[cbvinh]

What about BBM sending messages to whatever transport mechanism your friend has on his/her phone? The idea would be that you, with a BB, have a seamless experience where you use BBM to send your message and your friend gets it and can reply. BBM can still be exclusive among BB users and you can still easily communicate with your friends.

[adamschuetze]

What about BBM sending messages to whatever transport mechanism your friend has on his/her phone? The idea would be that you, with a BB, have a seamless experience where you use BBM to send your message and your friend gets it and can reply. BBM can still be exclusive among BB users and you can still easily communicate with your friends.

So basically, BBM can speak all the languages? I like it! So you'd have a nice tidy unified interface on your BlackBerry, and you could add contacts of any sort of messaging platform. You'd have to license them all (could be expensive, considering Apple), but that would be awesome. Kind of like putting all your SMS contacts into BBM, but extended.

[anon(1464249)]

What about BBM sending messages to whatever transport mechanism your friend has on his/her phone? The idea would be that you, with a BB, have a seamless experience where you use BBM to send your message and your friend gets it and can reply. BBM can still be exclusive among BB users and you can still easily communicate with your friends.

This would be a technical nightmare to code. There will always have to be a middle man to 'translate' the data and convert it to whatever BBM understands. Not to mention the licensing costs and it's very doubtful Appler or MS will ever license their proprietary software and give access to pieces of code needed to make this work. Giving support would be a disaster, if either party changes anything you need to recode...nightmare.

Easiest way is create different BBM clients for different platforms and have a layer in between the client and NOC infrastructure. This way all tech stays in house.

[kraski]

This would be a technical nightmare to code. There will always have to be a middle man to 'translate' the data and convert it to whatever BBM understands. Not to mention the licensing costs and it's very doubtful Appler or MS will ever license their proprietary software and give access to pieces of code needed to make this work. Giving support would be a disaster, if either party changes anything you need to recode...nightmare.

Easiest way is create different BBM clients for different platforms and have a layer in between the client and NOC infrastructure. This way all tech stays in house.

OK. I'm not a programmer, so my thought may be stupid. But you're nixing compatibility with multiple other apps because of the programming nightmare. But what about joining forces with one popular app? Wouldn't there be less of a programming issue if BBM only needed to program compatibility with only one nonBIS app -- Whatsapp, Kik, G-talk, whatever? And the other app maker then programmed in BBM compatibility? Just thinking out loud.

[cbvinh]

This would be a technical nightmare to code. There will always have to be a middle man to 'translate' the data and convert it to whatever BBM understands. Not to mention the licensing costs and it's very doubtful Appler or MS will ever license their proprietary software and give access to pieces of code needed to make this work. Giving support would be a disaster, if either party changes anything you need to recode...nightmare.

Back in the day, the Amiga had this paradigm called Datatypes. If you were writing an image manipulation program, you didn't have to code the individual load/save routines for the various image formats. You just needed to access the Datatypes library. The user could install new Datatypes into a specific directory and the image manipulation program would support the new format. This works even if a new image format was created long after the image manipulation program was created and/or compiled. There were Datatypes for images, audio and video.

So, why not BBM with a Datatypes translator for the various IM/SMS mechanisms? If you allow the Datatypes to be user installable, it would open up BBM to having third party developed translators.

[anon(1464249)]

OK. I'm not a programmer, so my thought may be stupid. But you're nixing compatibility with multiple other apps because of the programming nightmare. But what about joining forces with one popular app? Wouldn't there be less of a programming issue if BBM only needed to program compatibility with only one nonBIS app -- Whatsapp, Kik, G-talk, whatever? And the other app maker then programmed in BBM compatibility? Just thinking out loud.

This would defeat the purpose of having to use BIS or BES for BBM traffic.
BBM is proprietary software and one if not the only biggest ace in the hole RIM has going for them, opening up the software and allowing other companies to create hooks into the program would come at a cost. A small but significant example would be the encryption protocols used. In order to shed some more light on this you need to break down how BBM actually works.

Back in the day, the Amiga had this paradigm called Datatypes. If you were writing an image manipulation program, you didn't have to code the individual load/save routines for the various image formats. You just needed to access the Datatypes library. The user could install new Datatypes into a specific directory and the image manipulation program would support the new format. This works even if a new image format was created long after the image manipulation program was created and/or compiled. There were Datatypes for images, audio and video.
So, why not BBM with a Datatypes translator for the various IM/SMS mechanisms? If you allow the Datatypes to be user installable, it would open up BBM to having third party developed translators.

In this rapidly evolving market datatypes in this particular case are out of the question in my opinion. While it does allow for third parties to make use of them without effort, it would concentrate all effort on RIM.
They will be in charge of maintaining the datatypes upon any new implementation/upgrade/so on...

My suggestion is as simple as it is straightforward.
Create BBM apps for the specific platforms (iOS, Android, WP7/8, Symbian) free of charge or at a cost and allow them to connect to the NOC infrastructure through a layer.



Explanation

1. Platform specific BBM app is released. BBM pin numbers are distributed upon registering your app*.
2. User connects to the NOC through an API layer that allows for encryption and routing.
3. Use BBM as you are used to.

*Unique BBM pin numbers can be distributed by using a platform specific algorithm. Example: iOS platform gets PIN number based on device serial and the first 3 characters are APL, Android platform gets PIN number based on device serial and the first 3 characters are AND, etc...
Or upgrade the BBM backend to accommodate larger pins (8 character pins are reserved for BB OS 4.5-7.1, 10 character pins are reserverd for BB OS 10-..., etc...)

[kraski]

This would defeat the purpose of having to use BIS or BES for BBM traffic.
BBM is proprietary software and one if not the only biggest ace in the hole RIM has going for them, opening up the software and allowing other companies to create hooks into the program would come at a cost. A small but significant example would be the encryption protocols used. In order to shed some more light on this you need to break down how BBM actually works.

Well, here's my thought. BBM on Blackberry is the most user friendly IM on Blackberry without becoming a resource hog. But it requires BIS/BES to work. For us, that's not an issue. We're also using BIS/BES for other things. People on other platforms might not be so quick to jump on BIS/BES at additional cost. And I know that, for me, trying to juggle several IMs plus my social media stuff, some of it is ignored more often.

What I'm thinking is a BBM that incorporates non-BIS IM, as well. On the BB side, it would detect who has BBM, much like BBM 7 detects which client is voice compatible for showing that menu option. But, with the IM, the Blackberry would never have to know -- the software would determine proper routing. Or if the other end isn;t indicating compatible software. And both BBM and phone contacts could be merged into one list.

On the nonBB side, one or more of the IM app makers would integrate compatibility with nonBIS BBM IM. With fewer features. If a user likes it well enough to go for the Pro version, that could come from RIM & require BIS or BES -- for a price, both for the app and for BIS.

[anon(1464249)]

Well, here's my thought. BBM on Blackberry is the most user friendly IM on Blackberry without becoming a resource hog. But it requires BIS/BES to work. For us, that's not an issue. We're also using BIS/BES for other things. People on other platforms might not be so quick to jump on BIS/BES at additional cost. And I know that, for me, trying to juggle several IMs plus my social media stuff, some of it is ignored more often.

What I'm thinking is a BBM that incorporates non-BIS IM, as well. On the BB side, it would detect who has BBM, much like BBM 7 detects which client is voice compatible for showing that menu option. But, with the IM, the Blackberry would never have to know -- the software would determine proper routing. Or if the other end isn;t indicating compatible software. And both BBM and phone contacts could be merged into one list.

On the nonBB side, one or more of the IM app makers would integrate compatibility with nonBIS BBM IM. With fewer features. If a user likes it well enough to go for the Pro version, that could come from RIM & require BIS or BES -- for a price, both for the app and for BIS.

I think you're reaching to far into this and just think of the technical difficulties to over come.
Using a Layer between the non-bis and bis users is the easiest and elegant solution. I do like your suggestion of purchasing a BIS data plan from the carriers (which most sell per feature in Europe) So instead of buying a total BIS package they can just buy the BIS BBM package and enable more features with it (like voice).

[adamschuetze]

A really great (and relevant to this conversation) article on ecosystems and conflicts between them, written by Dieter Bohn at the Verge.

First strike: how tech's superpowers could start an ecosystem war | The Verge

The entire article is excellent (kudos to Dieter for great writing), but particularly relevant is the section on "The BBM Incursion".

[adamschuetze]

My vision for a viable future for BBM is to basically compete directly with Skype:

1) Full BBM capability for free to all users, BlackBerry/iOS/Android/WP8/Windows desktop/Apple desktop. This includes all the usual stuff plus wifi voice and video calling. It would be nice if these worked over HSPA+/LTE also, but that's another matter
2) Allow the capability to place a wifi voice call to a regular telephone number, for a price, just like Skype-out (or whatever it is called now)
3) Allow people on a regular telephone number to call your BBM over wifi. You'd pay per minute, just like Skype-in (or whatever it is called now)

You monetize it just like Skype has. Device to device messaging, voice, and video are all free. If you want to connect to a regular telephone line, then you pay per minute.

You could hold back some of the features to be BlackBerry-only, if you are worried that an open BBM would siphon away BlackBerry customers. BBM is easily the best messaging system out there. Integrated calendars, to-do lists, group messaging, voice, and now video. It just needs to take the next step to cross-platform to avoid becoming basically irrelevant.

[sirfly2fly]

BBM shouldn't go cross platform if it does those that want to stay for BBM no longer have a reason too stripped down version or not. You wanna find out what BBM is about go buy a BB, you want iMessage you get and iOS device no?
we want people coming to RIM right, not leaving. I seen BBM connected mentioned its useful if used right i.e games, fb, twitter, 4square ...the implementation could be a lil better but i hope we all see that improved in BB10 we will also see better apps when BB10 drops and i like the convenience of sharing information through BBM opposed to sending a text ..at the end of the day i see BBM with the capability to be the first mobile social network which is very advanced due to apps enhancing its functionality

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