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Gary Klassen, Inventor of BlackBerry Messenger
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78 Comments

We salute you Gary Klassen, Inventor of BlackBerry Messenger!

By Kevin Michaluk on 20 Oct 2011 12:36 pm
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We all know BlackBerry Messenger is one of the biggest hooks the BlackBerry platform has. Research In Motion originally made its mark in the world with push email, but in recent years it is BBM that has become the killer feature the company gets the most kudos for. Especially in the consumer space, BlackBerry Messenger is the must-have application that attracts people to buying a BlackBerry Smartphone and keeps them from switching to another platform when it comes time to upgrade. I'm not going to try and calculate where RIM would be today if they did not have BBM - all I know is they would not be in nearly as good a position.

Ever wonder who actually invented BlackBerry Messenger? You're looking at him above. That's Gary Klassen, a Software Developer at Research In Motion for over 10 years now, and he is the man who literally wrote the code for version 1.0 of BlackBerry Messenger. Walking through the hallways of DevCon yesterday, I got on my knees and bowed to him after he was introduced to me as such. Seriously, this guy is a celebrity in my book. Statues should be erected in Gary's honor.  

Companies are made of people and all too often it's the company itself and/or its founders who get to reap the credit for innovations produced. But I like to give credit where credit is due. And to that end, I say Gary Klassen... CrackBerry Nation salutes you. THANK YOU!!

Topics: BBM DevCon11 Gary Klassen News & Rumors

Porsche designed BlackBerry to be officially announced October 27th Previous
Bubble Bash 2 is the second app released free by RIM as part of the Thank You From BlackBerry OfferNext
Kevin Michaluk Kevin Michaluk 3683 (articles) 3023 (forum posts)
78 comments

vassosman

I LOVE YOU MAN!

El Platanero

Hey Kevin,

Why did the Devcon updates stop after Tuesday? I thought the main part was on 10/19/2011.

Xerxes10

Great to see credit going where credit is due, millions around the world depend on BBM!

iPhoneTHS

This is by far, IMO, to date, one of the best bits of news from Devcon! Gary, you're the "Nation's" hero. Did you guys ask him if he had anymore neat tricks up his sleeves?

8330 - 8530 - 9630 - 9650 - PlayBook - 9930!
Once you go Bold, you never go back...

Ibn la Ahad

My great respect for this guy. Now if we only had a few more of his kind of people walking through the buildings of RIM...

Deathcommand

ATTENTION!
SALUTE!

I love this guy. lol

Dinodeal

Gary you have forever changed my life...THANKYOU

Kingkracker

I can't imagine communications without BBM. Thank you!!!!!

justinplett

You are responsible for the long conversations i am able to have with my wife. Thanks Gary.

EvilmasterMMA

The all powerful EvilMaster bows to the Klassen!

The_Big

Gros merci de Montréal!!!
Traslated: Huge thx from Montreal!

Wolf35Nine

(Performance review with Gary's manager)
Gary: "I invented BBM, now give me my dam raise! Peace."

shebmiller

Awesome post Kev! And thanks for all the hard work Mr. Klassen!

Slash82

You took that pic with the 9900, hm? ;)

patpatiar

Did you actually bow down? +1 if you did!

THANKS GARY

Joe257

BBM has been RIM's saviour & knight in shining armor!

Without BBM, folks would easily move to other platforms. Now that BBM has helped RIM bridge these slim times, hope we see some killer devices in the early part of 2012. Mike did promise some snazzy stuff at DevCon, but I've not seen any devices at all!!!

HavPlenty

BBM always wins the tug of war vs other platforms with me. I'm here for good cuz of you now!! Thanks! And make iChat go Bye-Chat...Peace!!!

Neely2005

All I (and RIM) can say is THANK YOU!!!

keith2k1

Gary, you are the man!!!! BBM has saved me millions of hours on the road!!!

BBMINI

Cool post, Kevin. It's awesome to connect a person to the technology since BBM and BBs overall are so much more than 1s and 0s. And to finally see someone from RIM who is NOT Balsille or Lazaridis.

And, nice work, Gary!

BBThemes

nice, but i still want my coloured chat bubbles in BBM6 please :p

Xterra2

God Bless this man
He's the reason why am using a blackberry

jl_06

this man is our Yoda...the rimpire strikes back!

mister160

+ infinity
bbm = force

sir.dangerfield

Good job Gary and thank you! Way to give him recognition Kevin!

wes2nice

Gary, your the MAN!!!

Nashstruck

An innovator! You've kept my gf and I going long distance for 2 YEARS!
CHEERS!

Cazurela

Is there such thing as "BBM-sex" as an analouge to "phone-sex" LOL!

Liquid_Revolver

Now that is pretty cool, him being so low key is also really nice.

Too bad BBM wont save RIM if they dont put something together asap. RIP RIM

SkaterGuy2k

You the man, Thanks for being so awesome :D and Thanks from the rest of "The Phone World" for developing the baseline of instant messaging on phones, because we all know that everyone is trying so hard to develop anything to work the way BBM does. So again THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!!!!

tsaalsaa

I believe our friend Gary was an intern at the time when he invented BBM

Bolderholder

Gary Be Thy Name

If RIM has any thoughts of offering BBM to any other platform other than BB's in the future, MAKE'M PAY thru the nose for the privilege of having such as awesome communication tool!

But honestly, I would opt to keep it only for bb's. Just my opinion. ;o)

ciscobear

Gary should be made CEO, clearly he has vision :)

Thank you Gary from us here in the Caribbean :)

martinjdub

If there is one bbm friend we should all have, its Gary.

The RIMPIRE

MarcusX5

Kevin-

Instead of bowing to Gary , God bless him , show RIM the reactions of the Porsche designed phone !!!!! RIM"s Edsel phone!!!! Sorry but after the disappointed Devcon and now this.....i am considering leaving RIM.....

curve 8900 T-mobile
Torch 9800 ATT
Playbook 16GB

siddo_d

Greatest man in the world!

guerllamo7

You Da Man!
Great to see the man that delivered the best messaging experience ever.

Mel25

Gray the man with the bb plan!!!!

katlegob

Much Love and Respect for that Man, all the Way from South Africa, Give that man anything he wants!. Salute!.

bladerunner6821

YOU are the Man Gary! I seriously use BBM every other second of the day, i can't imagine my life without it. Thank you! i hope you read all these posts and realize how much of an impact you made on every BBM User!

BChydro86

Once upon a time. This was a great idea...

Today its a useless platform. Single platform messaging is flat out stupid in todays smartphone market. Only crackberry freaks use bbm religiously. And in reality is easily replacable by google chat and a multitude of other instant messaging apps that can be used across many platforms and on computers.

Bbm is dying with blackberry phones. I only use a blackberry for the keyboard. I'm not a touch screen typer.

Matt J

We who are about to die salute you!

xRuhRohx

As a software engineer and BlackBerry developer, I look up to this guy.
To be able to create something so powerful and so addicting.
Something that even swayed a lot of people to stick with a BlackBerry.
A true visionary here.

carlyincanada

Love my BB 9300 Curve & Playbook 32G!! Maybe Gary can get the Playbook to work better...email, apps etc!!

phonejunky

That's pretty awesome nice to see the inventor, have to take note of this

npunk42

Thanks from Salinas California!

AnotherBillJ

So how does Gary top this accomplishment? To where do you go when you're at the top?

Ken_Stan

Good job Kevin of giving him his props!!! He certainly deserves it for sure!!! Because right now with my upgrade coming in a month BBM is the ONLY reason im sticking with Blackberry!

TomCanuck

Thanks Gary Klassen <3

the brother

Thakns Gary for getting me laid! :P

bigjman

Gary's the man, one of the greatest inventions in smartphone history!

Jake Storm

Thank you Gary Klassen!

adiafzal

Gary, you rock! No other apps can come close to BBMessenger!

Goldthorn

Thank you Gary Klassen

shboy

thanks for posting kevin! THANK YOU GARY! BBM FTW

walcolm

Is he a member of crackberry? if he is not, i think Kevin should make him a crackberry nation hall of famer!

Majestic Lion

Thank you for helping us recognize the person behind an incredible innovation. Thank you, Mr Klassen.

Numero12

Gary You're the man! MASTER!

marshmallowX

Loads of KUDOS to you, GARY: You're simply da BOMB! The MASTER!!

jv9300

My love life is entirely built upon BBM. Thank you Gary.

DariusG1996

So Kevin, you said it yourself... "BlackBerry Messenger is the must-have application that attracts people to buying a BlackBerry Smartphone and keeps them from switching to another platform when it comes time to upgrade. "

So now please tell me why having multiplatform BBM will benefit BlackBerry, other than the BB reputation...

Who is going to buy a Z10, when they can get an iPhone and STILL have BBM? Surely they're driving customers away??

Then... The app will be FREE?! I pay for my BBM, wth?

Please answer my question :D tell me why this is a good decision for BlackBerry??

I told my current iPhone friends and they all said that they don't care, they've got What'sApp, Skype nd SnapChat! They're not even bothered about BBM on multiplatform... AND, some don't even want it!

Davidro1

I bought a Z10 for other reasons. Didn't know about BBM except that it was blackberry s' proprietary thing.

After I installed thousands of contacts I saw that no one had BBM. Didn't feel upset, never used BBM.

Yes ive used chat and i know what it does compared to email. Now, I'll be glad to learn more about BBM in a few months from now when other people statt using it.

Btw I downloaded Whatsapp and found it not all that great -- although im sure it's good for those who pay per text.