Research In Motion (RIM) has finally announced the rumored and anticipated BBM Music service which integrates with the BlackBerry Messenger.

Previosly, reports about RIM’s late negotiations with major music labels to launch a music streaming service for its BlackBerry devices came in. More reports suggested that the service will charge $5 a month for 50 songs.

Douglas Soltys, a spokesperson for RIM, confirmed the news and said that BBM Music is expected to be available later this year for a monthly subscription fee of $4.99, plus tax. BBM Music is a BBM-connected social music service that allows BlackBerry smartphone users to share and discover music through BBM Music friends. Users, however, will need to have BBM 6 installed.

“Once you have created a BBM Music sharing friendship with a BBM contact, you can make use of all that BBM Music has to offer (like other BBM-connected apps, BBM Music was built using the same BBM SDKs extended to the BlackBerry developer community. To see a list of other great BBM-connected apps, check out our BBM 6: Apps Made Social post),” Soltys said in BlackBerry’s official blog.

RIM will also be linking the BBM Music Service with Amazon MP3 Store for song purchases. Songs on the user's playlist can be downloaded to the device’s storage memory for offline listening. Songs can also be streamed over wireless networks.

Soltys confirmed that users will now be able to build their own music profile from a Catalog of millions of tracks. They can also invite friends to BBM Music from their BBM contacts and gain access to their music and share their own music. Seamless integration with other BlackBerry music services will also be available.

“A great way to stay up on what your BBM Music friends are listening to is by viewing the activity timeline on the Home tab,” Soltys wrote. “From there, you can see what playlists your BBM Music friends are creating, what songs they’ve added to their profiles, and the comments friends are posting on your track selections (BTW: My coworkers at RIM seem to really enjoy my addiction to indie rock =D).”

RIM will now compete against pre-existing streaming services such as Pandora, Rdio, Spotify and Rhapsody, and will be aiming to use the new subscription music service as a source to revive interest in its BlackBerry Messenger functionality, the blackberry official blog reported.

RIM, previously, had also revealed its new mid-range Curve 9360 just weeks after the company launched its high-end Torch 9810, 9850 and Bold 9900 handsets.

The 2.44 inch Curve will run on the new BlackBerry OS 7.0 and will boast a QWERTY keyboard with a touch-sensitive optical trackpad. The smartphone will be powered by an 800MHz processor and will arrive with a 5 MP, 2592?1944 pixels, LED flash camera, as compared to the previous Curves.

The device will also arrive with a 1000 mAhr removable/rechargeable lithium-ion battery, with talk time up to 5 hours and music playback up to 25 hours. The featured applications will include YouTube, Flixster for information about top movies, Vlingo, a voice app that will work as a personal assistant, and BlackBerry Protect designed to keep information secured if the device goes missing.

Sprint will be the first carrier to offer the new Curve models. The phone will be sold for $80 with a two-year data plan, after a $50 mail-in rebate, from Sept. 9.

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