Redwood City, Calif.-based Qik is increasingly targeting the mass market with its mobile live video streaming technology, and today it is doing so by expanding the number of handsets it supports to include some BlackBerry phones, including the Pearl and the new Bold. “What we are doing is enabling all mainstream audience to use Qik,” said Bhaskar Roy Qik’s co-founder and VP of Product Development. Roy said they now support around 70 phones. They started with high-end Nokia (NYSE: NOK) phones that run Symbian operating system, and Windows Mobile phones built by HTC, and just last week it expanded to Nokia and Sony (NYSE: SNE) Ericsson (NSDQ: ERIC) phones that run Symbian’s Series 40. Those are the kind of phones that “are given away by carriers,” Roy said.

As with the lower-end handsets, the BlackBerry devices mostly use the slower 2.5G networks, like Edge, but Roy said the experience should be just as good. “That’s one of the things we focused on starting in the early days.” He said if the signal is weak, then some of the data is sent over, so that they can still provide live coverage, and then later when the network is stronger, they send out the rest of the data, so the experience can be even better on subsequent playbacks. The BlackBerry Pearl did not ship with the ability to take video, but if users update the software on their phone it should become enabled.

Qik is facing a lot of competition for other companies like Flixwagon and Kyte, but getting on more phones can only help. In addition, Roy said that they will come pre-loaded on Nokia’s new touchscreen device called the XpressMusic 5310, and they are in early talks with carriers to be included on the deck. The company still has to figure out how it is going to make money, which may become more pressing if the economy worsens. Roy said next year they’ll most likely start experimenting with providing a free basic service for users, and then offering a premium services for a fee. “Yeah, that’s something that’s always been in our minds. It’s not putting pressure on that direction because of economic situation, but it’s something we will be experimenting with in the coming year.”