Interesting article about the potential for Google to take over RIM....
 

http://www.thestreet.mobi/story/1121...quire-rim.html

Interesting - plausible? I don't know, but certainly interesting.

Plausible, of course. But I'd let RIM die a load more before snapping them up for peanuts, they have a load of cash right now but are bleeding heavily.

Microsoft buying Nokia?

Yeh, RIM still have a way to go imho: a case of if they can hold off the "wolves" until QNX implementation hits their smartphone range.......

Touch and go imho - not overly convinced. Poor leadership from RIM's top people by the sounds of it. Their stock certainly has nose-dived in the last few months. But that's what you get when you don't release any innovative products. Updates on old technology don't make a "progressive" statement, do they?

But to put it into perspective, RIM's corporate market is still very strong. But they've taken on the market leaders and Apple.....

And currently are losing in the consumer market.

The crackberry lot seem to be imploding :D (kinda like this place when the Scoob's decline started - died down a bit now that the Scoob HAS declined :D )

The daft thing is that in different demographics, Blackberry does seem to be doing pretty well - female teenagers and corporate specifically. iMessage might rebalance that slightly, but iphones are seen as "bloke" gadgets.
There's a few usage maps being shown around too that highlight how far Apple need to go too - I had NO idea how popular Android as in the States.

However, I don't think RIM will die - at worst, they'll get swallowed up, as their security infrastructure is second to none, and have some pretty powerful backers (such as Governments)

There ARE some very strong similarities to Nokia though. The main difference being that Nokia were so arrogant that they thought they could fight of these "upstarts" (Apple & Google) - they had NOTHING in the development pot to take on Android and iOS.
At least RIM did see that OS6/7 was pretty much over, and looked at QNX (clever use of Android app integration) - they didn't have the option to go into bed with Apple (never going to happen imho).

Let's hope for RIM's sake and the circa (if you believe it) 129 million blackberrys out there, that time is on their side. Or maybe Google take-over might be a good thing.

Corporate are wiseing up, RIM was the only option and RIM cashed in on that with huge server charges. Microsoft are going to kill that market for them soon. Why have a third party in your mail service? MS will do a Google and give it away free. That leaves teenagers and they only have a short lifespan.

<tumbleweed> QNX </tumbleweed>

certainly interesting times ahead - I give RIM about 18 months. Tops.

+1

im hoping work get rid of blackberrys and get something android or ios i

Business won't go for Android yet - it's security is almost on a par with Microsoft.

I don't see Blackberry dying completely, maybe incorporated into something else.

For mobile devices, touchscreen still isn't sorted (Apple's is good but it's frustrating sometimes*) - a real keyboard/pad is still a viable option: especially for the more rugged environments. I would like to see Apple with a proper keyboard but it will NEVER happen :D Apple don't see physical keyboards as the future.

But keyboards on phones are, in all fairness, a Blackberry strong-point.

Now a 'berry (with the virtues it DOES have), with an augmented OS..... that could be the way forward.

Again, will be interesting to see what happens in the next 18 months! :D