This is not a direct answer to your question; it's more of a commentary. To wit:
The perception of RIM varies widely between the 1st world and less-developed countries.
First world consumers view BlackBerries as being antiquated. And, quite frankly, they are are correct. Compared to the functions and apps available for iOS and Android, BlackBerry has yet to show up to the party.
Meanwhile, here in Jamaica, everyone has a BlackBerry. Executives. Middle Managers. Regular Staff. Street vendors. Taxi drivers. Why?(The exceptions are mostly hipsters. Yes, we have them here too, all Mac'd out.)
The difference is 1 word: UNLIMITED
My BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS) plan costs JMD 1,500 / month. Unlimited data. And it means I have access to BlackBerry Messenger BBM, which is HUGELY popular here (I'm told in other 3rd world countries as well). BBM is basically the equivalent of unlimited texting. My bank is on BBM - I regularly send them messages while lying in bed.
If I had an iPhone / Android, I'd lose access to to BBM, plus have to buy an expensive data plan, all of which are capped. My carrier, Digicel, is testing it's 3G/4G rollout, so I'm still on EDGE. The competitor, LIME, has had 3G for some time. A 2GB plan will cost me JMD $2,000, while 4GB & 7GB plans cost 3,000 and 5,000 respectively. So cost-wise, I'd be a fool to switch to another smartphone platform.
For most people, it's not the data though: It's all about BBM. Business, relationships, current affairs, missing persons alerts all flow through BBM. Jamaica runs on BBM. A friend of mine runs his mobile phone sales/repair service directly via BBM - broadcasts are sent each day with the day's specials, you order, and he shows up. (he does use an iPad to generate an invoice and email, though :))
All my domains are hosted on Google Apps, so it'd be nice to get me a Galaxy S3 or HTC One X. But I'm not yet ready to pay so much extra for a data plan.
So that's why everyday I check on the progress of BlackBerry 10. I'm hoping it will at the very least bring RIM on par with iOS and Android. If it does that, then I'll buy one when they're released, and continue to enjoy BBM and unlimited data. If not, Android here I come. I'm raising prices anyway, so I'll be able to afford a data plan.
Interesting times are ahead. From a consumer perspective, I hope RIM succeeds - I don't want to be at the mercy of AAPL or GOOG. I hope BB10 excels and forces developers to port the best apps to BB.
I agree with you, the best features of Blackberry were the unlimited plan for cheap money (i remember something like 10-12euro/month here in Italy, while data plan were probably 30-40-50euro/month and in the hundreds of megabytes cap order) for small business man (BIS) and the integration and "power of control" of BES solution for big enterprises.
Now I see it still used almost only in big corps, probably because of this second reason.
I could also add that BIS (at least the version i've tried in italy with TIM and Vodafone, but I think the service should be the same all over the world) is a second level service for mail: we've a vanilla IMAP/SMTP server and BIS polls only the inbox folder (you cant, afaik, see and move into other imap folders) and also save your sent email only if you create a "Sent" folder on the imap box (so it doesnt use the default one that we have on webmail and outlook). My standard Android email app handles this correctly.
It's funny, I gave my GF a Google Galaxy Nexus to use for the last week, to replace her crappy Bold 9700. Within 2 days, she switched back to her BlackBerry.
Me: "Sweety, why'd you switch back? The Android's a much better phone!"
Her: "BBM. And other stuff."
Me: "What do you mean?"
Her: "The phone is good for games and Internet surfing, but I found it really confusing. I couldn't get to my e-mails easily. And I really wanted BBM again."
Now, it could just be her stubbornness in not attempting to learn a new UI. Android isn't necessarily worse or better, just different. However, I think if RIM can deliver games + Internet with BB10 (which they can, just look at the benchmarks and the PlayBook) alongside seamless BBM and messaging, they've got a winner.
Whether it's a winner in North America is a different story. But internationally, where BlackBerry is strong, you'll see a lot of people upgrading.
The usability of the Universal Inbox, which groups all messages and notifications, cannot be overstated. It is just so easy to glance and see all action items, and go directly from there to the app.
For those who've never used a BB, it works like this: Say someone sends you a message or friend request on FB. Sure, you'll see a notification over the FB icon, but you'll also see a message in the Universal Inbox saying "John Doe has sent you a friend request." Clicking on that message takes you directly into the FB app where you can confirm or ignore the request.
It works the same for other apps too. If there is an upgrade available for one of your apps, the message is there; clicking it takes you directly into the App World section for that app. Quite nice.
The perception of RIM varies widely between the 1st world and less-developed countries.
First world consumers view BlackBerries as being antiquated. And, quite frankly, they are are correct. Compared to the functions and apps available for iOS and Android, BlackBerry has yet to show up to the party.
Meanwhile, here in Jamaica, everyone has a BlackBerry. Executives. Middle Managers. Regular Staff. Street vendors. Taxi drivers. Why?(The exceptions are mostly hipsters. Yes, we have them here too, all Mac'd out.)
The difference is 1 word: UNLIMITED
My BlackBerry Internet Service (BIS) plan costs JMD 1,500 / month. Unlimited data. And it means I have access to BlackBerry Messenger BBM, which is HUGELY popular here (I'm told in other 3rd world countries as well). BBM is basically the equivalent of unlimited texting. My bank is on BBM - I regularly send them messages while lying in bed.
If I had an iPhone / Android, I'd lose access to to BBM, plus have to buy an expensive data plan, all of which are capped. My carrier, Digicel, is testing it's 3G/4G rollout, so I'm still on EDGE. The competitor, LIME, has had 3G for some time. A 2GB plan will cost me JMD $2,000, while 4GB & 7GB plans cost 3,000 and 5,000 respectively. So cost-wise, I'd be a fool to switch to another smartphone platform.
For most people, it's not the data though: It's all about BBM. Business, relationships, current affairs, missing persons alerts all flow through BBM. Jamaica runs on BBM. A friend of mine runs his mobile phone sales/repair service directly via BBM - broadcasts are sent each day with the day's specials, you order, and he shows up. (he does use an iPad to generate an invoice and email, though :))
All my domains are hosted on Google Apps, so it'd be nice to get me a Galaxy S3 or HTC One X. But I'm not yet ready to pay so much extra for a data plan.
So that's why everyday I check on the progress of BlackBerry 10. I'm hoping it will at the very least bring RIM on par with iOS and Android. If it does that, then I'll buy one when they're released, and continue to enjoy BBM and unlimited data. If not, Android here I come. I'm raising prices anyway, so I'll be able to afford a data plan.
Interesting times are ahead. From a consumer perspective, I hope RIM succeeds - I don't want to be at the mercy of AAPL or GOOG. I hope BB10 excels and forces developers to port the best apps to BB.
Edit: clarifications.