[RyanGermann]

-- disintegrated into CB10 sparkly dust

[Tom689]

I support this idea actually

[eddy_berry]

Ok. The beginning of this thread is very confusing.

1. Why does BB need two apps? I don't get that. They would be laughed at more. Does WhatsApp have a separate app for groups?

2. The numbers were very confusing at the beginning of the thread. It was 20 BILLION messages sent from 450 Million active users. That's 44 messages sent per user per day. Not that surprising. It should not matter how many people received it. I think they just wanted to bump the number and make it seem massive when it really isn't. It's just kind of normal. WhatsApp has a lot of users. Plain and simple.

3. BBM just started out cross platform. Give it time. If it doesn't suit you then don't use it. I use it. I use it to call my sisters in England. One has an iPhone even. Call quality is great.

4. To answer the question in the title. It may never catch up. BBM just needs to grab a piece of the pie and monetize it. If it can get to a point where BlackBerry is making good money doing it then they just have to keep themselves in the game. If they can ever surpass WhatsApp it would probably take a miracle of sorts. Perhaps a really destructive security issue or a complete worldwide meltdown. It won't be that easy.

[anon(5828343)]

Sadly, I think cross-platform BBM arrived at the party a little too late. Whatsapp got into the cross platform messenger game on the ground floor. After BBM went cross platform, I really held out great hope for it and encouraged many of my old BBM contacts who went to iOS and Android as well as many other contacts to download and use BBM. The initial momentum was great but since that time, it has really waned. About 2/3 of my cross platform BBM contacts have uninstalled BBM and I am back down to a handful of contacts.

[cjcampbell]

Sadly, I think cross-platform BBM arrived at the party a little too late. Whatsapp got into the cross platform messenger game on the ground floor. After BBM went cross platform, I really held out great hope for it and encouraged many of my old BBM contacts who went to iOS and Android as well as many other contacts to download and use BBM. The initial momentum was great but since that time, it has really waned. About 2/3 of my cross platform BBM contacts have uninstalled BBM and I am back down to a handful of contacts.

Yeah. You're right. No point in any other company ever making an effort to try and grab a piece of the IM market. Whatsapp has it locked up for all time.

Posted via CB10

[vrud]

That's 44 messages sent per user per day. Not that surprising.

Really? I find it very huge and likely overestimated.
I use BBM and can't imagine myself sending so many messages on a daily basis. If I want to really chat then I will make a phone call. Do you guys communicate through IM that much?

Posted via CB10

[thisiscjay]

Really? I find it very huge and likely overestimated.
I use BBM and can't imagine myself sending so many messages on a daily basis. If I want to really chat then I will make a phone call. Do you guys communicate through IM that much?

Posted via CB10

Barely use anything other than IM.

[cjcampbell]

Really? I find it very huge and likely overestimated.
I use BBM and can't imagine myself sending so many messages on a daily basis. If I want to really chat then I will make a phone call. Do you guys communicate through IM that much?

Posted via CB10

I'm in a group and in contact with a few others every day and I'll tell you, sending 44 messages a day is nothing. I am one of those that help boost the per user average of BBM messages sent.

[Troy Tiscareno]

Could someone please explain the catalyst that had WhatsApp increase its users from 250 million to 450 million in just six months?

Yes, that's easy.

It all has to do with the ease-of-use of contact discovery. When you install WhatsApp, it imports your contact list, and any WhatsApp user is matched up via phone number and made into a WhatsApp contact for you automatically. For most users, simply installing the app automatically gives them 20-100 WhatsApp contacts, and all of those contacts instantly see that they are now on WhatsApp as well.

This makes it so easy to use WhatsApp that people recommend it to their friends, who are delighted to find so many contacts on it when they install it, so they recommend it to their friends, and so on.

I know many BB people don't like this model, because they value their privacy too much, but most of BB's privacy/security really hurts BB in the consumer market, where ease-of-use and customer satisfaction is FAR more important, especially for something like a messaging app, which is only valuable when a significant portion of the people YOU care about are using it too.

This has long been a problem for BB, and one that is rarely talked about here, which is that the things that enterprises value (security, privacy, restrictions) are the OPPOSITE of what the consumer market wants, and by trying to satisfy both, BB often satisfies neither. This is why Chen has accepted letting go of the consumer market in North America and Europe - he needs to focus on enterprises, and there's very little synergy between enterprise and consumer features.

[Troy Tiscareno]

Yeah. You're right. No point in any other company ever making an effort to try and grab a piece of the IM market. Whatsapp has it locked up for all time.

No, what it means is that any company that wants to be able to win some of WhatsApp's marketshare had better be VERY focused, do the basics EXTREMELY well, PLUS offer some feature or something that is clearly superior.

xBBM's rollout was a mess, and it is STILL very unreliable on Android and iOS in terms of getting messages on-time. Who wants to use a messenger that can't reliably send and receive messages? Once again, BB failed to execute well on the basics, and the more advanced features are meaningless if the basics aren't rock-solid.

It simply doesn't matter that xBBM is very late to the game: the bar has been raised, and anyone who wants to play in the big game has to meet CURRENT standards, which are set by the current market leaders. Just like the iPhone radically changed the smartphone game, WhatsApp has changed the messenger game, and those competitors that can't keep up, REGARDLESS of the reason, will be left behind.

Henry Ford's many innovations put a bunch of formerly-strong car companies out of business, and I'm sure they had plenty of excuses why they weren't competitive, but in the end, it didn't matter what the excuse was - you either compete well by whatever the current market standards are, or you fail.

[medic_28]

Unfortunately, most users of whatsapp don't care about their cyber security. I'll stick with bbm.

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/how-secu...ews-18342.html

Playbook x2, Z10, Q5

[cjcampbell]

Yes, that's easy.

It all has to do with the ease-of-use of contact discovery. When you install WhatsApp, it imports your contact list, and any WhatsApp user is matched up via phone number and made into a WhatsApp contact for you automatically. For most users, simply installing the app automatically gives them 20-100 WhatsApp contacts, and all of those contacts instantly see that they are now on WhatsApp as well.

This makes it so easy to use WhatsApp that people recommend it to their friends, who are delighted to find so many contacts on it when they install it, so they recommend it to their friends, and so on.

I know many BB people don't like this model, because they value their privacy too much, but most of BB's privacy/security really hurts BB in the consumer market, where ease-of-use and customer satisfaction is FAR more important, especially for something like a messaging app, which is only valuable when a significant portion of the people YOU care about are using it too.

This has long been a problem for BB, and one that is rarely talked about here, which is that the things that enterprises value (security, privacy, restrictions) are the OPPOSITE of what the consumer market wants, and by trying to satisfy both, BB often satisfies neither. This is why Chen has accepted letting go of the consumer market in North America and Europe - he needs to focus on enterprises, and there's very little synergy between enterprise and consumer features.

Maybe, just maybe, one day, people will realize that they don't want their info running like that. Hopefully, for BB's sake and theirs. Facebook, in the not so distant past, is something recruiters have and do look at for posting history and "personality". Whatsapp is the same thing. Install that number from the resume you just received and get the profile pic, status updates, and when they're online. Sweet... sign me up :s

Yes, they get more users, but soon, it just might be realized how "open" they are by doing so.

[MrGabriel]

95% of those messages were "lol" and "omg"

[cjcampbell]

95% of those messages were "lol" and "omg"

Meh... I do those via BBM too so it's a moot statement

[eddy_berry]

Really? I find it very huge and likely overestimated.
I use BBM and can't imagine myself sending so many messages on a daily basis. If I want to really chat then I will make a phone call. Do you guys communicate through IM that much?

Posted via CB10

I've heard that some of the younger kids can message each other hundreds of times a day. I'm sure there are plenty that didn't have a single thing to say that day either, but hundreds of times per day users can make up this statistic.

I'm in a group and in contact with a few others every day and I'll tell you, sending 44 messages a day is nothing. I am one of those that help boost the per user average of BBM messages sent.

Case in point. Ha!

95% of those messages were "lol" and "omg"

That made me LOL.

[MrGabriel]

Meh... I do those via BBM too so it's a moot statement

I meant it as a joke because most of whatsapp users are years old.

[anon(4044683)]

IM first, and call later.

Really? I find it very huge and likely overestimated.
I use BBM and can't imagine myself sending so many messages on a daily basis. If I want to really chat then I will make a phone call. Do you guys communicate through IM that much?

Posted via CB10

[cjcampbell]

I meant it as a joke because most of whatsapp users are years old.

Ha... Well I see what you are saying, but have to interject a tad. I'm "years old" but probably years beyond what you meant. Quite frankly, BBM needs and wants these "years old" kids your speaking of. I do believe, that's the whole point of the Stickers that have been recently added.

[MrGabriel]

Ha... Well I see what you are saying, but have to interject a tad. I'm "years old" but probably years beyond what you meant. Quite frankly, BBM needs and wants these "years old" kids your speaking of. I do believe, that's the whole point of the Stickers that have been recently added.

haha typo. I meant "12 years old".

[cjcampbell]

haha typo. I meant "12 years old".

Fair enough, but that adds to my point, I'm far from 12 and use BBM all day. I easily send and receive, both group and personal, 100 isn messages per day. I just decided to go to the group I'm active in, and counted 208 deferent interactions from about 7:30 to 6:30 today.... now that doesn't count a multiple in a minute per user so there are about, I'd say, 50ish, other messages sent. So... that's just one group of adults. Imagine what kids will do.

[BBrickk]

+1!!
I can't emphasise this enough.

[Bishkin]

95% of those messages were "lol" and "omg"

You don't need a secure server to do all these, okay maybe if it is "Can we do lunch?" where there are more words in it. And yes those new bbm stickers they need to be secured as well.

[jorgkbzas]

But do you remember, when BBM look unbeatable?
This is a race, BBM its in pits..
Hold on and see whats happen, the security will be the tires that remains in the track.


Posted via CB10

[togarika]

Also whatsapp is worth 19 B and BBM Not even worth a 1 B.
Don't get me wrong I like BBM but it cannot compete with whatsapp.

Posted via CB10

The reason why BBM can not compete with Whatsapp is not because of it worth but rather that it is truely multi platform. You can only get bbm on Blackberry, IOS and android but whatsapp is on every smartphone OS and also on Nokia feature phones that run on s40 and s60 (symbian OS).

[tinochiko]

Any valuation is an estimated guess. Especially, for illiquid assets. But what we know for sure is that no one was interested in paying even 1/4 of What'sApp's selling price for the entire BalckBerry, which includes all the patents, BBM, QNX, BES, BB10, etc, which some people here believe are worth tens of billions of dollars EACH.

I am

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