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September 27, 2012

BlackBerry is Dead? Long Live BlackBerry!

Research in Motion (RIM) has, over the last several days, held a Developers' Conference down in San Diego, which it has called "Americas JAM" - essentially a developers' conference targeting both North and South America. It will also be taking JAM out to Europe and Asia over the next few months. Although this is a developers' conference, there were some very interesting bits of information revealed during the opening day keynote sessions that are worth noting, and we've done so here.

Stay with us to the end, and we'll also provide the means to access a video of a "thank you to developers" song that some of RIM's senior management team pulled together (all of them are, in fact, the actual band members in the video).

RIM is working hard to ensure that developers - at least those that are definitely focused on RIM and have demonstrated an ongoing commitment to the BlackBerry 10 (BB10) platform, that RIM is pulling out all the stops to support them. The company clearly understands that the development community is key to any and all future success, and is looking to support the development community - as well as looking to keep them enthused.

We feel the company is off to a good start, and we need to note that BB10 does offer some very interesting user interface capabilities that do indeed set RIM up to deliver some key UI differentiators. Contrary to what most headlines have focused on over the last few years, we're going to take a step back and take a look at the things RIM is doing right - and well - with BB10.

The keynote sessions started off, of course, with CEO Thorsten Heins taking the helm. Though he didn't really announce anything we haven't already heard - going back to BlackBerry World 2012, which was held in May, he did note a few interesting stats:

RIM has managed to once again grow its subscriber base, which now stands at 80 million. This continues to be an amazing capability – subscribers are only counted by RIM when an e-mail account is actually activated, and it maintains a careful list of active accounts. New subscribers translate to new RIM hardware being sold, so that one can reasonably assume that two million new RIM devices – which would or the most part be BlackBerry 7 hardware – were sold in the most recent quarter.

RIM now has 60 million BlackBerry Messenger users - many of which reside in the Asia-Pac global region (an area that has hugely adopted instant messaging as a social platform).

RIM now has 60 million active Facebook users.

Heins also noted that new BlackBerry 10 devices will continue to use micro USB ports "which will save users a little money." An obvious dig at Apple's new Lightening connector, which will cost some users - and enterprises such as hotels - that have invested substantially in the old adapters - a great deal of money.

Peek, Flow and Hub

Aside from that, Heins focused on the user interface elements that will appear in BB10 when it launches. Heins mentioned several key elements of the new interface: BlackBerry Hub and Peek, and the notion of "Flow" - all of which are critical to the "floating interface" design of BB10.

BlackBerry Hub gathers all communications under one location – e-mail, messages, BBM messages, Facebook communications, Twitter, LinkedIn, calendar events and so on, all integrated in one place and all accessible through a single thumb or finger gesture. Below is an example of the BlackBerry Hub, which is shown on the left side of the BlackBerry screen. The right side contains the screen that the user initiated access to the Hub from.

BlackBerry Peek allows users to access the hub and the various menus of applications immediately with one hand and a single continuous thumb gesture. Peek is also integrated into all BB10 provided apps, such as the calendar, so that users can, for example, move around a calendar's many different views with a simple, one-handed thumb swipe.

BlackBerry Flow is more a concept than an actual thing - RIM uses the word to describe the means through which a user can simply move around the BlackBerry screen and between apps . Users can finish the gesture by actually going to the Hub (or other applications or menus). Gestures can also be "backed out" meaning that by reversing the direction of a gesture, a user will be able to simply return to whatever place he or she was at when the gesture was initiated.

The image below shows a user initially engaging a Peek (left) to the Hub (center) and then completing the gesture and fully accessing the Hub (right). A user could have backed out of accessing the Hub (or any app or menu) simply by reversing the gesture.

RIM also provided demos of numerous BB10 apps, including, but not limited to Facebook, FourSquare, and Cisco/Webex. Shown below is the new Facebook app, with the user executing a Peek at the Facebook menu while retaining the actual part of the application being used.

The BlackBerry keyboard was next shown off. Although there was no mention of the "adaptive" capabilities of the keyboard (the virtual keyboard is supposedly able to learn any particular user's typing habits and is supposed to adjust accordingly - it's more complex than that sounds but we'll leave it at that). But RIM did highlight a new multi-lingual recognition capability.

It turns out that 30 percent of BlackBerry users write in more than one language. The BB10 keyboard has the ability to predict whole words and next word predictions based on what it perceives to be the language being used - even if a user mixes different languages (say French, German and English) within a single sentence, the keyboard software will modify its word and next word predictions based on the language it believes is being used. It is a very nifty capability for those 30 percenters.

BB10 also delivers what RIM refers to as Active Frames. BB10 constantly updates all running applications with new information as a user is using the device. So, for example, if someone in a user's contact list posts a new contact photo, Active Frames will pick it up and update the user's profile on the device in real time.

True Multitasking - Critical to the UI

It is important to note that BB10 is a full-fledged mutlitasking operating system - multiple applications will be running non-stop, and a key part of the "Flow" of the user interface is tied to the fact that any number of applications are running. Peek allows instant single gesture access to these apps as a user might need them, and provides that single finger/thumb ability to both see the apps and to change between them without any need to go back to a home screen or to otherwise "step out of whatever app is being used and to then go to another app." This is a further instance of what RIM means by user interface "Flow."

 It is difficult to describe in words but we believe that it is in fact highly intuitive (a key attribute) and that users will quickly grasp how to maneuver about. RIM is essentially betting the farm on this UI capability. Heins does note that the wireless carriers have shown a great deal of enthusiasm for the new UI, which is of course a good thing. The wireless carriers certainly want RIM to succeed here - and the industry as a whole would benefit in terms of providing a necessary check on Android and iOS.

Next, Heins spent a bit of time digging into BlackBerry Balance - which has been around for a good while now, but which will really come into its own through the Peek technology. BB Balance completely separates a user's work environment and personal consumer-side environment. Through its multitasking abilities, BB10 and BB Balance work together to deliver a true solution for BYOD environments, where all work apps - and most important, all work data - are kept completely separate from a user's personal apps and data. Peek (and the Flow concept) easily allows users to move between the two - making it an entirely frictionless environment for users - another key aspect of the UI.

RIM has also created the ability to create an "AppWorld for Work" that allows companies to create specific application views for employees. The image below shows a user about to choose between his or her personal and work environments.

Finally, the new BB10 Browser, which supposedly delivers the most powerful support for HTML5 of any mobile or desktop browser, also fully incorporates Peek, with one thumb touch interaction of Web pages with other apps (e.g. posting something to Facebook). RIM has done an awesome job of building the Flow architecture, and we believe RIM has a significant opportunity to win over new users with it. That’s besides keeping the 80 million current subscribers it now has also happily engaged.

The general idea behind the Peek and Flow concept was to create something as easy as "peeking" at your watch to view the time - something you do without thinking about doing it - effortless, simple, instant: use a gesture to do something, then simply reverse the gesture to return a user to whatever that user was previously doing - without losing context or the exact state of where the previous thing the user was doing was at.

Peek and Flow, at a fundamental level, also seeks to overcome mobile device screen size issues - an application needs to own the entire screen, so it becomes necessary to allow other applications that run in a full multi-tasking environment, to participate by allowing multiple "floating screen" views through Peek and Flow. Users are not "task switching" between apps - they are using multiple apps in real time and simply floating/flowing between them through Peek. Again, we need to stress that we believe RIM has very successfully managed to pull this off with BB10.

From a pure UI designer's perspective, Peek allows the user to "manage distractions" and easily move between legitimate needs to access other apps while also easily avoiding distractions by simply peeking at what the apps are doing, and then choosing to ignore them. Or to engage them.

The Final BB10 is Really Here

RIM this week is releasing to its developer community the final API set that will become BB10 when the new devices finally ship. This new developer release will also deliver most of the final set of BB10 features that will appear on the shipping version - the actual home screen, camera, BBM, App World, browser, contacts, calendar, and so on. Shown in the image below are other key developer technologies that being delivered.

Unfortunately we'll need to more or less end our overview here - which will fall woefully short of everything RIM has been revealing. There was lots of developer cheerleading by RIM, and lots of "We love our developers" noise - all of it clearly heartfelt by the technical senior management folks (yes, those that appear in the video we mentioned earlier).

There was lots of talk about the benefits developers can expect, as well as lots of promises that sticking with RIM will make developers money. An independent study by Vision Mobile, for example, points out the following:

That Blackberry apps generate:

  • Four percent more money per app per month than iOS apps
  • 35 percent more than Android apps
  • That it costs 21 percent more to develop an iOS app than an Android app, and 81 percent more than Blackberry apps

The company has also announced a "$10,000" program for its application developers. The rules are simple:

  • Make sure that the application is certified by RIM through its Certified for BB10 program
  • Make sure the app is fully completed, certified and available in the BlackBerry App World store by January 21, 2013.
  • Be able to sell at least $1,000 worth of downloads.

If the app fails to sell at least $10,000 worth of downloads, RIM will make up the difference up to $9,000. The point here, of course, is that RIM is confident it won't have to shell out a single nickel. We like the sentiment and wish both RIM and its developers huge success here.

Finally, check out the RIM band video and ode to its developers. It's not to be missed!

Want to learn more about today’s powerful mobile Internet ecosystem? Don't miss the Mobility Tech Conference & Expo, collocated with ITEXPO Austin 2012 taking place Oct. 2-5 2012, in Austin, TX.  Stay in touch with everything happening at Mobility Tech Conference & Expo. Follow us on Twitter.




Edited by Brooke Neuman


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