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What would make BB10 awesome? How to save Blackberry?

• What are your thoughts on making Blackberry 10 devices really awesome, or in general saving Blackberry (the company)? Here are some ideas I've had on what they can do to improve BB10 devices: 1) Give free NetFlix for 1 year with every purchase of a BB10 device. This worked pretty well for Chromecast and they were only offering 3 months free. This might cost BB some money but who cares, it would be a great boost for them. Netflix needs more users too and they will eventually turn into paying subscribers (which will make the deal not too expensive). 2) Actually have a mobile payment solution that works. Boy I would love to use those Mastercard Paypass enabled checkout machines at CVS, Sports Authority, Shop Rite, Toys R Us, Foot Locker, Office Depot, etc. etc. But I can't because somehow Verizon controls access to the "secure element" which Master Card may require for paypass. Blackberry can get around this by either signing a sweet deal that gives Verizon whatever they want, or  they could convince Master Card to let them use a "less secure" solution (works for Starbucks). 3) Android: Android apps do run on the BB10, but sort of a second class citizen there. They have to be re-packaged by the developers and some Android features won't work. Plus the user community views these as "ported" apps and therefore looks down on them a bit. So how to fix it? Well they could drop BB10 as an OS entirely and just go full Android. That could work, but they could keep the Enterprise services so that business can manage their devices better.  Or just make sure the Android runtime is updated quickly and make it better and faster and even easier for developers to publish to. 4) Apps apps apps. Instagram where are you? Get the top apps on there NOW. Getting everyone to write native BB10 apps isn't going to work without major incentives. So either make the Android runtime a first class citizen or figure out what to do to get the top makers to develop for BB10 native. 5) Push the features that are already great. You know the time shifting camera feature is pretty awesome. They should be advertising that every day on tv. Story maker app is also really nice. What are your ideas?

• Answer:

  It's already awesome.  What it isn't is hip.  Android and iOS have a corner on the hip market.  But there are some things you haven't mentioned that make it super-awesome, and that BlackBerry should really go for the balls on in advertising. From http://market-ticker.org/: http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=3229227 In short, go for the balls on the marketing. I mean it. Here's are a few examples that are true and fair -- and clearly point out why the BB10 devices are superior for both business and consumer users by showing people why they win in everyday situations.  Situations that I've all experienced in the last couple of months and all of which really matter to real people, not just techno-geeks (like me.) The Z10 (and I presume the Q10) have cutting-edge RF.  Better than any other device in the "smartphone" category I have ever tested.  So take one and a competitor's phone (you know damn well which one to use!) to a marginal service area, stage a "flat tire", and then do the old "Can you hear me now?" phone call.  For good measure make the person in the car a cute young woman with a flat tire in a ****ty part of town with some menacing young men headed her way..... The Z10 has outrageously fast LTE support.  I hit a sustained 30Mbps in the last week in Detroit.  While I've seen other people talking about 10Mbps data rates with other devices (e.g. Galaxy and iPhone) I've seennobody talk about 30Mbps rates.  That's three times faster than the commonly-published numbers and faster than my home broadband!  And this is with today's carrier hardware on a real road while moving at 70mph -- not pie-in-the-sky stuff that is not yet in the wild or in a lab somewhere.  Take the other devices, and the Z10, to one of those places that's lit and do a nice big file transfer side-by-side.  Can you download me now? Time shift camera.  Family picture time.  Take a nice landscape-aspect picture of a half-dozen people and then use time shift to get the instance where nobody has their eyes closed.  Good luck with the other devices on that.  Of course the "event" in question is a once-in-a-lifetime family reunion with an obviously-infirm member who won't be breathing the next time.  Hoh hoh hoh. I left my Excel Spreadsheet at the office by accident; forgot to put it on the laptop.  Oh darn.  So on the Z-10 (or Q-10) you simply connect to your desktop machine at your office and click the filename, and voila -- it opens on the phone in the built-in app.  For good measure make it a PowerPoint and plug the HDMI cord into a projector at the client's office.  Contrast against the cluster**** that ensues when you try to accomplish that with an IOS or Android device.  Joe closes the sale as if nothing ever happened; Jack loses the $10 million contract. From today, and a real kick in the balls for the young adult set that relies on their music: You're plugged into your car stereo listening to music.  A text message comes in.  Is your music interrupted?  On the Z-10 the answer is no.  On the Android device, even the current 4.2.x JellyBean devices it sure as hell is and it really sucks!  This one will blow the young people's minds and reach directly to what matters to them.  Just get in the car, link the phone (Bluetooth streaming if you don't want to to plug into the headphone jack), start playing your music and then have someone send a staccato set of text messages to you and watch the hilarity ensue.  My kid (who has my SGS-II) phone with official JellyBean on it had the phone jacked into the car stereo this afternoon and had this very thing happen, despite the Android apologists right here on my forum claiming this was fixed in current Android releases.  No it's not and it's damned annoying -- enough so that it got her pissed off.  BB10 handles this correctly and leaves your music undisturbed; I know because I use Bluetooth streaming daily while on my bike or jogging and never have my music broken up. There are plenty more.  The nice example I had in my car last week grabbing a hotel room under AWFUL RF conditions would be a great one, but re-creating it might be a challenge.  I suspect the bottom line is that on an Android or iPhone device it simply wouldn't have worked at all as they couldn't have held enough signal to manage to move data of any sort.  But I didn't happen to have one handy to try with at the time.  Nonetheless the old "background app closed out from under you" game that Android plays can probably be demonstrated to good effect as well.   Here's a short "script" idea for a 60 second spot:   Split-screen -- left side Z10 (or Q10), right side "the other guys" (in monochrome)   Opens with the user tracking a stock chart (in real-time) and music playing through the phone. "I think I'll take my kid to the movies tonight" (checks Flickster for movie location and times) "Is that stock moving yet?" (quick flick-back -- nope) "And I need some coffee" (opens maps, types in "Starbucks", up it comes) "So I can close the $10m sale -- oh $#@! -- my presentation is on my office computer!" (Ah, opens File Browser, selects DESKTOP COMPUTER at office, clicks file, it opens the PowerPoint seamlessly. The guy on the other side has a very long look on his face as he realizes the $10m sale got blown.) "Thank God for BlackBerry....." (the "other side" fades out)   Have a few text messages come in during this time, along with a couple of emails, showing that the music does not get interrupted and showing The Hub and Flow -- unlike how Android handles the same thing with consternation on the other guy's face. Put me in charge of marketing for BlackBerry for three months and tell me I can kick the competition in the nuts with impunity, provided I clearly am fair (that is, I don't fake anything) and I'll trash both Android and the iPhone sales while sending BlackBerry's sales soaring. I'll run a series of 30 and 60-second spots similar to the above that will trash the competition on these points and more.  When I'm done nobody will want an iPhone or Android anything. BlackBerry has the superior devices and operating system but nobody knows why they win for everyday uses, both consumer and business.  Stop pussyfooting around and kick the competition's balls all the way up to their throat. I think that's a good enough picture. h/t Karl Denninger, author of the Market Ticker blog, Leverage: How Cheap Money Will Destroy the World and former owner of an ISP MCSNet.