Verizon Wireless introduced a push-to-talk service for the BlackBerry Tour.

Beginning March 30, subscribers had the ability to add the service to their existing plans and download an application. Verizon is also offering a 90-day promotion for free push-to-talk service when customers activate a qualifying voice plan and BlackBerry data plan. The service is normally $5 per month on top of a voice and data plan.

The BlackBerry service includes the ability to make group calls with up to 50 participants. It enables presence and availability features for push-to-talk calls and allows subscribers to manage push-to-talk contacts online.

A Verizon spokeswoman told FierceWireless that the Tour is the only BlackBerry for which Verizon is offering the service right now, and declined to discuss whether it will be made available for other BlackBerry models.

Last week, Motorola and Sprint Nextel unveiled plans to launch the ruggedized Motorola i1 push-to-talk smartphone based on Google's Android 1.5 operating system for the Nextel iDEN network.

For more:
- see this release
- read this FierceWireless article

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