How To Get Your Hands On The BlackBerry Dev Alpha C Device

RIM continues to surprise the BlackBerry developer community in a good way. Since this last May at BlackBerry Jam in Orlando, RIM has given out over 7,500 BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha testing devices to developers around the globe. So far, these Dev Alpha devices have all been full touch models. The surprise is, RIM has now opened up a Dev Alpha device program for a QWERTY model, calling it the BlackBerry Dev Alpha C. This news comes fresh from the BlackBerry Jam Asia event that is going on right now.

RIM is only producing a limited number of these testing devices, and they will be reserved on a priority list for developers who have demonstrated that they are building apps for BlackBerry 10. So how does one go about getting one of these devices? See RIM's guidelines below:

Distribution will be limited to developers who submit two or more applications; these developers will be given priority seeding for the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha C. These developers will be determined on the following point system:

• 50 points for ported Android™ applications
• 250 points for all other applications (Native, BlackBerry® WebWorks™, Adobe® AIR®)
• 1500 points for Built For BlackBerry certified application
• BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha A/B recipients start with 200 points
• BlackBerry Elite Members start with 200 points

The BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha C offer will run from December 1, 2012 through February 5, 2013. The details on the program can be found here.