[Omnitech]

In an article supposedly illustrating which brands suffer from "low engagement", BlackBerry gets the lowest marks.

What I found annoying is the mischaracterization in its description. This is page 11 in that article, hopefully it's visible properly in this link:

Page 11 - 10 Companies That Need Better Engagement - TheStreet

First they unsurprisingly quote the T-Mobile FUD as "proof" that people are deserting in even bigger droves than what we are seeing.

Then they let loose with this, making it look like it was quoting an "authority", when it was just one of their writers:

"Turnaround specialist John Chen took over as BlackBerry's CEO in November 2013. Chen has been focused on severing its losing handset division to "concentrate the company's efforts on its strengths..."

I don't know about what part of "5 year manufacturing contract with Foxconn", along with various other specific denials about that claim from Chen didn't get absorbed into someone's braincells.

[notfanboy]

By labelling this article as FUD, you mischaracterize it as some writer's opinion piece of BlackBerry.

What this article reports is the result of a survey of 32,000 consumers done by Brand Keys. The benchmark for success is a score of 85%. BlackBerry, according to the surveyed consumers, placed dead last with 52%.

The 2014 Brand Keys' Customer Loyalty Engagement Index ranks brands according to consumer engagement, with the ideal company scoring 100%. The annual ranking surveys approximately 32,000 consumers, ages 18 to 65, who self-selected categories and brands in which they shop at and participate with. The interviews were conducted via telephone, face-to-face and a small portion online over the month of January.

Here's a more detailed description of their methodology:

For the Brand Keys 2013 survey, 39,000 consumers, 18 to 65 years of age, drawn from the nine
US Census Regions, self-selected the categories in which they are consumers, and the brands for
which they are customers. Seventy percent (70%) were interviewed by phone, twenty-five
percent (25%) via face-to-face interviews (to include cell phone-only consumer households), and
5% participated online.

Assessments are based on an independently-validated technique that fuses rational and
emotional aspects of the categories to identify the drivers for the category Ideal, and to
determine how well the brand meets – or exceeds – expectations consumers hold for the Ideal in
the category. The proprietary research technique combines psychological inquiry with higherorder
statistical analyses to deliver a verified test/re-test reliability of 0.93, with results
generalizable at the 95% confidence level. It has been successfully used in B2B and B2C
categories in 35 countries around the world.

[Omnitech]

By labelling this article as FUD

Only one problem with that characterization: that was not my claim.

In fact, I mentioned nothing about the overall article's premise about a brand survey done elsewhere, and wrote solely about the claims made on page 11 of the article.

, you mischaracterize it as some writer's opinion piece of BlackBerry.

Apparently you did not read what I wrote. I suggest you read it again.

I specifically quoted the text I had an issue with and why.

Yet some people like yourself seem hell-bent on turning every post into a "Blackberry Good / Blackberry Bad" referendum, needlessly polarizing the discourse.

One might be led to wonder if you enjoy creating this sort of artificial controversy.

.