I totally forgot that BlackBerry Maps for BB10 wasn't a global thing yet. But good news for you folk in Scandinavia and Eastern Europe as it looks like you can now take advantage of the native application - which for navigation does a sweet job if you ask me. Thanks to forum member JPVJ, he can confirm that Denmark, Sweden and Norway are now live and I'm hoping that there are more out...
The topic of apps has been an issue for quite some time now, CrackBerry Forums members weigh in on whether or not a richer ecosystem would improve BlackBerry sales and perception.
If you have an Outlook email account attached to your device, there's a pretty good chance you may have noticed a ton of authorization warnings happening, especially if you're on BlackBerry 10 and not a BlackBerry OS device. Microsoft took the services offline earlier and have since restored them however, mobile users still seem to be affected according to the Outlook status page. Have...
Early Monday morning things started off with a bang. BlackBerry announced that it’s board of directors had established a special committee to look at strategic alternatives including a possible sale of the company. I already discussed the matter briefly here and also here. I’ve been reading lots of the other news stories and watching some of the video clips. I notice that pretty much...
Today I had a read through a report from Gus Papageorgiou from Scotiabank. On the back of the announcement of a special committee to explore strategic alternatives, he raised his target price on the stock. His new target is $14.20, up from $12.50 previously. In his report, he comments on the higher probability of a sale of the company or a strategic partnership versus a going private...
It has been over one year since BlackBerry hired JP Morgan and RBC Capital Markets to help it explore strategic alternatives such as finding a partner or licensing the BB10 operating system. What happened during that time? I’m not sure. As far as I can tell nothing has happened, except both investment banks have likely been paid nice fees for being on the assignment. Was this strategic...
Late last night, Reuters published a story suggesting that BlackBerry’s board of directors may actually be opening up to the idea of going private. So in good CrackBerry form, I thought I should write up something that explains what it means and how it might change things for the company if it happens. Let me start by saying this: I don’t think BlackBerry is going private anytime soon...
A new report from Reuters suggests that's the case according to some of their infamous sources familiar with the situation. This isn't the first time we've heard such a thing either. It's been a topic of discussion for quite some time now but nothing has ever really come of it. However, if Reuters sources are correct there could be something to it eventually: "There is a change of...
Digging around the CrackBerry Forums today, one thread I spotted that was getting some serious traffic was the news from CBC that three more senior executives would be exiting BlackBerry. Taking a look through the list of those departing, one has already apparently been gone for over a month now and can be found working at Amazon yet, the information is just now coming about. The other...
While we're obviously all about the BlackBerry-sponsored Team Mercedes AMG Petronas, it's still great to hear about other Formula 1 teams putting BlackBerry to good use as well. We actually haven't heard too much about just how Team Mercedes uses BlackBerry day-to-day, but Force India IT chief Adrian Collinson has nothing but good things to say about their team's use of BlackBerry...
Last night we got wind that the cross platform mobile instant messaging leader, WhatsApp, has been rolling push to talk (PTT) into the application. Bla1ze already gave you a quick rundown on this news. The comments have been pretty harsh, which isn’t surprising considering this is an enthusiast site, and you all know BBM is going cross platform soon. We all get that WhatsApp, while it...
Are you among the many folks who downloaded the leaked BlackBerry 10.2 file for your BlackBerry smartphone? If you are, did you notice there is now an icon for the BlackBerry Hub? There's a pretty hot debate in the CrackBerry Forums right now about why this Hub icon is even there and some folks have even gone so far as to remove the files needed for the icon to exist. It's no secret...
Ever since Thorsten Heins took over as the CEO of BlackBerry, there have been two big stated goals. The first was to make a comeback in smartphones, on the back of BlackBerry 10. The second was to be a clear leader in mobile computing, not just smartphones. Mobile computing includes machine to machine (M2M) communication. The BlackBerry 10 smartphone comeback is something the company is...
*Update: It seems the image is a confirmed concept - however, feel free to air your thoughts. Maybe BlackBerry will consider a slider if they think there's room in the market for it* It's rumor time again so take this one with a pinch of salt but I'm liking what I see here. Forum member Tariq Nasir posted the above image today and listed it as the BlackBerry Z15 which is due to be...
Remember back when the BlackBerry Torch was announced? It was a good time. The device was quite successful for BlackBerry and although the Torch name sort of took a turn from being a slider into a complete touch screen device, there is still plenty of folks out there who would like to see that form factor make a return to the BlackBerry line-up with some amped up specs and the...
Have you sat down and watched the news lately? If you have, there's a good chance you've had to sit through some of the worst BlackBerry bashing ever. The mainstream news coverage of BlackBerry is pretty terrible and in some ways, they've helped perpetuate the thought that BlackBerry died two years ago and has shuttered their doors, yet the company is still alive today. Recently, a...
Well, its been just about 6 months since the Z10 was released so I figured it would be a perfect time for a follow up to my post from last year. The reactions I got after my first post was mixed, but overall positive. It was great to see so many people support my decision. There were, of course, people who thought I was crazy. So did I make the right choice? This might get a little...
As BlackBerry gets set to take its native BBM instant messaging service cross-platform to Android and iOS, there's no doubt the incumbent it wants to crush is WhatsApp. Over the last couple of years WhatsApp has grown to have a huge base of users across platforms and around the world. Jump into any phone app store, and WhatsApp will always be near the top of the list. WhatsApp has been...
Is launching BBM cross platform on iOS and Android BlackBerry's "Hail Mary" pass to rebuilding brand awareness in the USA? CrackBerry's in house industry analyst Chris Umiastowski thinks so!
BlackBerry names - it's always been a fun guessing game. With the older BlackBerry OS phones, over the years the system for naming new models became a bit of a fragmented mess - Bold, Curve, Pearl, Storm, Torch, Tour, Style became brand families and a bunch of model number designations followed the family name. Sometimes the name and model number progression made "sense." Sometimes,...
If you've been paying attention for the past little while then you already know BlackBerry Messenger is getting ready to go 'cross-platform' though arguably, they'll need to support more platforms than iOS and Android before it's really considered cross-platform. But what if that was already in the works? No, I'm not talking about Windows Phone but instead, something much larger. Your...
He's bacccCK! Watch part deux above. And if you missed part 1, you can watch it here. I like this kid (J_Caloy) - think we're going to bring him on the next CrackBerry podcast if he's willing. I'd love to see more members of CrackBerry Nation take to the youtubez to express their love for their BB. If you do it, send us the link. If we like it, we'll blog it up - it's as simple as...
Being a new F1 fan, I've been diving deeper into all the Formula One goodness on race weekends. I try my best to check out the practice and qualifying sessions as they happen, but for most races I've had to DVR them as they show a bit early here on the east coast. I make it a point to avoid social media on race day and have been doing pretty well so far. Kevin nearly blew the race with...
Yesterday in the CrackBerry Forums, a member asked me to comment on the possible value of BBM, presumably as a standalone asset that BlackBerry can monetize on its own. BBM is a mobile-only app with many purposes. First and foremost it’s an IM app, and arguably the best mobile IM app on the market. But it’s now also a video chat and voice chat app. And depending on what else BlackBerry...
In the CrackBerry forums we typically hear about users switching to BlackBerry from iPhone or Android and not so much Windows phone, but one of our new members beachhoppr did just that. In what is nearly a live blog of his first few days with the BlackBerry Z10, beachhoppr has given a play-by-play of his pros and cons with the Z10 as compared to Windows Phone (most recently the Lumia...