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So Blackberry survives but at what cost?

Just heard (on the radio, wow!) that Rim has ended its court battle with NTP by settling. (hey - it hasn't even made it onto their web site yet)

But is this a case of too little too late?

I got my first taste of Blackberry years ago - I loved their original (non-cell phone) device and lived on it for a good 2 years. This was before you could get Blackberry devices from your phone company and the like. Their stock was $10. Then it went to $180. Then they introduced phone devices. Then the competition started paying attention. BlackBerry still ruled back then but after the dotCom bubble broke. Down to $20 and now back to $81.

I stopped using my Blackberry because of poor customer service (I wasn't about to pay the equivalent price of a new device when I was simply "renting" mine for a repair). I only NOW have gotten to the point where I get the same results from my PDA (I use an ipaq but really rely on Google). Are my costs that much cheaper? Likely not. But there are so many more alternatives and hey, if I can do all of my computing on one device, then that would be ideal.

But I'm glad they are saved. I like RIM - great product but now they just look like another one in the great PDA community. Where's the innovation? I want them to make me go nuts just like they did with the original Blackberry.

Now THAT device Rocked!

Comments

Axinar said…
It was really sad to see them cave, but I understand the government swears by these things.

Actually I've been in the market for a new phone/PDA ever since my Nokia 6340i stopped being able to get on the Internet.

What exactly are you set up with?
March 3, 2006 at 8:12 PM
Andrew MacNeill said…
I run with an HP ipaq6515 - it has Bluetooth, GSM/GPRS , GPS and an SD slot where I use my WiFi card.

Also has a fairly decent camera.

Combined with gMail for mobile, it totally rocks!
March 4, 2006 at 9:03 AM
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