Lack of VoIP applications. Why?

Greetings. As of late I've been wondering as to why there is such a small amount of applications that can do this, the applications available that should do it, well, they can't. For example, Viber, LINE, Windows Live Messenger, Google Talk. Is there a reason to this? Why is this feature to make voice calls never developed in popular social network and IM applications for a BlackBerry? I thought it was the lack of hardware on the BlackBerry but after seeing BBM voice calls, I have doubts.

Viber has been trying this forever so apparently it's not easy. RIM pulled it off because they are RIM.

my understanding - and it's limited - is that because all data goes through BlackBerry servers, both BIS and BES, latency is a major problem for VOIP over BlackBerry. Remember BBM Voice gets past this because they are the BIackBerry servers, so there is no other redundant service their service has to go through.

Thanks for your replies. Is it not possible to use the data the carrier gives you for such apps? or even Wi-Fi? (I just noticed that I may have posted this in the wrong section. Sorry!)

See my signature. The old RIM decided to prioritize carrier requests over end-user features. The new RIM (led by Thorsten), well, let's see what they do. I think they'll allow/enable true VoIP apps. But let's see.

Originally Posted by chrysaurora

See my signature. The old RIM decided to prioritize carrier requests over end-user features. The new RIM (led by Thorsten), well, let's see what they do. I think they'll allow/enable true VoIP apps. But let's see.

Its already been stated that rim is developing VoIP apis for developers, so i think this is a sure thing in BB10

this will change with BB10..because RIM has already given out the API's and ready to port more open source VOIP libs if they feel the need. But as a third party dev you may have whatever works for you.

Full Duplex Audio Engine for BlackBerry 10 VoIP Developers �BlackBerry Developer Blog

Here was my question to Counterpath a while back... Validated by Mr. Saunders...
Hi there,
Can you tell me if you are developing a VOIP client for Blackberry 10 OS?
I’d be very much interested in purchasing Bria or equivalent.

Cheers,

Here is their response...
Hello Dave,

Thank you for your interest in CounterPath.

Currently we are working on a client for the Blackberry operating system. This new client will be available sometime early to mid 2013.

Best regards,

Well, yeah, I've heard it'll be possible for BB10 to have many apps, but it's not like I'm gonna buy a BB10 the day they come out. I'm gonna first wait and see how they do.