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Black Sheep Blackberry Blackballed By Business

Posted by timothy on from the die-hards-know-disco-is-not-dead dept.

Hugh Pickens writes "Nicole Perlroth writes that the BlackBerry, once proudly carried by the high-powered and the elite, has become a magnet for mockery and derision from those with iPhones and the latest Android phones. as Research in Motion clings to less than 5 percent of the smartphone market — down from a dominating 50 percent just three years ago. One of the first steps Marissa Mayer took as Yahoo's newly appointed chief executive to remake the company's stodgy image was to trade in employees' BlackBerrys for iPhones and Androids and although BlackBerrys may still linger in Washington, Wall Street and the legal profession, in Silicon Valley they are as rare as a necktie. BlackBerry outcasts say that, increasingly, they suffer from shame and public humiliation as they watch their counterparts mingle on social networking apps that are not available to them, take higher-resolution photos, and effortlessly navigate streets — and the Internet — with better GPS and faster browsing."

9 of 349 comments (clear)

  1. So fucking what? by MagusSlurpy · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Stupid people like to tease me for liking Star Trek and the Misfits. Fuck them, it's what *I* like that matters to me. If you switch phones because your old one isn't cool enough, you're a dipshit and deserved the mockery you were getting in the first place.

    --
    My sister opened a computer store in Hawaii. She sells C shells by the seashore.
    1. Re:So fucking what? by arcite · · Score: 5, Insightful

      No kidding. A BB is a BUSINESS tool. If you want a no nonsense device with a physical keyboard and superior email and message handling, a BB is still the best.

    2. Re:So fucking what? by FreakyGeeky · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This thinking is exactly why RIM is in trouble. "But we do business email best! We'll always have a market!"

    3. Re:So fucking what? by jbolden · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You should read the article. It was attacking the functionality of the BB as a business tool as well: mapping, not having all the messaging features, and client's having a low opinion of it. I don't think things are really that bad for BB but this is the NYTimes, so you can't just blow the article off.

    4. Re:So fucking what? by Tridus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Other phones are *better* business tools, if you're in a business that has more to it then just email and IM. There's quite a lot of business that falls into that category.

      We're looking at giving field staff phones when they do their ice jam monitoring during the winter/spring, because it lets them have maps of their routes, take photos of the jam, and submit it all from the field. We're not considering Blackberries for this task, because they're so far behind current phones that they're just not up to the task.

      Have a business where you can use apps to look at client data, market data, or any other kind of data? BB is a bad phone for it.

      Sorry folks, but "we do email best!" doesn't cut it anymore.

      --
      -- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
  2. WTF is this world coming to by Chrisq · · Score: 5, Insightful

    WTF is this world coming to if someone can be "shamed and humiliated" because of what type of phone they have?

    1. Re:WTF is this world coming to by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      WTF is this world coming to if someone can be "shamed and humiliated" because of what type of phone they have?

      The need to define a hierarchy based on shame and humiliation(and if that fails, good, wholesome, violence) appears to be older than humanity, if research on our adorable monkey colleagues is anything to go by). The precise means are historically contingent and practically irrelevant, so long as something is available.

    2. Re:WTF is this world coming to by jythie · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Meh, just look at slashdot or any other geek culture.. particular groups within it shame and humiliate people for failing to use what everyone else uses. You see it with iPhones and 'droids, OSX and Windows and Linux, Scotch and Wine and Beer,.. humans are social animals that like to push people for conformity around whatever the group uses to differentiate it from other groups. The symbols themselves are irrelevant and arbitrary.

      While one might be tempted to blame some specific group like 'hipsters', it is a pretty pervasive behavior that pretty much every subculture is guilty of.

  3. Bad IT Dept doesn't know how to setup Exchange by briantf · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Your explanation for setting up ActiveSync means the account you have is connected by an incompetent IT department.

    Setting up an Android or an iPhone for Exchange needs only an email address and a password. There are at least 3 different means by which Autodiscover can be configured to take care of client device configuration. If your IT dept can't figure that out, what makes you think a BES server is within their capacity to manage?

    Your shrill denunciation of SSL and the assumption that users are too stupid to use a password seems almost self-denigrating. You don't use SSL in any web app? You can't remember your corporate credentials? The iPhone might be too complicated for you.....

    Finally, we see the issue - you have a phone you don' t like, so it must be someone else's fault. The phone you did like was designed and built by a company so incompetent they self-destructed. It must be someone else's fault. I'm starting to see a pattern here....

    Regards,
    Brian in CA