RIM CEO: Buggy smartphone software is the "new reality"
By Thomas Ricker 
posted Jan 26th 2009 2:01AM
posted Jan 26th 2009 2:01AM
Now, instead of pleading for mercy at the feet of disgruntled consumers, RIM co-CEO, Jim Balsillie, calls the post-launch scramble part of the "new reality" of making complex cellphones in large volumes. A Verizon spokesman noted that return percentages are measurable in single digits (standard for a smartphone) adding, "The sales and performance of the device have lived up to our expectations." Fine, but when expectations are high that the consumer experience will be poor, somehow that doesn't sound like a victory to us.
Greedy people will always find a way to justify their mistakes! Sure they arent attempting simple things now but thats no justification for releasing buggy products. RIM has done a pretty good job till now, i dont see a reason why they want to go a wrong way, recent comments havent been encouraging at all. Hopefully better sense will prevail sooner than later!
I guess this means customers need to start voting with their wallets. Wait a year before getting the latest phone to make sure it actually works as advertised. I bet if enough people did that, RIM would change the way they go about releasing new phones...
Funny cause apple did the same with iPhone, i never had a phone that gave me so much headache like iphone did. I had to exchange it 3 times
and all because of the software problem.. now when the actual manufacture don't care about buggy devices.
i learn something with the iphone, i will not get something until it has been on the market for at least 1 month because that way some of the buggs
will be fixed.
500,000 in 1 month worldwide?
I guess you should have compared that figure to the G1 which made the same figure in 1 month in a US/UK-only release.
I can understand this to some extent. My fear is that they will never fully fix the software. Or that it will take to long for it to get done.
well early adopters generally know this when talking about any tech product at launch almost, but its disturbing when the big wigs putting out this buggy product openly accept that. i do alot of research before buying anything and even on release of most new products i know the problems well before it drops. with smartphones though, they are so tight lipped u just dont know. thats the exact reason i wait on buying cellphones at least a couple weeks after launch.
Which would you prefer? Major player who is generally frank about the realities of newly released smartphones? ... Or those who assume the buying public are so stupid as to believe all their user problems are self-created [read: MS]?
I'll put my money on the first example every single day.
what i would rather have is equipment that is tested and fully working when they release it. most of the biggest problems can be fixed within like a month of release, so why not just hold the damn release back a month and fix it from the gate?
i understand where your coming from, and in that situation (that you stated) i would probably side with your answer but what i would really want is for them to test it properly before they put it out the door. sure, your not going to catch everything every time but it should be a better percentage than what we have grown to accept now.
it's sad that companies are so eager to get the phone out there and make money off it that they don't fully test it and make sure things work well before they release. I guess i just need to not let the hype get to me and wait several months before buying a phone as mentioned above
Feel free to vote this down, but is that Dawson's Creek crying on the picture?....hahahahahaha
Haha I agree that is really funny, nice touch Engadget!
I agree with the CEO that this phone is complex. Everything at your fingertips with a screen that clicks. However everything that I dislike about the phone is a software issue. The acceleromator and the camera lagging can be fixed with a software upgrade, users were saying that .90 is the best unofficial release yet. So as long as RIM will continue to put out updates to fix these issues, as a company they will gain my loyalty as a customer.
Unfortunately, this seems to be a trend for Verizon and the phones they release. New phones are released far too often, in addition, these phones are buggy.
Verizon, other carriers, test phones before you release them and not just to see if it'll connect to the network.
Buggy software is NOT new reality. Windows Mobile has been around for years...
GOOD, i'm glad the press exposed that this device is really a joke compared to the iPhone. I got one for free and I wouldn't have payed a dime for this thing. The software sucks! It's slow,buggy, crappy all-around. My battery lasts less than half a day-and that's not using anything but the phone and text/emails, I hate to see how quickly it dies when using the camera/music/internet. I feel sorry for people who paid money for this thing and can't get out of it. Also, the internet sucks it's slow/tiny/hard to navigate/crap. No WiFi. I'm sorry the thing really does suck, and I wanted to like it- but it's not happening. Hey RIM don't you get paid to sit up there in Canada and try and release devices that actually work? That's reality, you morons. The iPhone puts this thing to shame, iPhones like a device from 2009, the Storm would be from around the early to mid 90's. And no I don't even own an iPhone, i'm just that damn bitter about how lame this thing turned out to be. If you are trying to decide between the storm and iphone- iphone hands down. And plus you won't have to be like "No, no, this is actually a BlackBerry" when people think it's an iphone/ipod. I'm out.
LOL Love the graphic in the corner. I have a G1 and love it but wish they would update more often. :-( Oh well still a kick ash phone that has saved me $$ at Best Buy on Movies and such. I want a BB 8900 NOW TMOBILE!!!
All I hear now are complaints about buggy software. When word gets out that a new phone is on the horizon, all I hear from the same people is "Why do the companies wait so long for these phones to be released? WAAAHHH!!!"
Seriously, folks, if you don't believe me, go back and read the articles about the release of the Storm being delayed.
If you follow the Verizon Wireless release schedule for Blackberries, new models are always released in May and November - color variations don't count. It's been that way since at least as far back as the Pearl.
Whaddya mean *new* reality?
There's really been a disconnect in recent years between what people expect of a new computer product, and what is actually required to make a good product great. In something enormously complex, the only real choice a computer company has is to let the you-know-what hit the fan and let the bugs run wild so they can find 'em and iron 'em out. For anybody who doesn't believe me, I have two words for you: Windows XP.
For all the whining I hear about Vista, I'm really surprised nobody remembers early XP! I was an early adopter of both operating systems, and I have to say that XP was a bucketload of trouble when I first got it. My video card hard-locked my system every time I ran any sort of 3D application. My DVD drive would become unresponsive at inopportune times (usually when I was watching a movie...). The only thing I could do in peace was browse the web and type. Granted, that was quite an improvement over the far less stable ME and Win98, which couldn't seem to handle my computing habits for longer than 24 hours at a time.
I'd say Vista was an oddly familiar experience, especially since Nvidia took their sweet time getting a stable 64 bit driver out. All my stability issues magically dissappeared when they got their act together, and Vista became a lot of fun to use. Now we have a "Second Edition" of sorts on its way. I'm sure it'll have its own share of bugs, but what can I say? I have some sort of strange disease that actually makes me enjoy being an early-adopter.
Frankly, I feel the problems with the Storm have been minimal at best. Feel like you're paying to beta test? Welcome to the world of 7 years ago. Internal testing and even public betas just simply won't find what the general public will. Lets not forget that both runs of the iPhone had their share of whiners as well. If you can't stand bugs, you shouldn't be an early adopter. For anything. Don't buy any new video cards. Don't play any new MMOs. Don't get any new gadgets. Wait until the bugs are ironed out, then enjoy. (And before anybody asks, I favor Windows Mobile these days.)
Now, instead of pleading for mercy at the feet of disgruntled consumers, RIM co-CEO, Jim Balsillie, calls the post-launch scramble part of the "new reality" of making complex cellphones in large volumes.
Translation:
Programming is getting harder for devices, so we're going to use that as an excuse to not try hard, deal with it!
All companies care about is making money now, who cares about your client. Banks screwed up the economy with their greed, and now technology companies are too lazy to put out a quality product, but are happy to let us pay top dollar for them.
I agree Julio, you nailed it.
We understand things are not simple but then if buggy software is a reality, i still believe we have a choice, then premium on such handsets isnt justified, do a beta and distribute free stuff till bugs are satisfactorily sorted out!