RIM Says They Are Not Abandoning Consumer BlackBerry Market

Earlier today we head RIM’s latest financial results, where the company had made made a loss of $125m for their last financial quarter, And RIM’s CEO Thorsten Heins said that they would be concentrating on their core market of business customers.

This led to speculation that RIM would be abandoning the consumer market for BlackBerry devices, and now RIM has confirmed that they will continue to develop blackberry devices for consumers. Research in Motion Ltd will instead concentrate on reaching business customers, who are said to value the security of the company's handsets.

RIM has been struggling as Americans are abandoning their BlackBerrys for flashier touch-screen phones such as Apple's iPhone and models that run Google's Android software. Despite the phones' continuing popularity among business users, the firm has had limited success trying to enter consumer markets in recent years.

Blackberry Messenger or BBM For iPhones and Androids - LATEST NEWS:

New thriller "7500" to feature cameos by the BlackBerry PlayBook and BlackBerry Torch 9860

Something scary is aboard Flight 7500 from LA to Tokyo. And it is not either the BlackBerry PlayBook or the BlackBerry Torch 9860, although both devices are on the flight. Both devices are making cameos in the film which is about a supernatural force that takes over a ten hour flight. One passenger reaches EOL and others follow. By the way, in case you were wondering why we picked the Torch 9860 over the identical on the outside Torch 9850, with the flight traveling to Tokyo, it is assumed that the owner of the device has the GSM variant of the phone.

Check out the trailer for "7500" below. The BlackBerry devices debut at 42 seconds into the video. The movie itself is set to premiere (that's the term those high-fallutin' movie guys use instead of launch) on August 31st.

7500 - Official Movie Trailer:

Series of videos purport to show durability of BlackBerry, leaves too many holes and questions

New RIM CEO Thorsten Heins has done a good job trying to communicate with BlackBerry customers. Until RIM comes to market with something that can blow the mind of iOS and Android users, it is the loyal Blackberry owners that Heins is reaching out to by granting an interview with Crackberry. It's a clever strategy. Keep the BlackBerry users you have now to stop the bleeding, which will buy some time until BlackBerry 10 wows other smartphone users.

In that vein, Heins must have figured that with the BlackBerry reputation for building a solid handset, posting some official videos showing a BlackBerry model surviving some brutal tests would be another way to keep current 'Berry users from jumping ship. So RIM uploaded three videos. One shows the flexibility of a BlackBerry model getting pushed out of shape in the lab. This "Bend and Flex" test simulates what a handset goes through when it is in your back pocket and you sit on it. The second test shows a BlackBerry model dropping in slow motion while the third test shows a 'Berry getting dropped in urine some water dyed yellow while a RIM employee shows that the dunking hasn't left any damage to the phone.

The problem with all three videos is that there is no way to determine how much damage the tests caused the actual phones involved. In the "Bend and Flex" test, we did not see the handset's display so we can only take RIM's word that the unit still works after bending like Gumby. The "Drop Test" video had more holes than Swiss Cheese. The screen and possibly the whole phone was turned off when dropped and no attempt was made to turn it on after the impact. And while the third video did show a BlackBerry model working perfectly after a dunking, there is no chain of evidence that proves that the phone that worked is the exact same model that got wet.

We have to applaud Mr. Heins and RIM for opening up a line of communication between the Canadian based firm and its fans, but videos like these three must be bullet-proof or else there will be too many questions about the authenticity of the footage. What could have been a strong first step for the new administration at RIM is reduced to wasted time and effort. And the problem is that the credibility of the company is already shot and time is something that RIM might not have much left of.

BlackBerry Smartphone Durability Testing: Bend and Flex Test:

BlackBerry Smartphone Durability Testing: Drop Test

BlackBerry Smartphone Durability Testing: Water Test

BlackBerry App World applications more profitable than Android apps

Here’s another shocker from BlackBerry’s DevCon event in Amsterdam - RIM execs brought clarity about the BlackBerry App world saying apps on it are actually more profitable than their counterparts in the Android Market.

Newly appointed man-in-charge Thorsten Heins said that the App World is now home to over 60,000 applications. While that’s a mere fraction of the hundreds of thousands on the App Store or the Android Market, Heins said that BlackBerry developers could profit more from their apps than Android programmers. Apps on the App World allegedly bring 40% more profits than Android apps, and an impressive 13% of developers for the platform have cashed in over $100,000 from apps. There are 174 million app downloads each month, equalling 6 million downloaded apps a day, according to The Verge. This brings the total to 30 applications downloaded by each user, which is quite impressive actually.

Finally, Heins added that the BlackBerry PlayBook OS now supports Qt, which is an interesting move that can attract disillusioned Symbian developers.

Blackberry App World Applications Store:

Motorola Xoom vs BlackBerry PlayBook

The battle for tablet superiority is going to be hard-fought in 2011, with flagship releases expected from every leading manufacturer. But there are those that have already been singled out from the impressive pack of contenders and ear-marked for great things. Two of these prodigious devices are currently slugging it out for the leader of the pack badge – RIM's BlackBerry PlayBook and Motorola's XOOM .

Display
The Motorola XOOM weighs in with an amazing 10.1-inch 1080p ready display, which makes web browsing and viewing media a pleasure. RIM's offering may be smaller but it certainly isn't inferior and the PlayBook's 7.1-inch 1080P display performs admirably. It's tough to separate them but we feel the Motorola just takes the tape ahead of the PlayBook.


Drivetrain
RIM's PlayBook boasts a hugely impressive spec sheet, including a 1GHz Ti-OMAP dual-core processor and 1GB RAM, which is more than enough to keep the device flying along, under even the most heavy of burdens. Motorola's little box of tricks, the XOOM, is equally powerful though, with a dual-core 1GHz NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip and 1GB RAM. Both devices offer dedicated GPU support, enabling them to keep up with the latest games and visual requirements.

Operating System
The XOOM is the first device to be empowered by Android 3.0 (aka Honeycomb), which is a version of the hugely popular mobile OS that has been specially tailored to operate tablet PC's. Honeycomb offers redesigned apps for e-mail, web browsing and offline support for the new 3D version of the company's market leading Google Maps.

RIM's PlayBook brings something new to market though, in the form of the company's new QNX Neutrino based operating system, which looks on track to set the world alight. Both devices are cutting-edge in terms of operating software .

Cameras
Both tablets boast front and rear-facing cameras, ideal for snapping photos and video-conferencing. The XOOM offers a 5 mega-pixel rear with dual-LED flash and 2 mega-pixel front-facing effort.
The PlayBook ups the ante though, with a 5 mega-pixel rear-facing snapper and 3 mega-pixel front-facing, making it the tablet of choice for enterprise standard video-calling.

Connectivity
Motorola's XOOM comes with every conceivable connectivity option. It offers Wi-Fi (b,g,n), Bluetooth, USB 2.0 and 3G, as well as being future-proofed with support for 4G LTE.
The PlayBook, on the other hand, currently only offers support for Wi-Fi (a,b,g,n) though 3 and 4G versions are said to be in the pipeline. This needn't be a terrible encumbrance though. Even with its good points it can't take this bout from the XOOM.

So it's a pretty comprehensive victory for the Motorola XOOM, which offers everything a user could possibly want from a tablet PC, and a little bit more to boot. RIM's BlackBerry PlayBook is an amazing contender though, and it would be remiss of us to write it off when we know how solid and dependable RIM's other devices are.

Leaked RIM roadmap reveals a really boring 2012

A recently leaked RIM roadmap reveals all the upcoming BlackBerries for 2012. Unfortunately there is nothing really interesting scheduled before November this year.

RIM is preparing two new mid-range Curves for the spring season - 9220 and 9320 - for Q1 and Q2 release respectively. White Bold 9790 and Curve 9380 will hit the market in March or April as well.

The BB OS 7.1 update is already out for all compatible devices, while RIM is expected to demonstrate the newly announced OS 10 at the upcoming MWC.

Speaking of OS10, the first smartphone to run it - codenamed London - is scheduled a bit later than expected - November 2012 or later.

Finally, if you have been waiting for a 3G-capable PlayBook tablet, it's coming in Q2 2012 quarter.

As you can see there is nothing really impressive on the roadmap (and Milan is expectedly absent), but we should have been prepared for that already. Whatever the next OS is like, RIM is still the RIM we know - always behind the others.