BlackBerry Messenger Coming to iOS This Summer
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Your point is flawed...
While it hasn't been said whether BBM will be a paid for app, however, I doubt anyone will pay anything for this app. Maybe a few thousand people might spend 99 cents for it, but nothing over that. However, once downloaded onto iOS, BB doesn't gain any further profit from the app unless they charge a subscription fee (which noone would be willing to pay for). Thus, the app then becomes a money drainer since the software would then be taxing BB servers, but they wouldn't gain any further profit since the phone wasn't bought from them.
As for your reference to iTunes, it free to download the program, but has BILLIONS/TRILLIONS of dollars worth of potential revenue to be pulled from having iTunes on windows PCs as well as Apple since each track is profitable regardless of the platform to which it is downloaded.
One thing you will most likely NEVER see is Apple porting their software that does not have additional revenue potential (Facetime, iMessage, etc.) since once the app is there, is just taxing their servers, and there is no profit to be made from each message, call, etc.
iTunes, in contrast, once downloaded onto a PC can provide thousands of dollars of revenue PER PERSON. It's a money maker once downloaded where other non-profitable apps are money drainers (due to taxing the Apple servers, etc.)
http://forums.appleinsider.com/t/11...pen-standard-facetime-video-chat-for-iphone-4
Only it hasn't happened (yet).
Welcome to Skype...both are available on both iPad and iPod touch as well as plethora of other Apps.
You must be lucky then. From the many people I know that have an iOS device, they've had issues with iMessage. I myself have experienced issues, and I've done a lot of troubleshooting to find out what the issue is but can never do so. Some days, messages will deliver fine to recipients including attachments. Other days, my friends will send me an attachment which I can view, but when I send one to them, it refuses to send. Then of course, you get the little notification telling you a message has been delivered, when the user gets absolutely nothing. Then on top of that, messages will just randomly disappear out of message threads. Hooray.
I'm not one for chiming in much on articles, but I thought this needed to be said.
somethingelsefl
macrumors 6502
You mean...like when Apple ported Safari to Windows? Where does your 'revenue' logic work for that?
OK 2 things - I don't believe a word they say, they include third world countries in their stats
Second, at a concert last night in Philly the guy in front of me with a BBerry looked like a relic from a long gone era trying to take a video on his massive screen
very sad
Second, at a concert last night in Philly the guy in front of me with a BBerry looked like a relic from a long gone era trying to take a video on his massive screen
very sad
iLog.Genius
macrumors 601
The first thing that comes to mind is BBM going directly at Skype.
At first look, you think well how is BBM going to compete with Skype? Skype is huge, everyone uses Skype. While Skype is widely used, it only has 30 or 40 million registered users as of the end of 2012. Compare that to the 60 or 70 million BlackBerry users, BBM as a service has a small advantage. If you're talking all-in-one messengers (iMessage, Whatsapp, LiveProfie, etc are message-based only), you really only have BBM (BB10) and Skype so BlackBerry making BBM cross-platform isn't as absurd or pointless as people think.
Everything BlackBerry is doing now is a gamble trying to turn their business around but I don't think this move is as critical as people think. Maybe if BlackBerry was still on their old java-based OS, this would be terrible move because those old OS's were very limited in functionality and BBM was the main selling point but now that they moved to QNX, whether you hate the brand or not, the OS has opened up that the functionality could be matched with those of iOS and Android if the developers support it so BBM being the main selling point, while on the surface may look true, it's not because BlackBerry is banking on the fact that they no longer need BBM to sell, instead they truly believe that BlackBerry 10 OS is already set up for the future.
Until we know more details, I think opening BBM to iOS and Android is a great opportunity to at least raise the awareness of the new BlackBerry and move away from RIM.
At first look, you think well how is BBM going to compete with Skype? Skype is huge, everyone uses Skype. While Skype is widely used, it only has 30 or 40 million registered users as of the end of 2012. Compare that to the 60 or 70 million BlackBerry users, BBM as a service has a small advantage. If you're talking all-in-one messengers (iMessage, Whatsapp, LiveProfie, etc are message-based only), you really only have BBM (BB10) and Skype so BlackBerry making BBM cross-platform isn't as absurd or pointless as people think.
Everything BlackBerry is doing now is a gamble trying to turn their business around but I don't think this move is as critical as people think. Maybe if BlackBerry was still on their old java-based OS, this would be terrible move because those old OS's were very limited in functionality and BBM was the main selling point but now that they moved to QNX, whether you hate the brand or not, the OS has opened up that the functionality could be matched with those of iOS and Android if the developers support it so BBM being the main selling point, while on the surface may look true, it's not because BlackBerry is banking on the fact that they no longer need BBM to sell, instead they truly believe that BlackBerry 10 OS is already set up for the future.
Until we know more details, I think opening BBM to iOS and Android is a great opportunity to at least raise the awareness of the new BlackBerry and move away from RIM.
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BBM however routes through Blackberry's servers. They are the conduit for all data transmitted through BBM. Just like iMessage data routes through Apple servers.
Safari doesn't route any data through Apple's servers it just provides a browser to view html data. So it's not causing any further downfall to Apple to provide a browser for PC, and their marketing plan would be to sway PC users with the 'feel' and 'user experience' to potentially invest in Apple in the future. However, I admit they failed miserably as the Safari experience on PC is abismal, lol.
4TheLoveOfTech
macrumors 6502
QuickTime...
Michael Goff
Suspended
h1r0ll3r
macrumors 68040
Agreed. Game over for Blackberry.
AppleInLVX
macrumors 65816
See, I'm wondering HOW they will do this and still maintain the level of security they had. As far as I recall from my BB days, the BBM system works by sending messages to the device in question as identified by the unique BB PIN of the device. It had a sort of hardware marriage to the software that will obviously not exist outside the BB platform. BBM off a BB will be like any other cross platform messaging service.
Also, given how much of BB's intellectual collateral is BBM, this might just kill What'sApp and KiK overnight.
Also, given how much of BB's intellectual collateral is BBM, this might just kill What'sApp and KiK overnight.
Michael Scrip
macrumors G3
Blackberry was cool when everybody had them. Of course we used BBM... it was free texting.
As people moved to other platforms... we've found other ways to communicate. Many people have unlimited texting now... so it's not really a problem anymore. And there are many other ways to text/chat.
Below is a snapshot of a group of my friends' phones from 3 years ago.
None of us are complaining that we don't have BBM anymore... we've moved on.
One big reason to use a Blackberry was BBM... but clearly that wasn't enough to hold people to their platform (among my group of friends... I understand there are still plenty of Blackberries in circulation)
But I'm not really sure what Blackberry's powerplay is here.
As people moved to other platforms... we've found other ways to communicate. Many people have unlimited texting now... so it's not really a problem anymore. And there are many other ways to text/chat.
Below is a snapshot of a group of my friends' phones from 3 years ago.
None of us are complaining that we don't have BBM anymore... we've moved on.
One big reason to use a Blackberry was BBM... but clearly that wasn't enough to hold people to their platform (among my group of friends... I understand there are still plenty of Blackberries in circulation)
But I'm not really sure what Blackberry's powerplay is here.
iLog.Genius
macrumors 601
Who knows but maybe they want to be less of a smartphone company and more into computing overall. No one can argue that QNX is a highly capable platform, it's whether or not users want to embrace it or ignore it because they're fine with iOS or Android. BlackBerry can only control the QNX aspect of the equation. For the user part, all BlackBerry can do is try new things and hopefully expand the brand as much as they can and turning BBM into a cross-platform IM is one of them. They have a chance to do something in this space (IM).
apfeljonas
macrumors regular
Honestly though, what's the point in this if WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger are on every platform? This looks more like a desperate move, unless BBM is genuinely better.
AGAIN, Quicktime doesn't then also tax Apple's own servers. You don't have to access files from Apple's servers nor do you have to route data through Apple's servers in order to use Quicktime. So they literally have zero downfall with people from other platforms using Quicktime.
In addition, users upgrading to Quicktime Pro would then also provide profit for Apple...
What about this is hard to understand? lol
iLog.Genius
macrumors 601
You're only looking at message-based IM's only. Today's BBM is more like Skype where it does messaging, screen sharing, video. Whether or not people embrace it at the end remains to be seen. BlackBerry, while looks like it turned the corner a bit, still has a long way to go before there is any sort of stability so anything they do here on out would be considered desperate.
Apparently it's going to free. This has people wondering why they would do this if there's no income being generated. Reading Crackberry, it seems like BBM is only a small part of something bigger BlackBerry wants to with the BBM name/brand and perhaps that will be the part that generates income.
Gav2k
macrumors G3
I'm amazed that in 5 pages of bb will fail post only two people brushed on the fact it could be subscription based!
Well lets look at the uk by example. Every kid in my kids school rocks a blackberry you can here the clicking as there walking down the street.
Now most of those kids like my daughter has a pay as you go blackberry which you only need to top up £5 a month for the bbm service. This is great because they get your incoming wtf are you texts and calls but you don't get spammed by bbm.
Bbm on iOS will be subscription based. Downside is they'll want a nice smartphone which will require a data connection for bbm to work.
Well I use imessage and it works on all my devices including non-phones......
Oh wait, all my devices are apple.... Bam
An interesting move. Most people I know use whatsapp to communicate with BBM.
There are some neat features with BB's new software:
camera time shift
their adaptive texting is very slick. I sure hope Ivy incorporates that into iOS 7
On a slightly different, but related note : this week, BB is rumoured to be announcing either a new Playbook tablet (or similar technology) or maybe a drop altogether of tablets.
This article contains some dumb (in my opinion) comments by BB's CEO Heins saying that tablets will be dead in 5 years. I think it's going to be the opposite with tablets bring powerful enough to overtake laptops. Maybe I'm wrong, but I definitely think I'm more right than he is! lol
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/30/4...-heins-says-tablets-not-a-good-business-model
There are some neat features with BB's new software:
camera time shift
their adaptive texting is very slick. I sure hope Ivy incorporates that into iOS 7
On a slightly different, but related note : this week, BB is rumoured to be announcing either a new Playbook tablet (or similar technology) or maybe a drop altogether of tablets.
This article contains some dumb (in my opinion) comments by BB's CEO Heins saying that tablets will be dead in 5 years. I think it's going to be the opposite with tablets bring powerful enough to overtake laptops. Maybe I'm wrong, but I definitely think I'm more right than he is! lol
http://www.theverge.com/2013/4/30/4...-heins-says-tablets-not-a-good-business-model
why would they want their messaging service on an OS with such an outdated design?!
Obviously they're banking on the functionalities of the app itself. It shouldn't matter that the OS it runs on has an outdated design.
Honestly, I've seen iPad's and tablets used more for entertainment purposes (and some businesses use them for light work). Look at what the top app's tend to be - games, games, an occasional media app, oh, and games. As great as tablet sales have been, most people still use laptops and desktop systems for work. Tablets are a great extension of these systems, but unless they become more commonplace in the corporate market, etc. they'll continue to be niche. I couldn't imagine typing out dissertations or work on a tablet, and if they make them large enough it may as well be a desktop or laptop system.
In many respects, I can understand why he would make such comments.
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canucksfan88
macrumors 6502a
this should have been done in 2011...way too late now.