RIM's BlackBerry devices get a busy signal

Subscribers to Research In Motion's wireless paging network who have been experiencing service interruptions since late last week should see the problem cleared up by the end of the day, according to the company.

The problem that caused the systemwide interruption has been fixed, but subscribers may still be experiencing trouble, a RIM technical support representative said Wednesday. The representative did not know the source of the problem.

A backlog of messages in the network has continued to cause the congestion. "Some customers may be more affected than others," the representative said. Some may not be receiving messages, while others can't send them.

In a short email, RIM marketing director Mark Guibert acknowledged that there were problems and that the company upgraded the network early Wednesday to deal with them. He didn't provide more details and didn't return phone calls.

RIM's BlackBerry devices act as two-way email pagers.

The popularity of RIM devices and services has grown rapidly. For its most recent quarter, which ended Nov. 30, the company reported that revenue had jumped to $61.6 million, a 160 percent increase from the same period last year.

Growth in subscribers to the wireless paging networking is RIM's main source of revenue, according to the company. Subscribers to Blackberry accounted for 59 percent of the company's revenue in its most recent quarter.