back to article Huge mob swarms phone launch – but it's a BLACKBERRY

The global launch of a new smartphone brought a huge mob of thousands of desperate punters to the doors of a shopping centre on Thursday night - ahead of Friday's grand unveiling. By the time staff unlocked the doors there was a 3,000-strong crowd, a huge crush surged forward and several people fainted. The Indonesian crowd …

COMMENTS

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  1. Fuzz

    If you sell a $540 phone at a 50% discount then of course you'll have a huge turn out. I'd talk about going, and then not bother because it was a Friday night/I forgot, just to get one to sell on for profit.

  2. tonysmith

    Yeah, a lot of 'non-western' countries blackberry has a bigger following than apple and I think it has more to do with their messaging service rather than price.

    I was in one of the middle eastern countries not so long ago and almost every kid had a blackberry. It was the 'older kids' - who had th

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "I think it has more to do with their messaging service rather than price."

      Do non-Western countries like playing "will anyone receive this message I'm about to send" roulette? It didn't really catch on in the UK.

      1. David 14

        Yeah... that's been a real problem... sure!! (please note sarcasm)

        Fanboi's love to mention a couple of datacentre glitches, but forget about crappy antennas, high prices, and the all-mighty fruit gods choosing what content you should be allowed to see on your phone.

        I'll stick with my blackberry and playbook... the hardware kicks ass and the functionality for what I do is far and above that offered by android or iOS devices...

        My $0.02

    2. bazza Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Interesting points

      You raise two interesting points which phone manufacturers (Apple in particular) should learn if they know what's good for them.

      Firstly, the killer app for a mobile is still communications. If a smartphone doesn't do messaging and voice calls effectively then it's market potential is limited.

      Secondly, "non-western countries" arguably amounts to several billion people, whereas "western countries" perhaps does not. So phones meeting the needs of the majority have greater market potential than those that don't.

      So does that mean that Blackberry have actually got it right from a worldwide marketing point of view? Despite their outage a few weeks back they remain the benchmark against which others are measured when it comes to messaging.

      Have Apple, by focusing on the apparent needs of a comparatively few app crazed incommunicative Westerners missed out on the wider world wide market where battery life, voice and messaging are the prime selling points? The reported problems with battery life and iCloud bugs don't exactly commend iPhones to those who can't charge up every day / mealtime / hour (as the trend would appear to be) and want to call or text their mates.

      Will Android manage to appeal in these emerging smartphone markets? Clearly yes because local manufacturers can tailor it for local non-google services (almost certainly not what Google intended) for local people, as has happened in China. But that results in more Android fragmentation.

      Time will tell I guess. If Indonesians are heading towards being Crackberry Addicts that could indicate that Apple and Android are reaching the limits of their world wide market potential. Given RIM's low share price, does that make their stock worth a punt?

  3. Paul Horstink

    Marketshare

    Right, popularity of blackberry mainly due to BBM and FB-usage. Blackberry services are relatively cheap (mostly purchased just for 1-day at a time). Blackberry claim to have 50% market-share for smart-phones in Indonesia...

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Some sense...

    At least the existence of the discount for the first 1000 justifies this kind of behaviour... I'll never understand why anyone would want to camp outside a fruit retailer to pay full whack for a device.

  5. heyrick Silver badge

    Wow.

    How much it would suck to be the 1001st customer!

    1. Ted Treen
      Facepalm

      @Heyrick

      About $270.00

  6. John 62
    Flame

    Blackberry != RIM

    At least two commenters have made the mistake of confusing the brand with the company. I think the moderatrix should be smacking down the ban-hammer for that!

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