Tag Archives: blackberry

BlackBerry Updates BBM Across Ecosystems

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Over the past two days, BlackBerry has rolled out an update to its BBM app across all four major smartphone platforms (Android, BlackBerry OS, iOS and Windows Phone). This update is meant to debut many new features to users, while also signaling a coming shift in the cost of using the app.

BBM may stand for BlackBerry Messenger, but the platform has grown far beyond its instant messaging/SMS roots. Not afraid to incorporate features that may have been popularized on other apps or platforms, BBM is fast growing in capability. Skype, Snapchat, Spotify, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter – you name a popular social messaging app, and BlackBerry has crafted a facimile of its core differentiator and bolted it onto BBM.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at what BlackBerry has added in the latest update for BBM.

– Timed Messages – Allows you to set a time limit after which a message or picture will disappear from the recipient’s chat window.
– Message Retraction – Lets you remove (retract) a message or picture from a chat after it’s been sent.
– Sticker Picker – Provides a new, faster way of inserting a sticker into a message.
– HD Picture Transfer – Does what it says
– Music Discovery – Shares the track you are listening to and gives you a feed of what music your contacts are hearing. Links to each platform’s respective music store.

These new features join other recent BBM additions, like voice calling, voice notes, channels, paid sticker packs and location sharing. But what BBM is not boasting about may be less attractive to users: its subscription model. Noted in passing on the official BBM blog, author Jeff Gadway writes:

“Timed Messages and Message Retraction features are premium features that will be available free and without restriction over the next three months. After this time, unrestricted access to these features will become part of a broader bundle of features that will be offered as part of a BBM subscription.”

http://blogs.blackberry.com/2014/10/bbm-new-features-video/

BlackBerry has not released any other information about what form subscriptions for BBM could take, though it already has paid sticker packs and advertising in-app. Users have already shown a willingness to pay in-app, but it remains to be seen if BlackBerry can turn BBM into a freemium revenue model.

BlackBerry BBM is available now for BBOS 10, iOS 7+, Android 4.0+ and Windows Phone 8+. Download it here.

That Blackberry Article

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Publicly, Mr. Lazaridis and Mr. Balsillie belittled the iPhone and its shortcomings, including its short battery life, weaker security and initial lack of e-mail. That earned them a reputation for being cocky and, eventually, out of touch. “That’s marketing,” Mr. Lazaridis explained. “You position your strengths against their weaknesses.”

A couple of weeks ago The Globe and Mail published an article by a team of reporters that provided insight into what happened at RIM Blackberry since the iPhone launched. Well worth the read, the article is full of retrospective quotes and anecdotes about Blackberry’s reaction to competitors’ products and their approach to leadership and decision making.

To me, the article paints a clear picture of Lazaridis confusing his product, tiny keyboards, with his business, communications. Over and over, from shelving the SMS 2.0 project to renaming the company, Blackberry failed at recognizing value beyond its hardware products. Now those hardware devices have negative value and are bringing down the whole company. This is effectively where Apple would be if you imagine that they had stopped at the iPod.