Results tagged “rim”

It's now over 5 years since the introduction of the original iPhone and this is what RIM's response is?

Multitouch smartphone with on-screen keyboard. An email program that resembles something like those found in iOS and webOS and to round out the 'sneak peek' - the ability to stream video content from your phone to your TV. Like Apple TV.

My favorite Darwin quote comes to mind:

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change."

A 5-year response time is not being adaptable enough, RIM.

Last month marked 5 years since the iPhone was first introduced.

Research In Motion has had their research in motion for the last 5 years and they've finally responded to the smartphone challenge and the current leaders in this space, Google and Apple:

You've had 5 fucking years and this is your response?

Looks lovely, but I hope they don't count on this saving their company.

Image via The Verge

From Roberta Cowan at Reuters:

Next-generation software for BlackBerry's smartphones is "ready to compete", Research In Motion's new chief executive, Thorsten Heins, told more than 2,000 technical developers on Tuesday, expressing confidence in RIM's long-term future.

This reminds of those Japanese holdouts who continued to fight even after World War II ended.

via The Loop

WSJ: Microsoft, Nokia Flirted With RIM:

Microsoft Corp. and Nokia Corp. in recent months flirted with the idea of making a joint bid for Research In Motion Ltd., according to people familiar with the matter.

Really? Microsoft and Nokia flirted with RIM? This RIM?

Like the way Vinny, Pauly and the Situation flirt with grenades to bring home at the end of the night?

I think we need a grenade whistle any time a company gets close to RIM.

Do Microsoft and Nokia have technology beer goggles on that make RIM appear like a valuable acquisition?

It's bad enough your email application-less tablet is selling so poorly you have to give it multiple price slashes, but then developers jailbreak it and call it Dingleberry.

I'm not a sports guy.

I love going to live games in big stadiums but following football, baseball and basketball on a day-to-day basis is not my bag. My sports are technology and design and Apple is my team. I love when they win.

Apple wins when they create awesome products I love to use, products better than any other company can make.

Apple wins when they show the world that while consumer electronics products are impossible without the brilliance of enginners, you need designers to make them so fun and intuitive to use, you don't even a need a manual.

I won't lie, though. Apple also wins when they kick Microsoft's ass. It was a great, symbolic moment last year when it was announced that Apple was worth more than Microsoft in market capitalization. It also feels good to know how successful the iPhone has become, especially after Steve Ballmer laughed at it in 2007. Oh, Steve. You big, bald dummy. Hold on while I do my touchdown dance in your face.

Apple wins when they own a small fraction of the mobile market, but taking home two-thirds of the profits. It adds insult to injury when they take all this money in the face of all their competitors copying the smartphone paradigm they established with the introduction of the iPhone in 2007. Hey guys, you're copying my team and you're still losing (They still don't understand Design is not skin deep).

Speaking of shamelessly copying, it seems Samsung never bothered to make their own playbook, they decided to just copy Apple's.

But I have to be honest - I'm really tired of writing about Apple.

I want to write about other amazing competitors. It's fun when your team wins, but it's even better when they win against a worthy adversary. Would you rather watch your favorite football team score touchdown after touchdown, against a team with a horrible defense? Sure, the first few are fun, but it gets old. What's great is competition. Real competition.

What's great is when your team wins, but in the last 5 seconds of the game. Triple overtime. Sudden death. Winning against a rival who fights until the end and who you can look at and say, 'We might have beat you, but you played awesome.'

In the last few years, there have been very few moments where it looked as though a company besides Apple was going to start making consumer electronic devices people would love to use.

The first one I got excited about was the Palm Pre and webOS. Jon Rubenstein left Apple as senior VP of the iPod devision in 2007 to join Palm. When he unveiled the Palm Pre running webOS in 2009, the Apple DNA was obvious, but webOS was fresh brought a unique perspective to mobile operating systems. 'Yes,' I said to myself. 'Apple has some real competition.'

Then HP bought Palm in 2010 and things got bumpy. The Pre was a solid smartphone but when the time came for HP to create a tablet to compete with the iPad, it wasn't all it could have been. I wanted to love the TouchPad, but it was clear HP blew it. Then HP's CEO, Leo Apotheker, gets ousted by HP's board of directors Now it's not even clear if HP wants to play the mobile computing game anymore.

Then there was news RIM was launching a tablet called the Playbook. The preview videos made it look as though RIM had executed things well. Oh, but then they shipped it without an email client. Not to mention providing no good way to get content on to or off of the device.

Sigh.

Earlier this month, Amazon enveiled their new lineup of Kindles, including the top-of-the-line Kindle Fire. The Fire uses a custom build of Android, has a color, multi-touch screen and an integrated marketplace to buy applications and movies and books and music. And a web browser which caches frequently visited sites for faster loading. Yes! Now we're talking!

Then I got my hands on the Fire and was let down. Like the HP Touchpad, so close, but so very, very far from winning.

Now, most recently, John Paczkowski over at AllThingsD reports that Apple, with help from Sharp, is cooking up some Apple TVs -- actual televisions -- not what Apple TV is in it's current incarnation.

It's the logical next step for Apple's goal of a fully-integrated entertainment ecosystem. These plans are not surprising. The question really is, why wouldn't Apple redesign the television experience?

This is exciting news. Imagine a television experience that doesn't involve convoluted remote controls and overly complex on-screen menus.

What isn't exciting is this piece from Paczkowski's post (my emphasis):

But what form it will take remains a mystery -- one that the entire TV industry is evidently eager to solve. "Based on our discussions, interestingly other TV manufacturers have begun a scrambling search to identify what iTV will be and do," says Misek. "They hope to avoid the fate of other industries and manufacturers who were caught flat footed by Apple."

What would be great is if these other TV manufacturers weren't 'scrambling' to cobble together something half-assed, but had a clear vision for a fun and intuitive television experience. Something they personally would love to use in their own homes.

It brings to mind a great quote by Steve Jobs (in his biography by Walter Isaacson):

The older I get, the more I see how much motivations matter. The Zune was crappy because the people at Microsoft don't really love music or art the way we do. We won because we personally loved music. We made the iPod for ourselves, and when you're doing something for yourself, or your best friend or family, you're not going to cheese out. If you don't love something, your not going to go the extra mile, work the extra weekend, challenge the status quo as much.

History keeps repeating itself and it's getting annoying. Apple introduces a new product, the industry reacts, they copy, but by the time they turn their enormous ships in the right direction, it's too late.

Repeat ad infinitum.

It's getting old.

Electronista says the price-slashing of the Blackberry Playbook in the UK is still not helping sales.

I'm confused.

Does poop not sell, even at a cheaper price?

RIM has worldwide outages the days leading up to and on the day Apple launches it's new mobile operating system and cloud-based backup service.

It's poetic, really.

Remember though, RIM has two, count them, TWO CEOs. I'm sure they have this under control.

BlackBerry users revolt against RIM as disruption spreads

Smartphone maker Research In Motion (RIM) is facing a user revolt after tens of millions of users in Europe, the Middle East and Africa suffered a second day without services such as BlackBerry Messenger (BBM), as the company struggled with problems at its hub in Slough, Berkshire.

The company also revealed that the areas affected now include South America, with users in Brazil, Chile and Argentina suffering loss of service.

Horace Dediu points out RIM is currently losing half a million users per month, and with only 16 million left in the US, they could all be gone by the end of the year.

While this outage didn't specifically affect the US, it's not going to help stop this downward spiral either.

UPDATE: Scratch that last sentence.

A "high level RIM employee" shot off an open letter the co-CEO's of RIM pleading for them to get their heads out of their asses (in so many words). Although the points this person makes I've read elsewhere and thought myself, it's still sound advice:

Rather than constantly mocking iPhone and Android, we should encourage key decision makers across the board to use these products as their primary device for a week or so at a time -- yes, on Exchange! This way we can understand why our users are switching and get inspiration as to how we can build our next-gen products even better! It's incomprehensible that our top software engineers and executives aren't using or deeply familiar with our competitor's products.

I also enjoyed the comparison of RIM's SDK to a "rundown 1990′s Ford Explorer". Odd choice of vehicle, but it works. I would have picked something uglier, like a 90's Buick Skylark. My coworker Victor suggested a 90's Chevrolet Cavalier.

Sometimes I feel like the guys at 37Signals are the only voices of reason in the realms of business, design and technology.

With everyone saying the platform is the end-all, David says fuck the platform:

For all the 200,000 apps in Apple's app store, I use two on a regular basis: Echofon and Bloomberg. Once in a while, I use Instapaper and play Civilization. And yet I use my iPhone all the time. It's my favorite piece of technology and has been for years.

Do you know why? Because Apple nailed the basics. Safari, Camera, iPod, Clock, Weather, Photos, Messages, Mail, and Maps are the apps that I use 95% of the time. Those are the ones that made me buy the phone and stick with it. If I had to read Bloomberg on the web and couldn't play Civilization, I'd be sad, but my day would surely go on.

I know I'm not alone. The pattern I've seen for many people new to iOS is a rush to try a bunch of apps and then never use most of them again. There's a large market for people who just want the core ten apps executed even better. I'd be happy to trade my iPhone for a N9, if that core experience was stronger.

I agree 100% with David. While I admittedly have more than 10 apps on my iPhone, I rarely use more than 10 on a regular basis (I can't delete Shazam, you never know what you'll need to find a track, dude!). Update: I hear where David is coming from, but his essential apps are different from my essential apps which are different than your essential apps. Platforms are important.

I also find his easy dismissal of platforms ironic, given the company he works for has built a great platform for collaboration, project management and communication.

For me, I use the basics: Safari, Mail, iPod, Messages, Camera, Maps

As far as 3rd party apps: Instapaper, Reeder, Twitter

It really is a shame companies like RIM and Nokia are dropping like flies in the face of Apple. We need competition to have a healthly mobile market. As Victor Brunetti points out, a lot of time and attention went into designing the N9 experience.

During a race, there's a different between turning your head to watch the other cars and keeping your eyes on the road (and watching the other cars in your peripheral vision).

Make a great product, don't try and make an iPhone killer, you won't be able to.

BusinessInsider tells us the real reason there was no email on the Blackberry Playbook:

Turns out it had to skip native email support on the PlayBook because its architecture can't support two devices with one person's account, according to a source.

Here's how our source explains it: "The Blackberry email system is the BES -- which is the source/focus of all the famous BB security. The BES email server has the concept of one user = one device (or they call it PIN)."

Sorry, that's hilarious. It reminds me of the Y2K scare where much the software running the nation's essential systems used two digits for the year instead of four when they were created in the 60's and 70's.

The difference is the date stamp 'shortcut' of the Y2K scare was the result of technological and budgetary limits of the time (remember, computers used paper punch cards and saving two digits for memory was a big deal), while RIM's lack of support for multiple devices for an email account is both extremely lazy and shortsighted.

The more I read about RIM, the more dire their future looks.

I've read articles in the tech news about RIM has a long history of creating great business software and devices - specifically the famous Blackberry messaging devices and smartphones.

The thing is, these last few years for RIM haven't been good and they've just slashed their outlook for Q1 2011.

I'm not sure why RIM doing poorly should be the slightest bit surprising. From a user interface perspective there hasn't been any breakthoughs. I've used my wife's Blackberry enough to know how stiff and devoid elegance it really is. Yes, the home screen has some unique iconography, but once you get into the email program - the Blackberry's bread and butter - it's like taking a time warp back to the 90's.

Just to put it in perspective, when RIM was *winning*, this was the smartphone competition:

Just sayin'.

John Gruber on the slack all the reviewers are giving to iPad's competitors:

I don't understand why so many reviewers bend over backwards to grade these things on a curve. If the iPad 2 had the problems and deficiencies the Xoom and PlayBook have, these same reviewers would (rightly) trash it, and declare (again, rightly) that Apple had finally lost its Midas touch.

These aren't "beta" tablets. They're bad tablets. It's that simple. It's true that their hardware seems closer to iPad-caliber than their software, but improving software is the hardest part of making products like these. By the time RIM releases "a serious software update or three" the entire market will have changed. The truth is, Motorola, Samsung, and now RIM have released would-be iPad competitors that pale compared to the iPad. Just say it.

I'm obviously a fan of car metaphors and they seem to be going around lately in the tech world.

To rephrase Gruber's response, if the PlayBook was a Ferrari (I'm partial to the 458), it would be a Ferrari that can't make left turns and doesn't have adjustable seats. Yes, it's a Ferrari, and it's fast and grips the road like a jungle cat, but it's incomplete. It's missing important features.

To digress a bit, this is one of the reasons I love BBC series Top Gear (not the crap US version) - they don't pull punches. If a Bentley handles like shit, they say so. The tech world would be wise to take some notes from Jeremy Clarkson and team*.

* For a great example see Top Gear's review of Alpha Romeo's 8C, at around the 3:40 mark is when Clarkson lets the honestly flood gates wide open.

David Pogue breaks down the realities of the new Blackberry PlayBook tablet:

Remember, the primary competition is an iPad -- the same price, but much thinner, much bigger screen and a library of 300,000 apps. In that light, does it make sense to buy a fledgling tablet with no built-in e-mail or calendar, no cellular connection, no videochat, Skype, no Notes app, no GPS app, no videochat, no Pandora radio and no Angry Birds?

You should also know that even now, only days before the PlayBook goes on sale April 19, the software is buggy and still undergoing feverish daily revision. And the all-important BlackBerry Bridge feature is still in beta testing. It's missing important features, like the ability to view e-mail file attachments or click a link in an e-mail.

And:

But -- are you sitting down? -- at the moment, BlackBerry Bridge is the only way to do e-mail, calendar, address book and BlackBerry Messenger on the PlayBook. The PlayBook does not have e-mail, calendar or address book apps of its own. You read that right. R.I.M. has just shipped a BlackBerry product that cannot do e-mail. It must be skating season in hell. (R.I.M. says that those missing apps will come this summer.)

This reminds of grade school - when you realize your book report is due the day of, and you hastily cobble it together with lightly reworded chunks from the encyclopedia.