Slashdot Mirror
RIM Offers Free Apps Following Outage
wiredmikey writes "Following a series of outages last week that affected BlackBerry users around the word over a three day period, RIM has come forward with its plans to "make good" on the incidents that frustrated millions of users who bashed the mobile technology provider. Research In Motion today said it would offer a selection of premium apps worth more than US $100 free of charge to subscribers as 'an expression of appreciation for their patience during the recent service disruptions.' The company also announced that its enterprise customers will also be offered one month of free Technical Support."
Ditto.
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
I wasn't even aware there was $100 worth of apps on the BlackBerry app store to begin with!
How well do they work on broken servers?
This is the second major outage RIM has experienced while my company has used their phones. Unfortunately for them, this one came right in the middle of my company's evaluation period for new phones company-wde and it just sealed their fate. RIM's going bye-bye.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
I'd use that free month's worth of support to have RIM help me move my account to another service.
Wonder if they'll do that?
I didn't see a list of the free apps in the linked article. Odd that I actually bother to RTFA and I get no useful information on it. In other words, good summary by slashdot of a terrible article.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
$100 of premium apps from EA, gameloft, ispeech and vlingo (Blackberry's version of Siri) is an awesome reward for having my e-mail arrive 15 mins late around 1am last Tuesday!
When apps on iOS, Android and even Windows Phone are way better than Blackberry apps and people begin to realise that these types of outages are not possible on those platforms (everything on a Blackberry, including internet usage, goes through continental proxies; not the case on Apple et. al. except for specialised services like iCloud and Gmail and such), free apps aren't good enough. On top of that, this doesn't do anything for companies like mine that prohibit end-users from installing anything on our Blackberry phones for regulatory reasons.
Even if they release a phone that's super-awesome and is somewhat competitive with today's smartphones (so far, this seems unlikely), their hub-spoke service model for consumer service is ridiculously outdated. Wake me up when they've gotten rid of BIS and internet proxies.
Users will want an app that allows them to migrate off RIM to iOS or Android.
Flexible bare-metal recovery for Linux/UNIX
At least all the BBs that ended up on eBay when people switched to iPhone on Friday will have some decent apps bundled with them.
Free playbooks instead? Nobody wants to buy them anyways. Might as well make some sort of real attempt to keep your current customers.
The initial list of apps is up at http://crackberry.com/research-motion-offers-free-premium-apps-customers-following-service-interruptions
-- I care not for your foolish signatures.
Unless of course the email delays cost you $200+ in business.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
As a BB owner, why bother at all? Either they have the person hooked on a corp account, hooked on BBM, or waiting to get off a contract to buy a iPhone or Droid. BB will not be my next phone.
being as hilariously out-of-date as Nokia brick phones?
Just asking.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Loyal but pi**ed off Blackberry user here... I was impacted by the outage last week. Run a small consulting firm, no BES so I am reliant on Blackberry's infrastructure via my mobile telco. Listen here RIM, if I wanted apps I'd buy an iPhone. Any compensation for us business users? Blackberry's roots are with business users and the enterprise environment, which is why I have continued to suffer with the device as more flash products have been released by RIM's competitors. Last week's outage was such a serious blow to RIM as the back-end Blackberry infrastructure remains their only remaining advantage. The Blackberry Torch -- which I loath for many reasons -- is so gutless that it is barely usable for surfing the web let alone for running Apps. RIM has taken last week's disaster as an opportunity to market their no-doubt underutilized App store. Very disappointing RIM...
How about jobs?
Time will tell whether this is enough to appease the Blackberry user and enterprise communities, or whether they continue to lose customer base to other, newer platforms. I suspect the consumers will continue to abandon them in favour of the iPhone, Android, and Win7 phones. But there still isn't much competition at the enterprise level. Even for those platforms that have some form of enterprise management, I haven't heard of any that provide the device data encryption that RIM does.
In the meantime, pro-RIM slashdotters will gloat over their "free" premium apps, while the anti-RIM slashdotters will greedily demand more (most likely including a few impossible demands.)
Personally, I'd rather see companies just stop promising the impossible. The only reason the telcos can offer genuine five nine's service is their hardware and software has undergone much more rigorous testing, has simpler requirements, and hasn't had significant updates in years (just patches.) Don't forget that there is a very smal handful of providers servicing the telco's landline, DSL, and cell hardware and software needs, so they can concentrate the testing expenses and share it out amongst the telcos.
Despite that rigorous testing, even the telcos have had some outages (I remember a cascading update failure of AT&T SS7 hardware a number of years ago in particular.)
In the vast majority of cases, five-nines is only a marketing ploy, with outages covered by blanket clauses that excuse planned downtime from the calculations. It doesn't mean you'll actually get the uptime the contract states, it just gives you a contractual rebate when they inevitably fail to deliver.
For those enterprises affected by the outages: tough. It's your responsibility as risk mangers to plan for outages of critical systems, and have backup plans in place.
It's also worth noting that I've never met a smart phone user that relied on their smart phone's email services exclusively. Rather, they forward other email accounts to the smart phone, so for those risk-managing users, they could still use those other service providers while RIM was down.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Have gnu, will travel.
I'm sorry, but if I still had my blackberry, I'd demand a refund for the down time I couldn't use my data plan (you know.. the extra $35 blackberry.net fee you have to pay via your carrier).
"Map Locations of Working iPhones and Droids"
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Following a series of outages last week that affected BlackBerry users around the word over a three day period,...
I hate when outages affected users around the word "over". If it was around the word "under", I wouldn't care...
Speaking with authority on someone who helped implement QoS at a large Telecom. All those Apple and Android devices pass through your telecom, they traffic shape a lot of data, thats how they offer stuff like $5 facebook or $10 unlimited social etc. They were dumb struck on how to do that for BB as they couldn't see data going.
So it is really what you want. Is secure communication important for you or not.
BTW, I am not saying iOS and Android doesn't offer options, however Joe the plumber is not going to setup VPN.
I ask this in all seriousness: Are RIM even trying?
The core of their business that they built up was corporate customers who they sold BES to. But the first 5 apps they're offering are all games.
Meanwhile, the various Android phone vendors and Apple have been merrily chipping away at the corporate market at a rate of knots and are now starting to look at the low-end handsets that are subsidised to the point of being incredibly cheap even on pay-as-you-go.
AFAICT, more-or-less all of RIM's unique selling points have been eradicated over the last few years and all that remains now is "All your data traffic is routed through our servers so if we experience significant downtime - which can and indeed has happened - your smartphone becomes a dumbphone". Not really much of a selling point.
If a service provider's service fails, shouldn't they refund you for that month's service fees?
...as everyone tries to grab their free apps at once.
How about just switching their phones off the antiquated BES teat and supporting activsync natively like every other phone out there? That would fix their server crashing problem once and for all.
I'm a BB dev, and thanks RIM. Instead of giving a small amount of virtual cash, they have pre-chosen apps for users to choose from. So, my apps don't get any benefit from this giveaway.
I know that the negotiated price of the $100 free apps will likely only cost RIM 5$ or so. But I would have appreciated RIM giving users 2$ in credit as well to spend anywhere in the store. Then there would be 70 million subscribers with 2$ in their pocket - maybe some of them would buy my apps.
It seems typical of the tin ear RIM has to the market, its app devs, and probably its own managers.
How about an app.. Artificial Clairvoyance. The app tells you when RIM is about to go down, giving you enough time to get you emails or arrange to get an iPhone.
They didn't even have to offer this one, it just came with the territory.
The new rage in business and customer retention strategies!
Users affected around the word?
It's a Rimjob.
RIM has been taking a beating over this in the news but most people don't think too much of a partial-day outage over years of service. Additionally I charge my BB about 2 hours a week, which makes other smartphones green with envy. I have carried a BB for 10 years, since they were the 'BlueBerries' and for a business tool they are unbeatable. Even before this there were mainstream stories blasting their latest phones, but I think the apps/browser is the only area they fall short. However, I do carry an Android as well since I don't mix business with pleasure....