Despite its early launch woes, the touchscreen BlackBerry Storm appears to be selling strongly, coming in a No. 3 on NPD’s list behind the Curve and the iPhone 3G.

After the Storm comes the ever-popular BlackBerry Pearl—which, like the Curve, is available on all four major U.S. carriers—followed by the Android-powered G1 on T-Mobile.

So, how did the Curve manage to overtake the iPhone 3G? Well, as the NPD group notes, availability on all the big carriers always helps (the iPhone is, of course, still only on AT&T), as well as its $99 (with a new two-year contract) price tag. Meanwhile, Verizon Wireless probably helped boost Curve sales with its “buy one, get one free” promotion, according to NPD.

And here’s a potentially worrying trend for Apple: the NPD found that RIM’s share of the smartphone market rose a solid 15 percent to a full 50 percent, while both Apple and Palm (which didn’t land a handset in the top 5) both saw their shares fall 10 percent.

Of course, it could be that smartphone shoppers are holding off on both iPhones (given that a new model might be announced as early as next month) and Palm handsets (seeing as the red-hot Pre will likely go on sale in a matter of weeks).

Then again, never underestimate BlackBerry, which still has some of the best smartphones in the business and has price and availability on its side, whereas the cheapest, AT&T-only iPhone 3G remains at a somewhat lofty $199 (with contract). By: Ben Patterson

Less than four years later, the do-it-yourself social network site with a $500 million valuation has reached another major milestone — 1,000,000 Ning networks.

On their way to 1,000,000 social networks, Ning’s come along way from their early days, when they experimented with three distinct sites that let you build your own YouTube, Flickr, or MySpace. We’ve since seen these services rolled into the core product that now allows for video, photos, and groups to harmoniously coexist in one place.

Being at the forefront of the social web, Ning has also seen a myriad of direct competitors who’ve done little to throw the social network hub off its way to the top of the social food chain. Sites like Me.com (which no longer exists; the domain is now home to Mobile Me), Big Tent, and BricaBox (shutdown in summer of 2008) did their best to copy Ning’s style, but pretty much failed at replicating Ning’s success and popularity.

Now at 1,000,000 networks strong, you’re bound to find an active social group on any topic, cause, or event that strikes your fancy. Some examples include the very popular Twitter Moms group with upwards of 13,000 members, the This is 50 fully branded social hub for 50 Cent’s 400,000 adoring fans, and Ning’s MuggleSpace, where 15,000 plus Harry Potter fans gather together.