[crackbrry fan]

Agreed. Thanks for the adding to my post CrackBerry fan.

No worries.

Posted via CB10

[Plazmic Flame]

BB10 just didn't get the chance it really needed. To me, it's like the had a guy driving the bus, in reverse, at 75 km/h.... guaranteed disaster.

Had Chen come in at the BB10 stage, I believe things would be much different. Either BB10 would be a success or BB10 would have been scrapped early and we'd have Android powered Classics and Passports... #DayDreaming

[IndianTiwari]

Just curious if switching to android actually helped sell more phones.

For the record, bb10 is the best operating system in my opinion.

Posted via CB10

IMO Switching to android didnt get the numbers due to high pricing and also many BB10 fans did not support the android . If the pricing of Priv was affordable things would have been little different. Bb10 for me is the best OS .

[crackbrry fan]

That was never the choice. BB10 was creating huge losses for BB, and as sales volumes dropped, the losses became worse. Per Chen's own words, they needed to sell 10M BB10 phones a year in order to break even, and they were selling half that and declining, and continuing to lose a lot of money per phone. So, the choice wasn't Android vs. BB10, it was Android vs. exiting the smartphone business entirely. Chen gave Android a shot - likely knowing it wouldn't work - because if he didn't, he'd be criticized for not trying everything before shutting down hardware.

Perhaps IF Chen continued with BlackBerry 10. Producing at least ONE high end all touch device per year, things would have been different with respect to their sales.

The Z30 was a phenomenal device, BlackBerry did ZERO marketing of it, in fact years after release people still ask me if that is a BlackBerry device.

There was no upgrade path for their BlackBerry 10 user. The Passport whilst still an Excellent Product was catering to a niche market within a niche market. Numbers could have been adjusted on the production side to cater for a reduced market.

Instead of jumping to Android , some care should have been given to BlackBerry 10. Chen cuts had an adverse effect on the platform with BlackBerry Music / video being hacked off in his cost cutting. which incidentally gave app developers the excuse to say, hey BlackBerry is folding why continue to produce for them.

When you have a CEO repeatedly going out and saying we will drop handsets, that shows ZERO commitment. This also became a self fulfilling prophecy.

He released some poor low end to mid end devices like the Z3 and Leap and simultaneously was hacking away at what was the complete BlackBerry experience with the removal of the music store etc.

The app gap was NOT addressed with any serious effort either. Whilst you may think that going Android was Great for BlackBerry, the majority of BlackBerry's base, used a BlackBerry because they did not want Android / Google as their service provider . That step further alienated their core user.

So when you speak of HUGE losses you need to paint the true picture of what created and fueled the Huge losses, misunderstanding . Mismanagement and a host of other Misses.

Posted via CB10

[Mirko935]

First of all, sorry for the long post. It got out of hand...

Anyway, I believe half the reason why Priv failed on the market (if we could say that it failed) was because of the BlackBerry "fanbase".

As I said in another thread, had I started frequenting this forum earlier, I probably wouldn't buy it because of all the bashing by the "fans". I was in the position that I never had a BlackBerry before and was really interested in this one primarily because of the sliding PKB. Not only were all the BB fan forums full of people saying how poor the PKB is (among other issues), but also almost all of the reviews by former BB users stated that it was far worse in comparison to previous BB phones.

I wasted a lot of time just to find an objective enough review to justify my wish for buying it. An average user would probably read one or two reviews and google a few forum topics, see that most people (not regular users, but alleged BB fans) say how poor the keyboard is and simply see no point in buying it. Why would anyone buy a phone with a keyboard if it's a poor keyboard? He'd rather stay with his Samsung, Apple, LG or any other full-touch sleek thin device.
It's not even only about the keyboard. The constant hating on its software sure didn't help either. Why would I go from another manufacturer for which I know that he makes good software to BB whose Android software is, according to their own fans, terrible?

My story, in case anyone is interested in how I barely decided to buy it:
I was a long time HTC user... Used a few of their slider PKB phones and I thought how I'd love to have those 30 or so clicky buttons again. I also got used to having a large screen so I'm not really interested in a "classic BlackBerry design".
One day a year or two ago I stumble upon the information that BlackBerry has something called a Hub... It sparks a slight interest for BlackBerry in me but unfortunately I find out that it (logically) exists only on their own phones which use a weird and to me utterly unknown OS. I still take a look at their phones but unfortunately they don't have anything with a sliding keyboard and I don't want to give up my large 16:9 screen. If they had something sliding, I'd seriously consider making the switch to their OS. If they had something with Android, I'd seriously consider them.
But giving up an OS that I know is very good and meets all my needs plus giving up the big screen are a bit much for me. And going to their full-touch devices makes little sense. Still, once in a while when I think about a new phone I also consider BlackBerry.
Finally, one day I find out about a device called Venice. It's a slider, it has Android plus I suppose it would have that same Hub that originally brought me to take a new look at BlackBerry. It's not a landscape slider like the ones I used previously, but since it comes with a 5.5" screen, I think the keyboard must be about the size of the one on my old HTC Touch Pro so it can't be bad. The specs seem great, the Samsung AMOLED screen with a curved edge like the one I saw on their S6 edge is something that was also interesting to me and the device pretty much seems like a dream come true.
The device gets released and the first reviews come. Mentions of a few software glitches are not something that I take too seriously, it's BB's first Android so I believe it'll get fixed in a few months. Some slight heating issues, it's an SD808, so no big deal. I don't game much anyway. What I really want to know about is the keyboard. Some say it's fine, but many also see no point in it, expected in this day and age. Some, primarily reviewers that come from old BB phones, say its lacking. What I also want to know about is what a common BB user has to say about it. I also count in the fact that a company fan would be somewhat biased and see everything as better than it really is. And what do the fans say about the keyboard... They say it's not good. Poor. Also, Hub sucks on Android. Build quality is terrible. BB Android is terrible in comparison to BB10. Virtually every BB fan says the device is no good (especially for the rather high price). The more I read what the fans have to say the more I doubt spending 800 € on it would be a smart move. I mean, if the company fans don't like it, it really can't be anything but terrible. I pretty much give up on buying it and decide to wait for something better to come, my phone was still just fine at the time so why spend 800 € to replace it with a poor device...

A few months later I see one in a store and decide to take a look. It feels nice and sturdy, the keys also seem more than fine, good size, good feedback; and I start to wonder what in god's name were those people talking about...

Long story short, my old phone finally started giving up on its life two months ago and I decided to discard all of the fans' opinions, reviews and whatever (which were still pretty much just as negative as before) and simply trust my instinct. And those few relatively positive reviews by people who don't have much feelings about BlackBerry.

And after two months of using Priv, I honestly have only good things to say about it. It's worth every cent. The keyboard is great (I could type 50 WPM with no typos after two days of using it), build quality issues that people love to spend time talking about here (bendable rear of the case, screen clicking) are pretty much impossible to notice in regular usage, it's beautifully fast - as fast or faster in most tasks than a, at launch, similarly priced iPhone 6, the screen is great, BB's software is great (at least on MM, haven't used it on LP) and more stable than Apple's iOS in my experience, there's really nothing I could want more. It even comes with a proper pair of headphones unlike 95 % of other phones.
Of course, a larger battery, faster CPU and more RAM would always be nice for any smartphone, but there's little hope that I'll ever see a Priv 2 with updated specifications.

So, if anyone's to blame for Priv's "failure" or BB's exit from hardware, it's their own fans. I don't mean to insult anyone or anything like that, but the fact is that it was BB "fans" that almost made me not buy it. Not reviews by people who don't care about BB, not the high price, not any other devices on the market, just BB fans. And I'd bet there were many other people that were interested about it, but doubted purchasing it for similar reasons to mine and didn't end up in the "almost" category.

[Dunt Dunt Dunt]

Perhaps IF Chen continued with BlackBerry 10. Producing at least ONE high end all touch device pet year, things would have been different with respect to their sales.

The Z30 was a phenomenal device, BlackBerry did ZERO marketing of it, in fact years after release people still ask me if that is a BlackBerry device.

There was no upgrade path for their BlackBerry 10 user. The Passport whilst still an Excellent Product was catering to a niche market within a niche market. Numbers could have been adjusted on the production side to cater for a reduced market.

Instead of jumping to Android , some care should have been given to BlackBerry 10. Chen cuts had an adverse effect on the platform with BlackBerry Music / video being hacked off in his cost cutting. which incidentally gave app developers the excuse to say, hey BlackBerry is folding why continue to produce for them.

When you have a CEO repeatedly going out and saying we will drop handsets, that shows ZERO commitment. This also became a self fulfilling prophecy.

He released some poor low end to mid end devices like the Z3 and Leap and simultaneously was hacking away at what was the complete BlackBerry experience with the removal of the music store etc.

The app gap was NOT addressed with any serious effort either. Whilst you may think that going Android was Great for BlackBerry, the majority of BlackBerry's base, used a BlackBerry because they did not want Android / Google as their service provider . That step further alienated their core user.

So when you speak of HUGE losses you need to paint the true picture of what created and fueled the Huge losses, misunderstanding . Mismanagement and a host of other Misses.

Posted via CB10

The C O S T - Chen had to cut stuff to save the company, yes it affected BB10 viability, but that's was like trying to save a person with a flesh eating disease.... you go through the motions, but you know that chances aren't very high that cutting off limbs will save the patient in the end.

Sorry but selling a couple million phones just would not have covered the cost of development of BB10 or special hardware drivers. Maybe if BlackBerry had built BB10 on Linux, that would have afforded them the ability to utilize existing hardware drivers and would have made development easier... but they didn't.

Most here that wanted BlackBerry to do more... for some reason they ignore Microsoft and the BILLIONS they have spent trying to gain any traction. They had highend phones that were subsidised, they paid for apps, they marketed, and marketed... with almost not results.

[kvndoom]

BB10's horrendous launch and all the drama of 2013 made Blackberry such a tarnished brand that no phone of any caliber released in 2015 would have been successful. Priv's problem wasn't that it was Android.. the problem was it's a Blackberry. (and of course the name and price didn't help at all)

A better question would be to ask is what BB10 sales would have looked like if it launched in 2015 with Blackberry's reputation already flushed down the toilet. I am all but certain that they would have been equally dismal.

[anon(9607753)]

Saying that BB10 had a better chance of survival (than BlackBerry Android) is like saying a mammoth had a better chance of escaping a tar pit because it was a bigger animal.

Posted via BlackBerry Priv STV100-1

[Bbnivende]

I think they should just make small and a large Android BlackBerry PKB devices . They will not sell in large numbers but there still is a market. I like the BlackBerry skin but maybe not enough to buy the product.

Posted via CB10

[TGR1]

I would love to see the data that convinced BBRY to go with a slider. That was really a niche product to hang the company's fate on and likely not the cheapest to tool and manufacture.

[Bbnivende]

No data. Just a hail Mary.

The old Torch model was moderately successful because BlackBerry did not know how to make a decent all touch and the 9900's screen was too small to succeed as an all touch.


The market has changed significantly since August 2011. If there is a market for a PKB , the device needs to be full time. The device cannot have a square screen nor should be too tall.

It is too bad that this render was not made back in 2013.

http://n4bb.com/blackberry-drive-res...ical-keyboard/

[Mirko935]

The market has changed significantly since August 2011. If there is a market for a PKB , the device needs to be full time. The device cannot have a square screen nor should be too tall.

Could you, please, elaborate?

99 % of screens in use today are 16:9, all the media content, games, VR, whatever, everything is made with 16:9 in mind. Plus, one of the reasons I don't want a full touch device is that the VKB obscures half of my screen. A "full time" PKB device would pretty much do the same constantly. A sliding PKB gives me both the benefits of a large screen and the benefits of the keyboard when I need it. Why would I want to lose either if I don't have to?

Not that I mind that there are people who would prefer a "full time PKB", but there are PKB users like me that prefer a slider.

[Tien-Lin Chang]

BB10 just didn't get the chance it really needed. To me, it's like the had a guy driving the bus, in reverse, at 75 km/h.... guaranteed disaster.

Had Chen come in at the BB10 stage, I believe things would be much different. Either BB10 would be a success or BB10 would have been scrapped early and we'd have Android powered Classics and Passports... #DayDreaming

Blackberry don't have the ability to give BB10 that chance, unhook BB10 with BIS/BES was a terrible business call which split their platfrom from their strongest selling point at that time (the terrible integration of BES10 w/ previous version and expensive blackberry data plans were another sad stories). And from the update notes I'd say that even Blackberry had purchase QNX they don't have the ability to evolve it, not to mention create a developer-friendly platfrom to start the ecosystem.

They just don't have the winning formula, simple as that.

[BlackBerryPassport]

If Priv had sold more then bb10 then surely BlackBerry had put those numbers out saying

'hey look our Android phone sold more then bb10 ' but it didn't. Whatever the reason was, over pricing etc.

Priv failed and surely Dtek50 didn't get it going, I know it's still time for Dtek50. But as for Priv. Failure

Posted via CB10

[Bbnivende]

Could you, please, elaborate?

99 % of screens in use today are 16:9, all the media content, games, VR, whatever, everything is made with 16:9 in mind. Plus, one of the reasons I don't want a full touch device is that the VKB obscures half of my screen. A "full time" PKB device would pretty much do the same constantly. A sliding PKB gives me both the benefits of a large screen and the benefits of the keyboard when I need it. Why would I want to lose either if I don't have to?

Not that I mind that there are people who would prefer a "full time PKB", but there are PKB users like me that prefer a slider.

Not difficult. People who need a PKB value a full time PKB . A slider PKB is just a compromise.

[mamalimt]

dang wow lol this thread is on fire haha.

[Mirko935]

Not difficult. People who need a PKB value a full time PKB . A slider PKB is just a compromise.

What does "need a PKB" mean? To me a full time PKB phone would actually be a compromise.

[spantch101]

Not to mention how many BlackBerry users who gave BlackBerry the benefit of doubt and blindly bought the Z10 on launch.

Kind of like........ Sheep

That helped Z10 sales as well.

Posted via Nexus 6p

You talking to me? Lol I was actually able to get my hands on one a couple weeks before launch here in Canada, was told to learn bb10 best I could to help people that bought the devices on launch.. sadly very few people ever needed my help.....

Posted via my old faithful Z10

[Bbnivende]

Could you, please, elaborate?

99 % of screens in use today are 16:9, all the media content, games, VR, whatever, everything is made with 16:9 in mind. Plus, one of the reasons I don't want a full touch device is that the VKB obscures half of my screen. A "full time" PKB device would pretty much do the same constantly. A sliding PKB gives me both the benefits of a large screen and the benefits of the keyboard when I need it. Why would I want to lose either if I don't have to?

Not that I mind that there are people who would prefer a "full time PKB", but there are PKB users like me that prefer a slider.

I am typing this on a VKB and yet I lack of a full screen is no impediment.

I agree that 99 % of phone buyers will purchase an all touch 16:9 phone. The slider is a subset of the 1% leftover of smartphone buyers.

Anecdotal evidence here on CB would suggest that PRIV owners only use their PKB occasionally. In addition there many complaints about the clicking sound when typing on the PKB. Many found that the PRIV keyboard was not as good as a 9900, Q10 or a Classic .

Ultimately, the BlackBerry PKB market is not large enough to support multiple PKB devices . The sales figures for the PRIV would suggest that the slider format did not increase the popularity of PKB's amongst the broader Android community.

"Need to have " means that typing on a glass screen is the input method of last resort.

[Mirko935]

I am typing this on a VKB and yet I lack of a full screen is no impediment.

I agree that 99 % of phone buyers will purchase an all touch 16:9 phone. The slider is a subset of the 1% leftover of smartphone buyers.

Anecdotal evidence here on CB would suggest that PRIV owners only use their PKB occasionally. In addition there many complaints about the clicking sound when typing on the PKB. Many found that the PRIV keyboard was not as good as a 9900, Q10 or a Classic .

Ultimately, the BlackBerry PKB market is not large enough to support multiple PKB devices . The sales figures for the PRIV would suggest that the slider format did not increase the popularity of PKB's amongst the broader Android community.

"Need to have " means that typing on a glass screen is the input method of last resort.

For me typing on a glass screen is the last resort. Despite the fact that I had a full touch 5" phone for more than 2 years and used swype daily. It's just no match to Priv's keyboard.



There was a topic on the Priv subforum, some other people that use it just as much as I do. I care about lack of full screen mainly because I want to see what I'm replying to. If it's something long, I have to scroll all the time etc. Some people don't mind that, but I do.

Anectodal evidence on CB also suggests that lack of a preinstalled file manager is one of the worst things that can happen to a person after purchasing an Android phone. It also suggests everyone wants BB10. So I learned not to trust the anecdotes on CB much.

Also anecdodally, I know several people "of the broader Android community" that were (and/or are) interested in Priv and didn't care much about classic BB designs or BB10. Some of them used PKB Android sliders before, some never used any QWERTY PKB, but still found Priv interesting.
If there were sales here like in the US where you could get the phone for 300-500 USD, most of them would buy it. But it's still 700-800 EUR here, so it's a bit too much for most people. Even my fiancee would buy it in a heartbeat (she has a work iPhone 6), but we can't really afford another one.
I also saw several people on a local internet forum stating that they would buy Priv, but the keyboard isn't good enough, that it's too small etc., after they have seen such anectodal evidence from BB users on forums like this one. And since local availability isn't all that great, many of them blindly believed what they heard on internet and decided to skip it, as I said in my earlier post almost happened to me.
Now, is it really a matter of Priv's keyboard being so bad or some BB users constantly being overly picky and whiny about everything (to name a few beside the pkb matter; no BB file manager, music and video player, black Hub theme and all sorts of other incredibly difficult life problems) I leave to you to decide.

Finally, I'm not sure about the size of the PKB market. Most polls I've seen in the last 4 or 5 years suggest there's still 40 % of people that would be interested in a PKB (slider). Take a look, the second one is from last year:
QWERTY keyboard preferred by mobile users, says Nokia poll

[Weekend Poll] Would You Be Interested In An Android Phone With A Physical Keyboard?

The question is how many stay interested in a BlackBerry Android slider after they visit e.g. CB and see that 20 % of topics opened in the last two years talk about BB death and another 20 % about how BB Android sucks.

[Slash82]

When I purchased my Z10 I laughed at the iPhone. It had no options like my z10. IPhone was an app launcher with crazy restrictions. Nutz. BlackBerry didn't advertise but one commercial at the Superbowl

Z10 was a great phone for its time but the z30 with wireless charging put it to total shame.

Posted via CrackBerry App for Android on America's 🌎 largest network.

The Z10 was and still is a great device!
It was about the experience and BlackBerry never understood how to bring it to the market.

They should have rather took the money for Instagram and SnapChat - instead of throwing it to Alicia Keys.
And they still don't get that it isn't about the number of apps - it's about the selection and social media.

Posted via CB10

[tre10]

The Z10 was and still is a great device!
It was about the experience and BlackBerry never understood how to bring it to the market.

They should have rather took the money for Instagram and SnapChat - instead of throwing it to Alicia Keys.
And they still don't get that it isn't about the number of apps - it's about the selection and social media.

Posted via CB10

They did have money for them. They turned it down. Best example I can remember is Netflix. BlackBerry wanted to send them the developer(s) to make the app for free and possibly still pay them a license fee. All Netflix had to do was support it after. They were turned down.

A member on here said in another thread BlackBerry paid for all his trips to developer conferences. Still no good.

Let me paste his post below. :

They invested very heavily in app development in the beginning. I was one of the developers that was supporting them back before launch. In exchange for apps, I received multiple free BlackBerry PlayBooks, *a Dev Alpha A, 2 Dev Alpha B, a Dev Alpha C, 2 LE Red Z10s, all expenses paid trip to Orlando Florida along with $500 in spending cash, and literally $200 a pop for each and every garbage Android app I ported over for them. I lost count, but it added up to thousands of dollars in cash.



If you total it all up, BlackBerry paid me around ten thousand dollars to develop apps for BlackBerry 10. I'm not the only developer who got all of those rewards. There were hundreds of people doing it. The major problem with writing apps for BB10 is there was no one else to pay you for your apps besides BlackBerry itself. The ROI simply wasn't there for most developers. The only money I made from my BlackBerry apps came from BlackBerry.



You have to have users who are willing to buy apps to get app developers to continue to support your platform.


So too sum up they were basically shafted by many developers. They just took their money and ran

[ardakca]

Big name apps are free. BlackBerry should have selected the big name apps. No need for small developers.

[tre10]

Big name apps are free. BlackBerry should have selected the big name apps. No need for small developers.

Many big name app developers decided not to make a BB10 app. BlackBerry had extensive discussions with many of them.

[Old_Mil]

That was never the choice. BB10 was creating huge losses for BB, and as sales volumes dropped, the losses became worse. Per Chen's own words, they needed to sell 10M BB10 phones a year in order to break even, and they were selling half that

Ironically, given the nature of the technology business it is far easier to turn annual sales of five million handsets a year into ten million than it is to turn 400,000 into a million.

Posted via CB10