retains their newest phone for at least twelve months, 90% of the phones sold in the last 25 years are still in circulation, if not in service.

This reality means that when secondhand devices fall into the wrong hands, sensitive information that you thought was erased can be restored and used against you.

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On Wednesday, PrivacyStar rolled out the introductory red carpet for Metro Block-it, a new call and text message blocking service for MetroPCS Communications, Inc. customers.

The service also allows customers to directly file complaints against telemarketers and debt collectors with the Federal Trade Commission and is now available on MetroPCS’ Android smartphones, with support for BlackBerry smartphones and feature phone service coming soon.

According to company’s formal announcement of the feature, MetroPCS is the first national mobile service provider to offer the PrivacyStar service directly to its customers.

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Gartner has declared Apple the top smartphone vendor of 2011, an achievement awarded Wednesday to the iPhone maker after a 12-month sales surge made possible by the critical and commercial praise of the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S.

Although others in the mobile community felt Samsung would emerge as 2011′s leading manufacturer of the market’s hottest mobile devices, the fourth quarter of 2011 – which was a powerful, record-breaking quarter for Apple – put the iPhone maker over the top.

For the quarter ending December 2011, Apple scored 23.8 percent share of the smartphone market on sales of 37 million iPhones.

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RIM may be struggling to have its BlackBerry smartphone keep pace with other industry leading devices in the mobile space today, but the company says at least 13% of its BlackBerry App World developers certainly aren’t struggling financially.

According to RIM vice president of developer relations Alec Saunders, the BlackBerry App World storefront is more profitable for devs that the competing Android Market owned and operated by rival Google.

Saunders revealed this week at the BlackBerry DevCon Europe conference that BlackBerry App World sees more than 6 million app downloads every 24 hours. Saunders alleges that App World now produces 43 percent more daily downloads per mobile app than Apple’s App Store.

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