RIM Attracts 15,000 Apps For BlackBerry 10 In 2 Days

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RIM Attracts 15,000 Apps For BlackBerry 10 In 2 Days

Posted by timothy on Tuesday January 15, 2013 @06:16AM from the pay-enough-you'll-get-all-you-want dept.

CWmike writes "It's starting to look like the BlackBerry store will be well stocked with apps when Research In Motion launches BlackBerry 10 (see YouTube preview) at the end of this month. The company held an event over the weekend where it offered app developers incentives to port their programs to the BlackBerry 10 platform and managed to attract 15,000 app submissions. 'Well there you have it. 37.5 hours in, we hit 15,000 apps for this portathon. Feel like I've run a marathon. Thanks to all the devs!' wrote Alec Saunders, vice president of developer relations at RIM, in a Twitter message. The 'port-a-thon' event was held in two parts: One aimed at Android developers and the other at apps written in other platforms, including Appcelerator, Maramalade, Sencha, jQuery, PhoneGap and Qt. RIM was offering $100 for each app ported and subsequently approved for sale in the BlackBerry 10 app store, up to certain limits. Developers could also win BlackBerry 10 development handsets and a trip to RIM's BlackBerry Jam Europe developer event." It's hard to believe that many current iOS or Android users are leaping toward Blackberry, though. If you're in one of those camps, is that so crazy?

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The question is... by GerbilSoft · 2013-01-15 06:18 · Score: 4, Insightful

How many of those 15,000 "apps" are actually useful, and how many are just worthless single-site frontends?
1. Re:The question is... by 6Yankee · 2013-01-15 06:24 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  5,000 single-site frontends and 10,000 fart apps.
2. Re:The question is... by geekmux · 2013-01-15 06:28 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  How many of those 15,000 "apps" are actually useful, and how many are just worthless single-site frontends?
  And how is this question relevant here vs. every other app store boasting the same 1:1,000 ratio of good to worthless apps?
  Seems a bit premature to bash RIM for doing nothing more than what everyone else does...and that is publish huge nicely rounded marketing numbers for apps, regardless of value-add.
3. Re:The question is... by jc42 · 2013-01-15 06:48 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  But, RIM's dead! The interblogs told me so!
  Pay no attention to those Apple fanbois, or the fandroids neither. It's only the loyal BB partisans who have The Truth.
  (Hmmm ... We could use an official site to inform us of the current buzzwords for properly insulting the users of various successful commercial products. Anyone know what the BB loyalists are actually disparaged these days?)
  
  --
  Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
4. Re:The question is... by GerbilSoft · 2013-01-15 06:51 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  iOS has the same problem, as does Windows Phone and Windows 8. (It's actually much worse on Windows 8; pretty much every app there is a worthless website frontend.)
5. Re:The question is... by jeffmeden · 2013-01-15 07:13 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  But, RIM's dead! The interblogs told me so!
  Pay no attention to those Apple fanbois, or the fandroids neither. It's only the loyal BB partisans who have The Truth.
  (Hmmm ... We could use an official site to inform us of the current buzzwords for properly insulting the users of various successful commercial products. Anyone know what the BB loyalists are actually disparaged these days?)
  "BB loyalist" is about as disparaging as you need to be...
6. Re:The question is... by thePowerOfGrayskull · 2013-01-15 07:54 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Quite relevant because what matters is the true count of useful applications - not the filler. By your reckoning (1:1000) that means RIM has 15 useful applications for BB10. Nothing to brag about. I've got 4 times that many very useful iOS apps on the devices I own and I've just scratched the surface. Android using friends of mine have dozens of useful apps on theirs.
  More specifically it means that they have 15 useful applications *from this portathon*. I suspect the number to be higher - as it's fairly easy to port opengl games and html5 apps, outside of android apps.
  They've already said they'll have over 70k apps at launch - it's not like this one-weekend event is their only effort to get applications on the platform. Unofficial estimates put them over 100k. That'll mean ~100 useful apps (if we stick with 1:1000) -- whhich is, frankly, on par with other platforms.
  They've also previously said that they have 90% of the most popular 600 android and ios apps, and 18 of the top 20 apps .
7. Re:The question is... by thePowerOfGrayskull · 2013-01-15 08:01 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  I'd be more interested in finding out how many of those are even legit.
  http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57562905-94/blackberry-app-world-said-to-hawk-pirated-android-apps/
  That's not a platform issue, it's an asshattery issue. You can also find tens of thousands of apps that are repackaged iOS/Android apps on iOS/Android - with few or no changes.
  Like any other platform, they can't reasonably go to check each app submission against every known platform and verify the credentials of the developer match up - it's not realistic which is why none of the others do it.
  RIM has made it very easy for any legitimate app developer to file a claim and have an app taken down - and responds to such complaints much more quickly than its rivals based on actual results.
8. Re:The question is... by dogsbreath · 2013-01-15 09:10 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  "BB loyalist" is about as disparaging as you need to be...
  this is a blanket?
  jah
  and we are pigs?
  jah
  then this is funny, jah?
  jah! that is a good one!
  Cheap jokes aside, IMHO this is lots of room for BB to move back into being a player.
  First, they still have a very large user base and second, the other players all have significant weak areas that BB could target.
  BB has always been about business communications and productivity, areas that Apple has never been any good at. Email on iPhones is a joke at best. Even if you jailbreak and install "mail enhancer pro" (jah, that is a good one too!), the mail tool is missing core functionality.
  Multitasking on iPhones is pathetic and a total pain to move data between apps. BB 10, if it is still based on QNX, should have the built in capability to change how parallel applications and parallel processing paths function on mobile devices. Raise the bar as they say.
  The iPad is interesting and a decent lightweight tool for browsing web but again absolutely not a power tool. More like a kids workbench.
  The two vendors who have traditionally been powers in the business space, Microsoft and BB, seem to recognize this and are making plays in an area that Apple just does not understand or fails to address well.
  I don't quite know what to make of Android in this area as it should be able to fill the void as well but does not seem to have a leader in the business arena.
  BYOD is popular amongst the working population but corporately there is a desire to retain control over corp. communications and security, at least in the Fortune 500. Time is ripe for BB to get back into business.
  Anyways, competition is good and from that point of view I am hoping BB succeeds.
  Best not to be too religious about platforms, companies, hardware etc. They are just tools and who wants to be mired in a world dominated by iOS and Android when other excellent systems exist?
so why would i buy a blackberry? by alen · 2013-01-15 06:21 · Score: 3, Insightful

instead of an iphone or one of the Galaxy phones?
do they do anything that iOS or Android does not?
1. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by Spy+Handler · 2013-01-15 06:26 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  it has... Canadian Technology!
2. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-01-15 06:51 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  it has... Canadian Technology!
  So....it asks you nicely before it crashes? Or just apologizes afterwards?
3. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by gstoddart · 2013-01-15 06:57 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Oh, I agree ... historically, that's been the primary reason for BlackBerry stuff. If you can access Exchange from other devices readily, what does RIM bring to the table?
  At which point, they're just another manufacturer with nothing to differentiate themselves or make their platform a better choice.
  If they don't have something nobody else does, I don't know what is going to bring customers they've already lost back.
  I'd love to see a list of reasons why someone should go with a BlackBerry, because I'm at a loss to come up with a single one myself. That's not to say they don't exist, but they need to be sure to explain to people why it's worth looking at their products.
  There was a time I'd have said "a phone running QNX, wow, that must be awesome". Now I just wonder how badly they've mangled QNX.
  
  --
  Lost at C:>. Found at C.
4. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by Anonymous Coward · 2013-01-15 06:58 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  No it cross checks you into the boards while serenading you with Alanis Morissette songs, before pouring maple syrup on your concussed head, ya hoser.
5. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by asmkm22 · 2013-01-15 07:07 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Email, mostly. It's much easier to type out an email message (or text, for that matter) on a physical keyboard than on a touchscreen. For me, that's a really big deal.
  There's also an argument to be made about the Blackberry feeling more "industrial" or "professional" than iPhones or Androids. I don't particularly care about being able to play games or watch Netflix on my phone because I use my phone for business and for placing calls. I imagine I'm in the minority on that one though, because it seems like many people today view their phone as some all-in-one gaming machine that happens to make phone calls as well.
  Personally, I can't wait to be able to ditch my Android and get back to a half-screen-half-keyboard Blackberry, provided the phone is responsive and the battery life is decent.
6. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by c · 2013-01-15 07:32 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  it has... Canadian Technology!
  There's an excellent "Cold Or Not" app...
  
  --
  Log in or piss off.
7. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by TsuruchiBrian · 2013-01-15 07:37 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  If he doesn't donate it soon, Harrison Ford will just do it for him.
8. Re:so why would i buy a blackberry? by thePowerOfGrayskull · 2013-01-15 08:04 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  instead of an iphone or one of the Galaxy phones?
  do they do anything that iOS or Android does not?
  Well, you cannot get your meeting schedules synced to your BMW without a Blackberry.
  But with 10, I think RIM is losing one important selling point - the physical keyboard. -snip-.
  No, RIM is releasing models with both all-touch and physical keyboards.
Re:Thankfully... by YodasEvilTwin · 2013-01-15 06:23 · Score: 3, Informative

The idea is that BB10 supports those frameworks already. Some ports are as simple as setting up the tools and clicking a button. Hopefully the more complex ones are given the time they need.
Re:Thankfully... by MightyMartian · 2013-01-15 06:43 · Score: 4, Interesting

That's my thinking. If all you have to do is a quick rejig and recompile because the APIs are so close to the Android ones, then it's a near-zero effort situation. I don't know much about the new platform, but I thought I had read that it would support Android apps out of the box, so it may literally may be just pushing a button.
Not that there's a damned wrong with that. If Android compatibility or portability is good enough, then you already have thousands of apps ready to go and you don't need to put massive amounts of effort into convincing developers to support your platform (like Redmond is doing).

--
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Re:App bounty by gstoddart · 2013-01-15 06:46 · Score: 5, Insightful

Which, if you think about it, probably is a wise investment.
If on day one there's 15 apps, nobody is going to buy one because it's dead on arrival and the money you spent developing it would be a waste. If there's 15,000 apps, it's possible to conclude it's not a completely useless platform.
Releasing it without apps would be suicide, because there's nothing interesting about a smart phone you can't get software for. By now, anybody who has had a smart phone has a list of a handful of apps which are deal breakers.
Now, the question remains as to if enough people will care enough to buy these. I'm not sure anything RIM does at this point is going to make me say "oooh, I need a BlackBerry" ... but they do need to get a significant amount of people to do that.

--
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Do they still require a business plan? by shirikodama · 2013-01-15 06:49 · Score: 4, Interesting

After going through hoop after hoop to try to release an app to their store including notarized this, and documented that... for a FREE FRIGGING APP, I gave up when they told me that I needed to submit a business plan to them. I couldn't believe it.
Yah, sure by SmallFurryCreature · 2013-01-15 06:57 · Score: 4, Insightful

Because 100 dollars is a fortune! I mean, it would get you a whole hour of my time! I will EAT TONIGHT!
The smart developer doesn't restrict himself to one platform, especially in a market that already has seen major shifts.

--

MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Maramalade? by djlemma · 2013-01-15 07:05 · Score: 3, Informative

Guess a typo in TFA got carried over into TFS. I was trying to search out all these SDK's and google got confused..

So for those interested, it's spelled exactly like the stuff you put on toast. Info here..
Re:Thankfully... by trampel · 2013-01-15 07:46 · Score: 5, Informative

That's my thinking. If all you have to do is a quick rejig and recompile because the APIs are so close to the Android ones, then it's a near-zero effort situation. I don't know much about the new platform, but I thought I had read that it would support Android apps out of the box, so it may literally may be just pushing a button.
Not that there's a damned wrong with that. If Android compatibility or portability is good enough, then you already have thousands of apps ready to go and you don't need to put massive amounts of effort into convincing developers to support your platform (like Redmond is doing).
BB10 contains the Android Player, which essentially runs repackaged Android APK files (I'm don't know if the reason for the different package format is technical or not). This is different from the native APIs, but the user experience is quite seamless. I "ported" one of my apps to the Playbook, and it was not even a recompile - it is a package converter.