[BB4matt]

After watching the video it became clear that BlackBerry's mobile computing using the passport's controllable work space and blending feature has now moved ahead of all other platforms.

Regardless of the different presenters and their presentation styles BlackBerry's invited guests received all passports and Blend software links to duplicate and verify what they just learned.

This was a smart $150k investment and that is what the 250 (?) guests will remember not the jokes or nervousness or the brown shoes.

I liked the replay and it's info and as somebody on the forum said:
Passport blends, iPhone bends....


Posted via the amazing Z30

[evodevo69]

Don't know what all the comments re: both Chen and Peter Ng are about, they both didn't seem any more or any less nervous/confident than Gadway.

I like how Chen's english is being criticized when he's actually more well spoken than many Canadian born citizens - I guess the distinction between an accent and speaking a language is beyond some here. Interesting how no one said anything about Thornsten's english, which was no better than Chen's from what I remember.

Anyway, Chen was a tad too much on the informal and laid-back side of things I thought, which was funny but it did downplay the event a bit.

The main presenter wasn't all that great - none of the speakers were. Peter (or the asian guy as noted by some) was pretty much the same as Gadway, you could tell both were a little nervous, going off a rehearsed script that didn't execute it as being natural - they both suffered from this.

To say Peter lacked confidence while Gadway was the shining star is stretching it a bit.

Wayne Gretzky seemed like he was pretty nervous, more so than any other speaker. He shouldn't have even been invited to speak since his talk seemed very rehearsed and lacked any passion. It was insincere.

One other thing - it really detracted from the presentation whenever the guests were invited up and they'd keep looking over to the main presenter - they should've just been invited up and then present to the audience, rather than look as if they were presenting to both the crowd and the main speaker.

Whole thing was alright, videos were fantastic, and demonstration of the phone, apps, and blend - by both Peter Ng and Jeff Gadway were good, but not Apple good. But there's where the difference in size becomes apparent - one company is small and other is a giant.

#CB10 #Q10 #Darkhorse

[nbaliga]

The entire thing was amateur.

Was very disappointed. I kept remembering Vivek's presentation last year and how he was both informative and passionate. Gadway was informative but presentation style was not that of a polished presenter.

Chen is a cool dude not a showman. BBRY needs someone with his cool to steer this ship. I accept that. However a bit more scripted agenda would have been nice. Self deprecating humor can get old after a while.

Wayne Gretzky came across very very nervous and uncomfortable. Was tough to watch.

Posted via CB10

[Supa_Fly1]

The entire thing was amateur.

Was very disappointed. I kept remembering Vivek's presentation last year and how he was both informative and passionate. Gadway was informative but presentation style was not that of a polished presenter.

Chen is a cool dude not a showman. BBRY needs someone with his cool to steer this ship. I accept that. However a bit more scripted agenda would have been nice. Self deprecating humor can get old after a while.

Wayne Gretzky came across very very nervous and uncomfortable. Was tough to watch.

Posted via CB10

Vivvek was ALSO very nervous in his early first presentations ... only the latter showed complete confidence and much practice allowed for it.

[jscan44]

Don't know what all the comments re: both Chen and Peter Ng are about, they both didn't seem any more or any less nervous/confident than Gadway.
#CB10 #Q10 #Darkhorse

Peter Ng was a horrible speaker, everything he said just seemed forced and not believable.
He seemed lost at a few occasions as well. He should not have been on the stage.

Comparing him Vs Gadway is no comparison. If Gadway wasn't speaking the whole event would have looked alot worse.

[bungaboy]

I thought that Gadway did a good job. Some of the material he covered could have better but I do understand the target audience for the device. The rest was kinda meh. Wayne seemed nervous as hell and out of place for the whole 2 minutes he was up there. The biggest thing was the crowd seemed dead. I assume most people have seen and played with the leaks so everything that was shown wasnt new and that is the harm in all the leaks.

Blend was suppose to be the "big thing" i think that wasnt much known until today. And then the presentation crashed during that.

Overall I wouldnt say it was poor. I was just looking for some kind of wow that would make the crowd get up and cheer and it never seemed to happen

Sounds like Apple events are more suited to your tastes then it seems.

[TGR1]

Now that I finally had a chance to see the launch event, my opinion is as follows.

John Chen is not built for the stage. He said himself he is not an actor. He is, however, very funny.

Jeff Gadway was awesome. I am very proud of him. He was definitely the star of the show.

The third guy that spoke.. about apps.. Ive never heard of him before so I already forgot his name. You could tell he was very very nervous and I dont think has the proper qualities to be a presenter. You could tell he was very script focussed and wasnt able to ad lib where it would have been more approriate and natural sounding. Maybe with some more confidence and practice.

BlackBerry doesnt exactly have money to waste on big lavish presentations.

I felt that they did a decently good job highlighting their product strengths, especially with the side by side comparisons and with the presentation as a whole.

Sounds as if general content \was ok. Nothing that intensive practice and polishing couldn't have fixed.

Mr. Chen may have been jet-lagged, busy, non native speaker, what not - those are excuses and don't fly for product launches. If you don't give your own flagship product the respect it deserves, why should the customer? He should have been polished until he glowed, or reduced his presence.

[Spawn12]

Something else I just thought of. They were touting this phone as being for the business world, the enterprise, yet when Chen (?) said apps are available either through BB World or Amazon, he mentioned Candy Crush and some other game that really are for kids. I just don't get it.

Of course u wouldn't get it would you?? Instead of concentrating on what they were trying to say, you latch onto the bit about candy crush??

Not all enterprise people are boring and serious, are they not allowed to have some downtime to play the odd game??

The message he was trying to get across was that even though it's a phone aimed at professionals and enterprise, you can still play candy crush which is a hugely popular game whilst easily getting through your day of productivity. That's the message I took from the launch and for me he nailed it on the head.

Posted via CB10

[asmiley]

We're more alike than not.

The thing I like about Chen is that he comes across as more "Canadian" than most Canadians. He's kind of the guy most Canadians would like themselves to be.... successful, smart, down to earth, straight forward, and witty.

You could argue he makes a much better interviewee than a presenter at a function like this, but even though he lacked polished I think he lends a lot of credibility to Blackberry. I'd rather his less-than-polished honesty than some to have some smarmy guy in jeans and a black shirt tell me something is incredible ten times.

[Easy-G]

I seem to be the only one here who thought Chen was really good.

Saw Thor present the BB10 launch - now THAT was cringeworthy. The guy had the charisma of a boulder.

Chen makes me laugh. Not just me either - heard a lot of laughter from the crowd. There were moments when I thought "did he really just say that in a product launch?!", but although on the face of it that could seem counter-productive, I think it puts us on his side.

Everyone is welcome to disagree with me!

Posted via CB10

Oh man, I feel the same way! I got such a kick out of John Chen! My favorite quote was after Gretzky walked off stage, "I brought your national hero! ... If you guys aren't supporting us... you guys... got some problems." lololol

Posted via CB10

[qwerty4ever]

Chen had jet lag. This is why he seemed so tired.

Z10STL100-3/10.2.1.3247

A three hour timezone difference does not induce jet lag. Well maybe the poor air quality on the aircraft did him in if he travedlled commercial instead of on a private jet. Chen should have hired a professional presenter to cover his part of the presentation with Chen briefly (30 seconds) answering a few questions from the audience.

[Spawn12]

A three hour timezone difference does not induce jet lag. Well maybe the poor air quality on the aircraft did him in if he travedlled commercial instead of on a private jet. Chen should have hired a professional presenter to cover his part of the presentation with Chen briefly (30 seconds) answering a few questions from the audience.

Sure and that would have got more bad press, why wasn't the CEO there to launch his product blah blah blah.

He did a good job, not a brilliant job...unlike Heins with his godawful presentation during the BlackBerry 10 launch. That was truly cringeworthy.

Can't please some people I guess.

Posted via CB10

[RubberChicken76]

I think Gadway did well. Chen takes the self-deprecation thing *way* too far. It's good in small measures, but he totally over does it.

I like it better when he's in the earning's calls. Found it hard on stage.

Honestly, I don't think any of the CEOs have been great. Thor was monotone, Chen too off-the-cuff (looks like he doesn't prepare) and Jim was rambling all over the place.

Mike L wasn't bad usually, but a bit technical.

[qwerty4ever]

I like Chen's line in reference to Canadian media: "If you don�t support us, you have some problems." He did pull out all the stops to win Canada. IMHO they just priced it wrong. It must be $599 for Canada.

Sorry the BlackBerry Passport pricing off-contract should have been CAD250.00 for existing BlackBerry consumers with no trade-in required when bought from their current carrier. For new converts to BlackBerry the pricing could have been CAD350.00 off-contract. The notion BlackBerry thinks it can charge CAD700.00 in these times of near irrelevance on a global basis speaks volumes about arrogance and ivory tower mindset. Heck Bell Mobility, in Canada, wants to charge CAD750.00 off-contract and CAS299.00 on-contract for 2 years. Bizarro World should be the name of BlackBerry Limited. Does the BlackBerry Passport support HDMI output? Will there be a docking station with ports for a keyboard, monitor, network connection, external storage devices, etc.? For CAD750.00 I demand true innovative thinking from BlackBerry Limited. Will there be a professional case which holds the BlackBerry Passport and a travel passport? All they've delivered is an evolution of the BlackBerry Z30.

[jaydee5799]

No dynamic presenter...could that equate to a not so dynamic product? Sorry. I think it was lacking a little life as well.

[eugenelee223]

I watched the google i/o, the apple presentation, the samsung presentation and the BlackBerry presentation (more than once for each) and IMO I don't think BlackBerry's was as bad as most of you are saying. I actually like John's awkward humour and I really think he's relatable that way. And the presenter who basically showcased the Passport in all it's glory was awesome. Aside from the 4GB RAM muck-up I thought he did a fantastic job. Of the 4 presentations, I think my mind was blown while watching Google's I/O but the apple and samsung presentation were meh. For apple I kept expecting to see something revolutionary... and the payment app was cool but that's about it. I hate how they bring in all the famous people because I really feel like they're trying too hard - that high 5 between Cook and Bono was just awkward. And Samsung's presentation was really weird with the three presenters (not) in-sync with each other. BlackBerry may not have the same hype but I think someone mentioned selling tickets to fans which I def agree with. They could have packed the place with Crackberry fans Anyway, just my opinion but I watch a lot of these every year and I really think some of you are being too hard on them.

[Zidentia]

After watching the video it became clear that BlackBerry's mobile computing using the passport's controllable work space and blending feature has now moved ahead of all other platforms.

Regardless of the different presenters and their presentation styles BlackBerry's invited guests received all passports and Blend software links to duplicate and verify what they just learned.

This was a smart $150k investment and that is what the 250 (?) guests will remember not the jokes or nervousness or the brown shoes.

I liked the replay and it's info and as somebody on the forum said:
Passport blends, iPhone bends....


Posted via the amazing Z30

The b rown shoes, yes that was a distraction.

[anon(5828343)]

It was OK, I watched it live streaming on CBC.ca. Gretzky's appearance was a surprise. There was a lot of information, but it's true there was no "wow factor."

Posted using my BlackBerry Z30.

I love Gretzky. He was my hockey hero when I was in junior high. But why reach into the past when your product is hopefully about the future? While my kids (16 & 18) respect Wayne Gretzky ("the Great One"), they hardly think of him as a contemporary cultural icon. It would be like having Apple hire Larry Bird or Kareem Abdul Jabar to be their celebrity endorser. Both great men who garner incredible respect but who aren't really about the future.

[anon(5828343)]

I agree, Jon Chen really dropped the ball at today's presentation, it was cringe worthy.

John Chen is always cringe worthy. As a rule, I turn off any device when I hear his voice (whether its a speech or an interview) and this was no different. He started and I turned it off as I can't stand listening to him speak.

P.S. I'm the child of Asian immigrants so the accent or labored English isn't what bothers me.

[anon5759238]

Ok, I didn't see the event, but (and this is just my opinion) I've noticed that compared to Americans, Canadians do seem more..."easy-going" I'll say. To me they seem to have a bit flatter affect, so it could be that is affecting your impression?

And I'm not saying this as a criticism of Canadians, just that relatively speaking, there's a difference.

As for me, I think the product speaks for itself. I'm excited about the phone, not the presentation.

Posted via CB10

You hear about that with musicians too. A band doing a tour in Canada and the US will tell you that the crowds in Canada will seem alot more reserved compared to US fans. It can even throw them off a bit and get them second guessing themselves and thinking the Canadian crowd isn't that into them

On the phone note I totally am getting a passport

Swordsmanship & Western Martial Arts Channel C000C9AF6

[offyoutoddle]

Actually I could, and indeed regularly have. But then I have the advantage of having done this sort of stuff in front of large audiences professionally for the last 15 years or so. And if I got product data wrong, I'd consider it a MAJOR fail. Not being mean, but just making a point.

Omg REALLY people!!! I bet half of you guys could of done a better job! Whatever JC did his thing!!!! #motivation #back2black

[mlepage]

Not all enterprise people are boring and serious, are they not allowed to have some downtime to play the odd game??

The message he was trying to get across was that even though it's a phone aimed at professionals and enterprise, you can still play candy crush which is a hugely popular game whilst easily getting through your day of productivity. That's the message I took from the launch and for me he nailed it on the head.

Speaking of games, Threes is free in the Amazon app store right now. And as shown in Bla1ze's review, you can also get the excellent Monument Valley. Plus feel free to try my game NeverMaze, or my free game Alpha Memory, both work great on Passport. I also have a new game coming soon, made using Unity.