[FSeverino]

I agree with you somewhat (the op)... I think that RIM HAD to show EVERYTHING before launch because if they just dropped all this info and a week later said BUY IT there wouldnt be much hype. The hype has been snowballing for a couple of months and when everything is official I think even one or two 'new' new features would suffice.

Even if everything they have to offer has already been shown... im still getting one. It looks MUCH better than iOS, and everyone I know who have actually used it (admittedly only a couple) LOVE IT. With all the haters posting positive articles im really thinking that we need to make a 'Haters gonna hate repent' banner. lol

[Knightcrawler]

I honestly dont expect to see any major surprises come the 30th.

I think we've already seen the biggest features that BB10 has to offer.
The reason for this is because i read somewhere that in an interview that a RIM exec stated that their target with BB10 is 3rd, once they have 3rd wrapped up, they will shoot for second, then 1st in the mobile market.
This along with the fact that BB10, so far, offers nothing to tempt away fans of the other platforms, is what makes me think there is not much more to see from BB10. At best BB10 can grab the casual users of other platforms which by itself is no insignificant number.

There's your problem, right there.

There is a misconception about RIM saying they're aiming for 3rd place. They never actually said that.If you look at the quote from Thorsten (from AGM i think? or maybe BBWorld), he says he's aiming to be the 3rd mobile platform. Note how he doesn't say 3rd ranked platform. What he was trying to convey was that RIM wants to be that 3rd option on the market, as opposed to WP8 (or tizen, sailfish, firefox os etc if they ever come out). It's a given that they'll try to be ranked #1, just like it's a given that #1 will remain with apple for the time being (and #2 with android)

[collinc93]

my personal opinion is opinions are opinions.....BB10 the proof Jan 30

[CrownIsle]

I am READY for them to announce that BBM will be avilable for each and every type of cell phone OS in the world! BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!! High, but false wishes lol

[CairnsRock]

You could be right OP. Rumor mills are becoming increasingly accurate in the tech world. Look at when the iPad Mini came out, the only thing left unknown was the price, plus the iPad 4, which was a real surprise being 6 mos after iPad 3.

If all of the UI is known as you say that leaves:

Apps
Price
Availability dates for both models.
BB10 on Playbook availability.

Anything else?

[whitbags]

The point being made about the General Public is a very good one. The vast majority are currently unaware that BB10 is even coming, so all the stuff we've seen leaked in the techblogsphere will come as a big surprise to them. Ultimately BB10 Launch isn't aimed at the likes of us. It is aimed at the Great Unwashed.

Lets hope they like what they see

[aragone79]

I know, I'm one of the person who already leaked several features that you can found in blackberry 10 OS. But, I have a feeling that what I see will not hurt RIM at all. Why, because they already safe the best for the launching. What I already saw and share is just a beta OS. And it's not a final one, a Gold OS which will you get when you purchase the BB10 Handset. No one ever saw the final BB10 OS one. Not yet. Because RIM R n D and Devs are working on to make the OS more perfect than what we see right now.

So, you can expect surprises from RIM on Blackberry 10. No need to worry about it. Btw, I even didn't do deep explore in Blackberry 10. There so many ways to make Blackberry 10 more powerful than nowadays. IMHO.

[djrupey]

I think we need to bear in mind what hints we have been given about "mobile computing". This is what the big thing will be about -deep integration of BB10 with other devices all around us -our car, our TV, our stereo, our fridge, our desktop PCs and tablets, even our space station. What was just a mobile phone with Internet access and lots of small programmes to perform various useful functions will become a central control device linked in to all the other gadgets around us. That is the real meaning and power of BlackBerry Hub. And it will be able to do these things because QNX, the basis of BB10, is already in lots of these devices. Microsoft should be seriously worried, because Windows 8 has been poorly received, and sales of desktop PCs have dropped by about 5%. Tablets are taking over many things that PCs were used for, and BB10 is going to be in there. Remember, IBM was top dog once, and everyone thought their position was unassailable. Now where are IBM?

I could be wrong, but everything I have heard and read on this forum over the past two years strongly suggests it. So I am on the edge of my seat waiting for January 30th.

[Admorris]

The problem once again with RIM and Blackberry is that their marketing absolutely sucks. There is NO ONE...not one person who knows a damn thing about BB10 besides people on here. There is 0 excitement being built up in the lead up to this all or nothing launch. For this to be as make it or break it as it is, this could possibly be the worst marketing campaign in tech history...just ahead of the Playbook launch. I had hopes for BB10 a while back, but now I'm starting to understand the phrase, "the best predictor of someone's future is their past". They are making the same mistakes that got them to where they are and that will get them the same results they have always had. Just the fact that on the most celebrated BlackBerry forum in existence people are talking about no "wow" factor and a "boring" design spells doom for this release and most likely for RIM. If they have any big surprises left for launch, they will be behind the scenes stuff that the general public could care less about. Sure, techies on here may eat up some type of extra super duper security feature or whatever, but that doesn't make the average joe walking in to a store to buy a phone excited. Mark my words, this phone and launch is going to be a miserable failure and this site is going to be LOADED UP with complaints and sob stories within days of the big launch.

I will list the mistakes of this phone that will ultimately kill it in the marketplace:

1. 4.2" screen is too small this day and age. People are used to 4.5" and bigger. This will turn people away before even taking a look at the OS. Apple is starting to feel the effects of their 4" screen already (cutting production by 50%). The only reason they have hung on as long as they have is because of their past. If they continue on with their mentality, they will be insignificant in the mobile world within 4-5 years. In doubt they will make that mistake however.

2. No widgets (or eye candy) - the average joe wants their phone to look good when they turn it on. This OS looks boring...as boring as iOS. There is no consistent home screen. From what I can tell, the active icon screen disappears if they are all gone and defaults to the first page of apps? That will be confusing to most and iOS boring for all.

3. Active icons (whatever they are called) just look old and outdated. The icons should have rounded edges. Another mistake is having them constantly change based on how often you use them. They need to be able to be set up statically. I don't want to have to guess where my active icon is every time I flip to that page and I suspect most won't like that either.

4. Peek feature is a complete rehash of Android, but from the side and not top. I see no real world advantage of this over Android and once again, I suspect it will get blasted as a "copy" of android by most that take a quick look at it while browsing through their mobile store.

5. Icons look terrible...worse than iOS and considerably worse than Android...I mean bad bad bad. They are far too large for the smaller screen size (which makes the screen look even smaller).

6. As listed above... marketing. BB's marketing could be the worst marketing of any tech company in history. No lead up for a make it or break it unveiling leads to death. Look no further than the Playbook as proof of this. This will be an exact repeat of that product. While it is a decent product, most people walking in best buy or wherever to buy a tablet don't even know that the Playbook exists. And when a sales guy shows it to the customer, all the customer knows is that it's a blackberry and quickly moves on. This will happen to the BB10 as well.

7. Keyboard/camera - while the keyboard looks interesting, I can guarantee you that most will be able to type faster on a normal touchscreen keyboard and could care less about flicking words up to the screen. Sometimes things that work don't need to be changed just for the sake of change...this is one of them. The camera does nothing that the newer Samsung phones don't do. My Note 2 (as well as the S3) can change faces individually...that will be a feature that neither attracts nor pushes people away from the phone, therefore it is a dead feature (bb needs excitement, not status quo).


My main point in this rant is that it may very well be an OK phone, but OK is not what BB needs right now...they need something that actually attracts customers. They need something that makes a customer want to buy by just looking at it without a sales guy coming over to explain features in order to make them buy it. What I'm saying is BB10 needs to be marketed where people are going to the store to buy the phone out of excitement, not just learning about the phone for the first time while they're looking at other phones. If the latter is the case, then it will lose every time based on the things I have pointed out above. I sincerely hope I'm wrong, as competition is a great thing, but I would bet that this launch will be an abject failure.

Sent from my SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2

[ubizmo]

I will list the mistakes of this phone that will ultimately kill it in the marketplace:

What's interesting about this is how you list your personal preferences and present them as RIM's "mistakes".

1. 4.2" screen is too small this day and age. People are used to 4.5" and bigger. This will turn people away before even taking a look at the OS. Apple is starting to feel the effects of their 4" screen already (cutting production by 50%). The only reason they have hung on as long as they have is because of their past. If they continue on with their mentality, they will be insignificant in the mobile world within 4-5 years. In doubt they will make that mistake however.

Really? I guess you have inside information that screen size is the cause of Apple's iPhone production cut. As for what "people" want, the last actual research that I saw on this was Smartphone Screen Size: Users Want 4-to-4.5-Inch Phones, Survey Says, and the Z10 is right in the middle of the desired range.

2. No widgets (or eye candy) - the average joe wants their phones to look good when they turn it on. This OS looks boring...as boring as iOS. There is no consistent home screen. From what I can tell, the active icon screen disappears if they are all gone and defaults to the first page of apps? That will be confusing to most and iOS boring for all.

Confusing to most and boring for all. And yet, the actual reviewers of the OS--you know, real people who have actually used it--are reporting neither confusion nor boredom. What is your inside line to Average Joe?

3. Active icons (whatever they are called) just look old and outdated. The icons should have rounded edges. Another mistake is having them constantly change based on how often you use them. They need to be able to be set up statically. I don't want to have to guess where my active icon is every time I flip to that page and I suspect most won't like that either.

What you call a mistake would be considered by many to be a feature. The whole point about active frames is that they are, well, active and not static. To assert that active frames should be static, and it's a "mistake" if they're not is, um, odd.

4. Peek feature is a complete rehash of Android, but from the side and not top. I see no real world advantage of this over Android and once again, I suspect it will get blasted as a "copy" of android by most that take a quick look at it while browsing through their mobile store.

Not every feature needs to be utterly different from everything on iOS and Android. When I pull down the notification curtain on my Android phone, I see "3 messages" in my Gmail account. That's all I see. I don't know who they're from or anything else about them. To get that information, I have to tap the notification and go into the Gmail app. Once I do that, that notification is gone from the notification curtain. From what I've seen, this isn't how Peek works in BB10 at all. In BB10 I can Peek at my messages, not just a notification of how many new ones there are, and I can do it any number of times. I wouldn't call this a rehash of Android.

5. Icons look terrible...worse than iOS and considerably worse than Android...I mean bad bad bad. They are far too large for the smaller screen size (which makes the screen look even smaller).

Yeah, but what does Average Joe think about them?

6. As listed above... marketing. BB's marketing could be the worst marketing of any tech company in history. No lead up for a make it or break it unveiling leads to death. Look no further than the Playbook as proof of this. This will be an exact repeat of that product. While it is a decent product, most people walking in best buy or wherever to buy a tablet don't even know that the Playbook exists. And when a sales guy shows it ton the customer, all the customer knows is that it's a blackberry and quickly moves on. This will happen to the BB10 as well.

And yet, this is precisely what Apple has done: They don't run a teaser campaign; they announce/launch and then release quickly thereafter, but somehow they have avoided death.

RIM did run a decent television ad campaign for the PlayBook. The problem was that the product itself was priced the same as the iPad but lacked its functionality. I think just about everyone will concede that that was a blunder, but there's no evidence that BB10 will repeat it. On the contrary, BB10 gives every impression of being fully functional from day one, although we don't know about certain apps.

7. Keyboard/camera - while the keyboard looks interesting, I can guarantee you that most will be able to type faster on a normal touchscreen keyboard and could care less about flicking words up to the screen. Sometimes things that work don't need to be changed just for the sake of change...this is one of them. The camera does nothing that the newer Samsung phones don't do. My Note 2 (as well as the S3) can change faces individually...that will be a feature that neither attracts nor pushes people away from the phone, therefore it is a dead feature (bb needs excitement, not status quo).

Actually, you can't guarantee anything. This is a keyboard that "most," including you, haven't even tried. It's certainly possible that once it's in people's hands we'll learn that "most" don't need or want the "predictive flicking", but we don't know that yet. Moreover, I'm confident that RIM did plenty of testing before they committed to this keyboard. As for the camera, the main thing is of course that it should take good pictures.

My main point in this rant is that it may very well be an OK phone, but OK is not what BB needs right now...they need something that actually attracts customers. They need something that makes a customer want to buy by just looking at it without a sales guy coming over to explain features in order to make them buy it. Nothing I have seen so far does this...it just looks like a mix between android and iOS. I sincerely hope I'm wrong, as competition is a great thing, but I would bet that this launch will be an abject failure.

It has been pointed out repeatedly that BB10 doesn't have to lure anyone away from Android or iOS to be very successful. People are buying their first smartphone in large numbers every month. You seem to have the idea that unless BB10 is utterly different from other platforms in every respect (except the virtual keyboard!), it can't possibly succeed. This has little plausibility. For the most part, all smartphones do the same things: email, social networks, messaging, audio/video purchase and play, web browsing, maps and navigation, games, book and news reading, etc. These are the things we expect from smartphones. BB10 needs to do these things well. Being able to move from one task to another easily is important. No one thinks that you can't do this on iOS or Android or WP; BB10 simply needs to do it well enough that people will say, "Hey, I like that."

[Easy-G]

If what you say is true, I feel bad for the vast majority of people buying phones today. I think that Android and iOS make up the vast bulk of user today because of the quantity and quality of apps and the ease of use/familiarity of user interface. The sexiness factor applies, especially with iPhone, but unless people are complete idiots, it is a distant third in the decision making process.

Just addressing your points,

1. Screen size, specifically width, for iPhone is based on the range of motion of your thumb. It's meant to maximize the ability for one-handed use. BlackBerry has increased the width slightly because it is more practical for two-thumb typing, but the keyboard, with swipe-able words on keys takes one-handed typing to a new level of efficiency. A big screen for the sake of looking at content is the Android way. Users still care about one-handed use and input efficiency.

2. By widgets, I'm guessing you mean functional home screen objects... like the Active Frames, Search and Camera icons, the things most people want at the ready. Android will always win on customization, but many customers are frustrated by skins and widgets imposed by manufacturers and want a clutter-free, minimalist look.

3. You're argument is that they are not rounded... okay. Though not announced, Kevin and others have discussed a "hanging frame" function that pins active frames in place. Seems like a no-brainer that will likely be implemented.

4. Peek isn't a pull-down notification menu. It looks at your notifications AND your actual unified inbox "Hub" and lets you decide whether to go into the Hub or not. From any app.

5. You're right, I don't like many of the native app icons either, but third party icons are essentially the same as on any other OS. Clearly you though the extra row of icons on the iPhone 5 was groundbreaking.

6. Mainstream marketing can be found on retail (Futureshop) and carrier websites, as well as major print newspapers. I think the web campaign has been pretty good so far. Positive buzz is being created on major tech blogs with the harshest RIM critics like Gizmodo, Engadget and the Verge. Retail locations will be setup with demo hardware and staff trained to show people the greatness of the product.

7. Refer to point 1. The size, layout, and software underlying the keyboard already makes it the best typing experience on glass. Flicking up words may be unnecessary for fast two thumb typers, but it will blow away the competition in one-handed typing. And not to say that the time-warp feature doesn't exist elsewhere, but Apple has built an empire on making old features sexy. It's a great, practical feature and if RIM has nailed the implementation, it will attract the shutterbugs.

Not trying to be troll here, but your entire rant is a subjective view from a user accustomed to Android. Android manufacturers are doing quite well doing their Android thing, those that can turn a profit anyway. RIM isn't looking to make a big-screened phone with a shotgun approach to features. It is focusing on what it does best in order to best meet the needs of its target market.

[Admorris]

If what you say is true, I feel bad for the vast majority of people buying phones today. I think that Android and iOS make up the vast bulk of user today because of the quantity and quality of apps and the ease of use/familiarity of user interface. The sexiness factor applies, especially with iPhone, but unless people are complete idiots, it is a distant third in the decision making process.

Just addressing your points,

1. Screen size, specifically width, for iPhone is based on the range of motion of your thumb. It's meant to maximize the ability for one-handed use. BlackBerry has increased the width slightly because it is more practical for two-thumb typing, but the keyboard, with swipe-able words on keys takes one-handed typing to a new level of efficiency. A big screen for the sake of looking at content is the Android way. Users still care about one-handed use and input efficiency.

2. By widgets, I'm guessing you mean functional home screen objects... like the Active Frames, Search and Camera icons, the things most people want at the ready. Android will always win on customization, but many customers are frustrated by skins and widgets imposed by manufacturers and want a clutter-free, minimalist look.

3. You're argument is that they are not rounded... okay. Though not announced, Kevin and others have discussed a "hanging frame" function that pins active frames in place. Seems like a no-brainer that will likely be implemented.

4. Peek isn't a pull-down notification menu. It looks at your notifications AND your actual unified inbox "Hub" and lets you decide whether to go into the Hub or not. From any app.

5. You're right, I don't like many of the native app icons either, but third party icons are essentially the same as on any other OS. Clearly you though the extra row of icons on the iPhone 5 was groundbreaking.

6. Mainstream marketing can be found on retail (Futureshop) and carrier websites, as well as major print newspapers. I think the web campaign has been pretty good so far. Positive buzz is being created on major tech blogs with the harshest RIM critics like Gizmodo, Engadget and the Verge. Retail locations will be setup with demo hardware and staff trained to show people the greatness of the product.

7. Refer to point 1. The size, layout, and software underlying the keyboard already makes it the best typing experience on glass. Flicking up words may be unnecessary for fast two thumb typers, but it will blow away the competition in one-handed typing. And not to say that the time-warp feature doesn't exist elsewhere, but Apple has built an empire on making old features sexy. It's a great, practical feature and if RIM has nailed the implementation, it will attract the shutterbugs.

Not trying to be troll here, but your entire rant is a subjective view from a user accustomed to Android. Android manufacturers are doing quite well doing their Android thing, those that can turn a profit anyway. RIM isn't looking to make a big-screened phone with a shotgun approach to features. It is focusing on what it does best in order to best meet the needs of its target market.

I don't consider you a troll at all...I enjoy thoughtful, intelligent responses. If anything, people probably consider me a troll for playing the devils advocate on here...Lol. I guess we just have a difference of opinion on what defines a successful launch for BB10. Most on here (and yourself) consider it a successful event if BB fires up its base of users. I don't consider that a success. I believe in order for BB10 to be considered a success, it HAS to pull customers away from Android and iOS and build its base. And based on that theory, it has to separate itself from those two with new and exciting features. I just don't see that they are doing that. They are joining the game late with very similar features and in some cases, less features. I don't see how that is a winning formula. Hope I'm wrong!

Sent from my SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2

[Easy-G]

I don't consider you a troll at all...I enjoy thoughtful, intelligent responses. If anything, people probably consider me a troll for playing the devils advocate on here...Lol. I guess we just have a difference of opinion on what defines a successful launch for BB10. Most on here (and yourself) consider it a successful event if BB fires up its base of users. I don't consider that a success. I believe in order for BB10 to be considered a success, it HAS to pull customers away from Android and iOS and build its base. And based on that theory, it has to separate itself from those two with new and exciting features. I just don't see that they are doing that. They are joining the game late with very similar features and in some cases, less features. I don't see how that is a winning formula. Hope I'm wrong!

Sent from my SGH-I317 using Tapatalk 2

Phew! I thought **** was getting heated there for a second! True, numbers will define success in the end. Here's to hoping.

[Skeevecr]

Well, they never will be 1st with that attitude...


I hate to bring up Apple in comparison, but they took the industry by storm in a year.

At this point it is better for them to under-promise and over deliver, so make boastful claims about taking the top spot would just open them up to criticism from bloggers who still aren't entirely comfortable about the whole saying nice things about blackberry yet.

Actually, as far as Apple, you should check their sales in the first and even second years, they were nowhere near an overnight success.

[RocPlayr]

As that may be true, it does not mean surprises won't be revealed. I expect something that will surprise some, while others say "I knew it"!

[Skeevecr]

As that may be true, it does not mean surprises won't be revealed. I expect something that will surprise some, while others say "I knew it"!

Indeed, with the incessant need for some people to leak stuff, a regular visitor to sites like this is going to have less surprises than other people, but there will still be some.

[Rickroller]

if i knew that i wouldnt be surprised

but for the sake of argument, lets try some hypothetical examples

something BB10 integrates with your car's qnx system allowing you to give voice commands on the move, which can be used from anything like making phone calls, playing music or asking to navigate to a loacation. spoken through your bb10 phone and appearing on your car's qnx screen.

I'm baffled here, as most of this can be accomplished in almost any modern car nowadays using BT. If this is to be the "wow" factor or one of the "surprises", then most people won't be impressed. Why? Because for any of this to be effective, people need to have a vehicle that utilizes the QNX system. And if you think older models of vehicles running QNX are going to miraculously be able to update into newer model technology all because of a BB10 phone, then you are going to be sorely disappointed.

As for what surprises will be shown off come Jan 30, I agree with the OP and don't expect anything mind blowing to be demonstrated. I'm hoping to see some demos of some actual multi-tasking similiar to what Samsung's are currently able to do. I'd also like to see some DLNA abilities for wirelessly streaming and whatnot, although I know these things aren't important to everybody. I also am hoping for some confirmation on the supposed Apollo series, as this rumoured 5" beast really has peaked my curiousity.

[Skeevecr]

1. Screen size, specifically width, for iPhone is based on the range of motion of your thumb. It's meant to maximize the ability for one-handed use. BlackBerry has increased the width slightly because it is more practical for two-thumb typing, but the keyboard, with swipe-able words on keys takes one-handed typing to a new level of efficiency. A big screen for the sake of looking at content is the Android way. Users still care about one-handed use and input efficiency.

Actually, you have bought into Apple's hype machine that tries to imply only their phone is the right size for somebody's hand, if you look at so much about this bb10 handset it is very much designed with one-handed use in mind from the size to touches such as moving the url bar to the bottom in the browser to reduce the distance you need to reach when using it.

[Blacklatino]

At this point, I have a similar concern. However, I want the best BlackBerry that RIM can build- today. RIM needs to focus on getting back in the game with new devices with specs that are "on point" with current devices on the market or better. Refreshes will probably cause some concern......pending on what is actually upgraded.
sent from my sexy PlayBook using Tapatalk2 (*_~)

[howarmat]

one thing we havent seen confirmed and only hinted at that would be a good "wow" factor is the screen sharing. I think this is cool and to have that built in is fantastic. Hopefully we see it at launch and it will wow some people

[tdaye]

I don't think for ONE second that we have seen all the features. WHY on earth would RIM give phones to devs fully loaded with all the integrated features?? So they can leak them? It's been said many times that "RIM has made sure some things have been kept well hidden before that launch". It makes no sense to release dev alpha phones with a fully loaded os only to be leaked, I doubt they are that dumb.

[megajo123]

well they're obviously going to release the playbook 2

[Bold_until_Hybrid_Comes]

who knows. its not out yet

[tdaye]

well they're obviously going to release the playbook 2

It shows this in the leaked road map, which is on schedule.

[Rickroller]

one thing we havent seen confirmed and only hinted at that would be a good "wow" factor is the screen sharing. I think this is cool and to have that built in is fantastic. Hopefully we see it at launch and it will wow some people

I haven't seen or heard anything about this. What's the d-lo on this?