[idssteve]

Absolutely, they had and still have a lot of forces working against them. Notice how most people like to, or would rather blame BlackBerry for everything. No one ranted more fiercely then I did when Zuckerberg killed support for blackberry on WhatsApp when the entire infrastructure was there and it would be peanuts to keep it open, because the real cost is writing new software and programs. But it was simply easier for them to just pull the plug because they couldn't be bothered. Not to mention BlackBerry was extremely popular if not the most popular device used that helped put Facebook on the map when it really started to take off around 2006, 2007. But this means nothing, it's easier to "abandon the allies."

I've noticed in the general forum that if anyone suggests there are forces working against BlackBerry or other companies competing, they still prefer to blame BlackBerry and state "they got what they deserved" It's kind of the mentality like when I was in Cadillac forums. Cadillac had a couple of bad years before they restructured and innovated and it took time to get back on track and target younger people with new designs, but in the meantime they were like "when Cadillac builds a better car I'll buy one!" But they didn't, they bought Lexus, Mercedes and BMW even though they still built good cars. But there always has to be a fall guy, something they can criticize or make fun of and right now that's like BlackBerry in the mobile realm.

I'll never forget about five or six years ago there were several lawsuits against BlackBerry that were the most stupid cases I've ever heard of, and over ridiculous issues, but just kick them when they were down. But yes people continue to blame BlackBerry even then. I also maintains that I do not believe it was that easy for a Canadian company to buy airtime for televised commercials on American networks and break into the mainstream. I don't think they exactly "make it easy" for foreign companies to break into a sea of American commercials among all the protectionism's they have and when many foreign companies are seen as somehow stepping on their toes or taking their jobs away, invaders, in some form. Today this is more fierce than any other time I've seen.

It's just easier to blame the weak company instead of any other external factors that might've been against it.

If blackberry built a product right now that rivalled any android or iOS device I'm wondering if anybody would even care, I'm wondering if it's too late to even be considered anything other than a laughingstock at this point.

Any new product that has a less than 1.5% selling rate (or whatever that number is now) trying to break into a market among giants takes guts and they do have a LOT against them. Some will admire this, some will mock them and laugh and still others will blame them for the slump and NEVER consider any external forces that are trying to destroy them.

Business is competition and everyone wants the monopoly on the market, and they will do what it takes to crush the others, even if they barely have a market for their product. But people like to pretend there's a cute fluffy little fantasy world where all the businesses get along wonderfully and hold hands in the park and sing Kumbaya while at the same time they are stabbing them in the back to make their own profit and take their revenue, that's business.

Bigger sharks eat little fish so never trust the sharks.

I'm actually quite surprised someone like apple didn't buy blackberry a few years ago when they could've had them for peanuts, say around 150-200 billion. All the patents and technology and innovation that BlackBerry had, all the encryption technology. But I guess now there's no interest.

EDIT: i'm reminded of the time at Best Buy I asked to see the new D tek 50 and the cellular salesperson at flat out told me "oh I don't bother showing BlackBerry to people there's no market for them." It is also that kind of propaganda and mentality that helped contribute to the downfall.

Yup, kick them when they're down.

Your posts seem to be getting as long as mine... lol. Still on ur 99??

To your point, I noticed a universal animus against BB in multiple Verizon stores back about 2010?? Almost verbatim "Blackberry is going out of business" and "Droid is the future"... from multiple stores, in multiple states. Obviously resulting from hearing, or reading, a "driven theme" from SOMEwhere. Talking with these sales floor personnel inevitably uncovered VERY nasty experiences with the Storm 1. "Brand killing" nasty, it seemed. I'd just assumed, back then, that ML & JB were astute enough entrepreneurs to understand the implications of the brand damage that mistake had inflicted and seek to mitigate that damage & correct the organizational errors that led to that half baked fiasco. Instead, they "stuck" their biggest client (Verizon) with much of the cost of Storm returns. Little wonder animus crept onto sales floors, despite corporate VZW's "all is well" official face. Lol.

And then, RIM demonstrated a double down of the Storm's "too little too late half baked rush to market" attitude in PlayBook's intro and early months of BB10. In fact, early months of OS7 9900 were problematic enough to have my company eagerly anticipating a BB10 turn around. Surely RIM had learned the lesson and took that extra year to perfect BB10 so that it would be 110% right at launch...? Surely...???

Unfortunately, the rest is history. Less than a month after my company jumped into early BB10.0 Z10s with both feet, some break room discussions referenced BB10 as short for "Barely Baked When?". Lol. It was reliable, at least. just a hopeless pain for editing spreadsheets. My company lives on spreadsheets. Something 9900's PKB & trackpad are wondrously suited to.

Mean time, OS7.1 matured into acceptable reliability and we've learned OUR lesson about assuming lessons are ever learned on any corporate level.... lol.

[anon(9721108)]

2011 was the year BlackBerry were accused of promoting the London riots. The perps used bis-BBM which the 'cops couldn't read. '

Funny how much things have changed with people clamouring for crypto messaging.

I also seem to recall the Indian government threatening BlackBerry to give up the encryption for BBM or else, yeah because the government wanted to see what a certain group was saying, but I cannot recall who. But I do recall BlackBerry working with the Indian government to resolve the issue.

[anon(9721108)]

Your posts seem to be getting as long as mine... lol. Still on ur 99??

To your point, I noticed a universal animus against BB in multiple Verizon stores back about 2010?? Almost verbatim "Blackberry is going out of business" and "Droid is the future"... from multiple stores, in multiple states. Obviously resulting from hearing, or reading, a "driven theme" from SOMEwhere. Talking with these sales floor personnel inevitably uncovered VERY nasty experiences with the Storm 1. "Brand killing" nasty, it seemed. I'd just assumed, back then, that ML & JB were astute enough entrepreneurs to understand the implications of the brand damage that mistake had inflicted and seek to mitigate that damage & correct the organizational errors that led to that half baked fiasco. Instead, they "stuck" their biggest client (Verizon) with much of the cost of Storm returns. Little wonder animus crept onto sales floors, despite corporate VZW's "all is well" official face. Lol.

And then, RIM demonstrated a double down of the Storm's "too little too late half baked rush to market" attitude in PlayBook's intro and early months of BB10. In fact, early months of OS7 9900 were problematic enough to have my company eagerly anticipating a BB10 turn around. Surely RIM had learned the lesson and took that extra year to perfect BB10 so that it would be 110% right at launch...? Surely...???

Unfortunately, the rest is history. Less than a month after my company jumped into early BB10.0 Z10s with both feet, some break room discussions referenced BB10 as short for "Barely Baked When?". Lol. It was reliable, at least. just a hopeless pain for editing spreadsheets. My company lives on spreadsheets. Something 9900's PKB & trackpad are wondrously suited to.

Mean time, OS7.1 matured into acceptable reliability and we've learned OUR lesson about assuming lessons are ever learned on any corporate level.... lol.

Well I use it for things like Facebook Twitter, I try to use the 9900 as much as I can in here etc. but the Sim remains in the iPhone for now. I'm doing phone banking and stuff like that. I hold it every day I charge it every two days I condition all three batteries and I'm never going to get rid of it.

As for other groups or people who blame BlackBerry, I do get your point about BB 10 and they kind of shot themselves in the foot with that one ;-) I get it. Personally I was never excited for BB 10 because I loved OS7, still do. I also believe if you're going to do something do it right and like you say it was rather half baked. So I would almost rather they didn't even attempt it and just perfect what they had but people always demand new things and BlackBerry tried something new to get more customers but we all know how that worked out. It's a tough call, but it's also sadly pathetic how people get bored with something and companies always feel the need to change things otherwise they will lose more customers. Case in point, twitter. Twitter layout in iOS is now revised so once again you have to relearn stuff and you're not as productive, I also cannot respond as quickly because I have to learn the new layout. I say if something works don't mess with it, but people will eternally complain and get bored with current model phones or software or they have to have something to complain about so then the rest of us have to go through this learning phase every time. YouTube is another app that's pretty bad for that. In YouTube your viewing history is now hidden under your profile, then your library, and then you can finally find it, when before it was basically one click away. I am not one to get bored and that's why I've never been bored with the 9900 or OS7. It is a shame about the app issues though.

[idssteve]

I also seem to recall the Indian government threatening BlackBerry to give up the encryption for BBM or else, yeah because the government wanted to see what a certain group was saying, but I cannot recall who. But I do recall BlackBerry working with the Indian government to resolve the issue.

Seem to recall an interview where ML was asked about that. His response was something like: "... this interview is over..". Or something. If I recall. I truly empathized with Mike on that. He was in a no-win position, imo.

[idssteve]

Well I use it for things like Facebook Twitter, I try to use the 9900 as much as I can in here etc. but the Sim remains in the iPhone for now. I'm doing phone banking and stuff like that. I hold it every day I charge it every two days I condition all three batteries and I'm never going to get rid of it.

As for other groups or people who blame BlackBerry, I do get your point about BB 10 and they kind of shot themselves in the foot with that one ;-) I get it. Personally I was never excited for BB 10 because I loved OS7, still do. I also believe if you're going to do something do it right and like you say it was rather half baked. So I would almost rather they didn't even attempt it and just perfect what they had but people always demand new things and BlackBerry tried something new to get more customers but we all know how that worked out. It's a tough call, but it's also sadly pathetic how people get bored with something and companies always feel the need to change things otherwise they will lose more customers. Case in point, twitter. Twitter layout in iOS is now revised so once again you have to relearn stuff and you're not as productive, I also cannot respond as quickly because I have to learn the new layout. I say if something works don't mess with it, but people will eternally complain and get bored with current model phones or software or they have to have something to complain about so then the rest of us have to go through this learning phase every time. YouTube is another app that's pretty bad for that. In YouTube your viewing history is now hidden under your profile, then your library, and then you can finally find it, when before it was basically one click away. I am not one to get bored and that's why I've never been bored with the 9900 or OS7. It is a shame about the app issues though.

Yep the old "consumer vs enterprise" market choice. RIM tried to compromise their way into both and lost both. The hazard of compromised solutions.

Fwiw, I personally believe BBOS had a chance to retain enough of their enterprise and other PKB/TP loyalists by continuing to develop that market separately from consumer pursuits. I once advocated for a consumer oriented "BlueBerry" line... lol. Awful as it sounds. Lol. Hard to expand market share by closing off market segments, imo.

It's fun to conjecture that a developed BBOS Enterprise market share might have bottomed out in single digits, at least.??? Maybe??? That's at least orders of magnitude above where they are now, at least. Dream world conjecture, at this point.

It's worth noting that BIS subscription revenue was a significant part of RIM's market model. Handsets were their hook into that. They could afford to sell long life handsets, packed with costly features, because of that. Pretty obvious that "planned obsolescence" wasn't much of 9900's design mission, imo. Our 99s were designed for a different market model than the currently predominant "advertising based" model. Seems to me, anyway.

[idssteve]

Realistically, shouldn't this Gold High Cap battery be thicker than the original JM-1?!

-sent from a beautiful Bold 9900

Li-ion tech is still pretty steep in discovery curve but pretty safe to say that recent advances in solid state electrolytes will find themselves implemented in more profitable applications than our 5 year old cell phones. Lol. Keep an eye on Tesla...

In general, tho, when it comes to "traditional" Li technologies, energy density and reliability are interacting tradeoffs. Physically bigger = better reliability. Roughly speaking.

EBAY batteries truly are a wide open gamble in chaos. Some, like my 5000mAh horse are spectacularly outstanding. Others, like half a dozen examples of the same battery from the same source, are doa. Go figure.

SOME are abjectly fraudulent! One client built is own battery as replacement for ten year old equipment we'd originally provided. We showed him our sources & procedures but he purchased eBay cans that simply didn't add up in our in-house testing. Dis assembling that canned cell we found a tiny cell hidden inside. AND the extra space was filled with sand... !! Obviously in effort to add weight to the deception... lol. Probably prevented the tiny battery from rattling around inside the deceptively oversized can!! Lesson? Buyer beware. Lol

[anon(8063781)]

Yabbut it's made of GOLD and it's got a fluoro flash 'uprated' sticker on it for only 61 cents more. Who could resist?

:-)

ikr? They'll be EXPLODING with energy!

[anon(9721108)]

Well I finally set up Paypal and have Amazon and Ebay so the world is my oyster



-sent from a beautiful Bold 9900

[Sue-zz]

^^^ We have Ocado next-day supermarket delivery in the UK, plus Amazon 'free' next day delivery. Never have to leave the house. I know how Julian Assange feels. :-)

There are still new BB10's, Bolds and Curves on Amazon UK with continuous temptation to buy a couple to see me through the next ten years.

[Doug_M]

Hi everyone, after an 11 month absence I'm back (with my 9900 of course). I'd switched carriers to one that doesn't have BIS but gave me 4gb of data a month (Public Mobile) for $40. I'm still with them but bought a pay as you go plan from Telus for $10 a month. That doesn't give me BIS but they have an add-on for another $15 that gives me BBM, Twitter and Facebook. I'll probably drop that part and just use phone/sms as $25 is too much for a second line. What is the cheapest BIS plan out there these days (any country)? I'm guessing, but I think in Canada it would be Koodo's post-paid $30 per month plan that gives you 100mb of data. Last I knew Koodo post-paid included BIS if you needed it.

So I have access to the MSDN library and set myself up with an Exchange server. I was going to add BES Express 5 but I can't get a CAL and SRP anymore. Regardless, I'm unclear on a certain BES aspect. If I'm running my own BES what kind of data plan do I need from my carrier?

[anon(8063781)]

Well I finally set up Paypal and have Amazon and Ebay so the world is my oyster



-sent from a beautiful Bold 9900

Consume responsibly!

[anon(8063781)]

Hi everyone, after an 11 month absence I'm back (with my 9900 of course). I'd switched carriers to one that doesn't have BIS but gave me 4gb of data a month (Public Mobile) for $40. I'm still with them but bought a pay as you go plan from Telus for $10 a month. That doesn't give me BIS but they have an add-on for another $15 that gives me BBM, Twitter and Facebook. I'll probably drop that part and just use phone/sms as $25 is too much for a second line. What is the cheapest BIS plan out there these days (any country)? I'm guessing, but I think in Canada it would be Koodo's post-paid $30 per month plan that gives you 100mb of data. Last I knew Koodo post-paid included BIS if you needed it.

So I have access to the MSDN library and set myself up with an Exchange server. I was going to add BES Express 5 but I can't get a CAL and SRP anymore. Regardless, I'm unclear on a certain BES aspect. If I'm running my own BES what kind of data plan do I need from my carrier?

Welcome back! I wrote a Koodo service book to get MMS working without BIS. It would probably be very easy to edit it for Telus. You could merge it with the Anworm browser service books to have browsing and picture messagimg without BIS.

As for the cheapest BIS plan in Canada, Bell used to have a pay as you go option of 100MB of data with BIS for $10/month. Calling and texting were extra (at ridiculously high by the minute or by the text prices). But if it was a second line for email/BBM, it could serve the purpose. IIRC BIS plans don't chew through much data. I don't know if 100MB is enough. I guess it would depend on how often you're in a WiFi zone.

[mushroom_daddy]

^^^ We have Ocado next-day supermarket delivery in the UK, plus Amazon 'free' next day delivery. Never have to leave the house. I know how Julian Assange feels. :-)

There are still new BB10's, Bolds and Curves on Amazon UK with continuous temptation to buy a couple to see me through the next ten years.

The Ocado (UK) Shopping app in BB-World still works well on the 9900 ....
so not only can you stay inside all day, you'd also not have to put down the Bold to shop for groceries

[Doug_M]

Welcome back! I wrote a Koodo service book to get MMS working without BIS.

Thanks. That is cool (service book)! Koodo prepaid doesn't have BIS so that'd be useful there.

As for the cheapest BIS plan in Canada, Bell used to have a pay as you go option of 100MB of data with BIS for $10/month.

They have a prepaid plan that has no monthly fee and is pay as you go. That's work well as I don't make many calls. But the $10/100mb data add-on is confusing. In the fine print it says: "Supports personal email accounts and HTML and WAP browsing and tethering. Outlook synchronization, corporate email integration and other corporate-type solutions not available." Which leads me to believe no BIS.

Another option people might not know about is Chatsim. They've partnered with something like 200 different carriers (Bell and Telus in Canada). No calls or SMS, just data specific to about a half dozen chat services (WhatsApp, BBM, Facebook are the "big" ones). Messaging (without photos) on those is unlimited and costs $24 per year.

If Chatsim doesn't work out for my son maybe I'll swap and he can have the pre-paid for voice and sms and I'll use the Chatsim for a BBM-anywhere (otherwise wifi) 9900. Sad thing is then I'll have to try and convince my family and friends to install BBM on their Androids and iPhones.

[Sue-zz]

The Ocado (UK) Shopping app in BB-World still works well on the 9900 ....
so not only can you stay inside all day, you'd also not have to put down the Bold to shop for groceries

Woo! Joyness abounds. Danke.

They only seem to sell 'food' though, not BlackBerry accessories.

(Also BB10 BBW Ocado app seems to still work.)

[EFats]

.... What is the cheapest BIS plan out there these days (any country)? I'm guessing, but I think in Canada it would be Koodo's post-paid $30 per month plan that gives you 100mb of data. Last I knew Koodo post-paid included BIS if you needed it.

I've got $25 plan with Freedom Mobile that has BIS. I think it could've gone as low as $20 but I added on something. Their cheapest plan now would be $30. As a secondary line, probably not but why not just use it as the primary one?

I don't have to contact them to mess with BIS. Every time I switch back to my Bold, it takes like 30s for me to re-register Host Routing Tables and it all comes back on.


Sent from my BlackBerry 9900 using Tapatalk

[EFats]

Well I finally set up Paypal and have Amazon and Ebay so the world is my oyster

Weird thing progress, eh?
In the old days I'd just trade my pears for your corn. Then we got money & I just paid you some metal discs for your pears.
Then we got really clever & invented credit cards where some magic company pays you & then I pay them so that I can get your pears.
Now eBay comes along with PayPal and this Pal now gives you the money, who in turn gets their money from the credit card man who then finally gets paid from Me.

What happened to the good ol' days where I could just pay you directly?
(Would be nice if I could link my Bold to my debit card...I think...)


Sent from my BlackBerry 9900 using Tapatalk

[anon(9721108)]

^^^ We have Ocado next-day supermarket delivery in the UK, plus Amazon 'free' next day delivery. Never have to leave the house. I know how Julian Assange feels. :-)

There are still new BB10's, Bolds and Curves on Amazon UK with continuous temptation to buy a couple to see me through the next ten years.

I have to wait until about June 12 for something to come from St. Paul Minneapolis or is it St. Paul Minnesota I'm not sure :-) maybe were lazy in North America ;-)

[anon(9721108)]

Li-ion tech is still pretty steep in discovery curve but pretty safe to say that recent advances in solid state electrolytes will find themselves implemented in more profitable applications than our 5 year old cell phones. Lol. Keep an eye on Tesla...

In general, tho, when it comes to "traditional" Li technologies, energy density and reliability are interacting tradeoffs. Physically bigger = better reliability. Roughly speaking.

EBAY batteries truly are a wide open gamble in chaos. Some, like my 5000mAh horse are spectacularly outstanding. Others, like half a dozen examples of the same battery from the same source, are doa. Go figure.

SOME are abjectly fraudulent! One client built is own battery as replacement for ten year old equipment we'd originally provided. We showed him our sources & procedures but he purchased eBay cans that simply didn't add up in our in-house testing. Dis assembling that canned cell we found a tiny cell hidden inside. AND the extra space was filled with sand... !! Obviously in effort to add weight to the deception... lol. Probably prevented the tiny battery from rattling around inside the deceptively oversized can!! Lesson? Buyer beware. Lol

Did you see the replaceable battery thread in the general forum? I am being warned about the possibility of non-authentic BlackBerry batteries from Amazon or eBay LOL but the ones I have ordered have all been authentic with the codes and everything. I only got that one bad one that had a red X and I did fix it for a few months before it went kaput.

[anon(9721108)]

Hi everyone, after an 11 month absence I'm back (with my 9900 of course). I'd switched carriers to one that doesn't have BIS but gave me 4gb of data a month (Public Mobile) for $40. I'm still with them but bought a pay as you go plan from Telus for $10 a month. That doesn't give me BIS but they have an add-on for another $15 that gives me BBM, Twitter and Facebook. I'll probably drop that part and just use phone/sms as $25 is too much for a second line. What is the cheapest BIS plan out there these days (any country)? I'm guessing, but I think in Canada it would be Koodo's post-paid $30 per month plan that gives you 100mb of data. Last I knew Koodo post-paid included BIS if you needed it.

So I have access to the MSDN library and set myself up with an Exchange server. I was going to add BES Express 5 but I can't get a CAL and SRP anymore. Regardless, I'm unclear on a certain BES aspect. If I'm running my own BES what kind of data plan do I need from my carrier?

LOL my plan is twice that and then some for the iPhone they make you get the premium data plan with voice. No choice. So even if you added that extra line that's still pretty cheap and far ahead of the game. The only problem are the taxes in Canada to drive the price up another 11 or so percent

[anon(9721108)]

Consume responsibly!

I now have five iPhone cases, that doesn't sound too responsible ;-)

Actually I'm going to be selling a few of them. Here's the one I just ordered it's been called the most beautiful iPhone case you can get, very protective and only $13 if you can believe it.

[anon(9721108)]

Weird thing progress, eh?
In the old days I'd just trade my pears for your corn. Then we got money & I just paid you some metal discs for your pears.
Then we got really clever & invented credit cards where some magic company pays you & then I pay them so that I can get your pears.
Now eBay comes along with PayPal and this Pal now gives you the money, who in turn gets their money from the credit card man who then finally gets paid from Me.

What happened to the good ol' days where I could just pay you directly?
(Would be nice if I could link my Bold to my debit card...I think...)


Sent from my BlackBerry 9900 using Tapatalk

Well yeah I sort of think like you I don't want to use my credit card I linked to my debit card but I went through the PayPal app to do it. Quite a bit of a process it took around an hour and a half and they actually charge $2.50 to send you a four digit code that you have to enter to activate your card through PayPal if you get it through the app, and then they reimburse you the $2.50 24 hours to 30 days later LOL.

My buddy did everything on his Microsoft computer, he registered for PayPal on eBay and he never had to go through any of that, but I do like apps they make everything pretty convenient.

I wonder if there was a PayPal app for the 9900, I'm sure there was or is in fact I'm going to take a look ...

[anon(9721108)]

By the way if anybody wants this official BlackBerry softshell case that I never really used mint condition and the shipping is not too much, let me know it's yours....

[Doug_M]

I've got $25 plan with Freedom Mobile that has BIS. I think it could've gone as low as $20 but I added on something. Their cheapest plan now would be $30. As a secondary line, probably not but why not just use it as the primary one?

Freedom Mobile is only available in a few cities. It costs extra to use it outside of those "zones". Nice to know they have BIS though, if they ever make it out my way (NS).

I don't have to contact them to mess with BIS. Every time I switch back to my Bold, it takes like 30s for me to re-register Host Routing Tables and it all comes back on.

Koodo is like that. No messing around, just swap your sim and re-register. The way it should be! I Like Koodo, if they ever have a sale on that is close to the deal I have with Public Mobile I'll likely switch back to them.

[Doug_M]

The only problem are the taxes in Canada to drive the price up another 11 or so percent

Tell me about it! It's 15% here in NS. Criminal!