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RIM Offers the Virtual Olive Branch

geek — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 15:53:09 +0000

Realizing that there are more viable smartphone choices out there, RIM has made a strong move to placate customers still upset about last weeks service outage. Namely offering enterprise customers one month of free technical support and end users a suite of “premium” applications for free. The complete press release is below:

Research In Motion Offers Free Premium Apps to Customers Following Service Interruptions

Waterloo, ON – Research In Motion (RIM) (NASDAQ: RIMM; TSX: RIM) announced today that a selection of premium apps worth a total value of more than US $100 will be offered free of charge to subscribers as an expression of appreciation for their patience during the recent service disruptions. The apps will be made available to customers over the coming weeks on BlackBerry® App World™ and will continue to be available until December 31, 2011.*

“Our global network supports the communications needs of more than 70 million customers,” said RIM Co-CEO Mike Lazaridis. “We truly appreciate and value our relationship with our customers. We’ve worked hard to earn their trust over the past 12 years, and we’re committed to providing the high standard of reliability they expect, today and in the future.”

The complete selection of premium apps will become available to download at BlackBerry App World over a period of four weeks beginning Wednesday, October 19th. The selections over this period will include the following (with more to come):

• SIMS 3 – Electronic Arts
• Bejeweled – Electronic Arts
• N.O.V.A. – Gameloft
• Texas Hold’em Poker 2 – Gameloft
• Bubble Bash 2 – Gameloft
• Photo Editor Ultimate – Ice Cold Apps
• DriveSafe.ly Pro – iSpeech.org
• iSpeech Translator Pro – iSpeech.org
• Drive Safe.ly Enterprise – iSpeech.org
• Nobex Radio™ Premium – Nobex
• Shazam Encore – Shazam
• Vlingo Plus: Virtual Assistant – Vlingo

RIM’s enterprise customers will also be offered one month of free Technical Support. Current customers will be offered a complimentary one month extension of their existing Technical Support contract, and customers who do not currently have a Technical Support contract will be offered a one month trial of RIM’s BlackBerry Technical Support Services – Enhanced Support, free of charge. Additional details about the program and information about how to register will be available at www.blackberry.com/enterpriseoffer.

“We are grateful to our loyal BlackBerry customers for their patience,” added Lazaridis. “We have apologized to our customers and we will work tirelessly to restore their confidence. We are taking immediate and aggressive steps to help prevent something like this from happening again.”

Note to Editors:
Last week, many customers experienced service interruptions and delays over a period of approximately 3 days in Europe, the Middle East, India and Africa, 1.5 days in Latin America and Canada, and 1 day in the United States. Global teams worked around the clock to contain the issue and minimize the impact to customers as much as possible. As of Thursday, October 13, service levels returned to normal.

* Please note that the availability of this offer will depend on the type of device, operating system version, access to BlackBerry App World and local conditions and/or restrictions.

About Research In Motion
Research In Motion (RIM), a global leader in wireless innovation, revolutionized the mobile industry with the introduction of the BlackBerry® solution in 1999. Today, BlackBerry products and services are used by millions of customers around the world to stay connected to the people and content that matter most throughout their day. Founded in 1984 and based in Waterloo, Ontario, RIM operates offices in North America, Europe, Asia Pacific and Latin America. RIM is listed on the NASDAQ Stock Market (NASDAQ: RIMM) and the Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX: RIM). For more information, visit www.rim.com or www.blackberry.com.

Forward-looking statements in this news release are made pursuant to the “safe harbor” provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and applicable Canadian securities laws. When used herein, words such as “expect”, “anticipate”, “estimate”, “may”, “will”, “should”, “intend,” “believe”, and similar expressions, are intended to identify forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements are based on estimates and assumptions made by RIM in light of its experience and its perception of historical trends, current conditions and expected future developments, as well as other factors that RIM believes are appropriate in the circumstances. Many factors could cause RIM’s actual results, performance or achievements to differ materially from those expressed or implied by the forward-looking statements, including those described in the “Risk Factors” section of RIM’s Annual Information Form, which is included in its Annual Report on Form 40-F (copies of which filings may be obtained at www.sedar.com or www.sec.gov). These factors should be considered carefully, and readers should not place undue reliance on RIM’s forward-looking statements. RIM has no intention and undertakes no obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, except as required by law.

The BlackBerry and RIM families of related marks, images and symbols are the exclusive properties and trademarks of Research In Motion Limited. RIM, Research In Motion and BlackBerry are registered with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and may be pending or registered in other countries. All other brands, product names, company names, trademarks and service marks are the properties of their respective owners. RIM assumes no obligations or liability and makes no representation, warranty, endorsement or guarantee in relation to any aspect of any third party products or services.

Apple iPhone 4s Launches in US

geek — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 16:48:20 +0000

Shortly after 8:30 this morning, UPS dropped a small diminutive box off at reception with my name on it. Apple’s 5th generation iPhone has arrived in California and the mayhem continues. As I sit here wondering when is a good time to start trying to swap from one phone to the other I am listening to my peers complaining about how difficult it is to get their own new phones activated – maybe this phone will be a success after all.

Some interesting side notes:

Steve Wozniac, Apple’s co-founder, was enjoying the excitement at the Los Gatos, California store last night. He “didn’t want to miss” this great event, even though we all know that he probably has two of the new phones hanging out in his Prius. As an aside, it’s nice to see that he’s taken the high-road and isn’t be accused of “cutting the line” like previous releases.
The Pleasanton, California Apple store had about 250 people in line with some suggesting that the store had “1000′s of phones” of unknown configuration for unknown carriers. With the ever increasing number of SKUs that Apple has to manage for this release, it’s easy to see how 1000′s could quickly turn into “you’re not getting the phone you want.”
Local news in the San Francisco Bay Area has caught the fever and are reporting regularly about all the people waiting for their new phone and how successful the launch is. In typical Apple fashion; yes, the launch is successful, woo hoo!

Share your stories, what are people seeing in the queue waiting for their Apple phone?

geek

iFixit Teardown Has Begun!

geek — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:02:01 +0000

In what has almost become a right of passage for new cell phones, ifixit.com has started their iPhone 4s teardown. Not much of a surprise, as rumors were running rampant, the new phone apparently only includes the same 512MB of RAM that the previous iPhone 4 included.

They identify all the core pieces and it appears that just what you might already expect is in there. Nice to see, of course, the quality of Apple’s design, and equally amazing how much stuff they have crammed in there. Stop on over to the iFixit site and check out what they’re doing!

geek

Are iPhone 4S Sales Better Than Expected?

geek — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 17:38:02 +0000

Bloomberg is reporting today that all three US based wireless carriers have sold out on their initial allotment of iPhone 4s phones. Apple, Verizon and newcomer, Sprint are all showing that launch-day availability of smartphones is no longer available. Most of the sites that were visited are showing up to three weeks for delivery and even Apple is quoting 1-2 weeks before people get their phone.

On an up note, if you’re willing to start sitting outside your local Apple retail store it’s likely that they will have a bit of inventory on hand for those of you not wanting to pre-order their phone.

geek

iOS5 Beta 2 Released by Apple

geek — Fri, 24 Jun 2011 23:49:07 +0000

iOS 5 was released a few weeks ago as one of the most stable beta releases that I have seen in recent years and the improvements over previous software were significant. The notifications functionality is outstanding and well worth the price of admission – which n the iPhone 4 was what appeared to be a slight lag from time to time. This afternoon, Apple released iOS 5 beta 2 (9A5248d) to developers, and an updated version of iTunes 10.5 beta 2.

While I’m sure Apple is doing the best they can to make this an easy upgrade process for developers, it’s frustrating, to say the least that after installing the new release of iTunes you will be unable to sync your beta 1 iOS 5 device until you have upgraded it to iOS beta 2. As those are ~750+MB downloads, it’s a bit frustrating. To resume syncing, connect you idevice and follow the upgrade process as you did when originally installing iOS 5; it will work successfully.

Some other highlights culled from notes and the internet:

iTunes 10.5b2 can’t sync iOS 5 Beta 1 devices
iOS5 Beta 1 devices can’t iMessage iOS5 Beta 2 devices and vice-versa
WiFI Sync works with OSX Computers only (has to be enabled in iTunes 10.5 beta 2) – Sorry Windows users
Over-the-Air (OTA) updates have been released – none current available
General speed improvements (thank goodness) and bug fixes

That’s it for now – I will add more as I get it.

~geek

Verizon Wireless Reports LTE 4G Outage

geek — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 17:13:38 +0000

Earlier this morning Verizon finally acknowledged a problem with it’s 4G LTE network. Through their official Verizon Wireless Twitter account (@VerizonWireless), Verizon Wireless has reported that “We’re aware of an issue with #4G #LTE connections & our network engineers are working to resolve quickly. Will update here.” As a Verizon Thunderbolt customer, this is a wee-bit frustrating, with the most interesting read coming a few hours later: “Investigating 4G LTE network issue; ThunderBolts making voice calls, may get slower 1xRTT data. Will update here.”

Not sure what this means for the long haul, but it does not appear that Verizon Wireless is being too quick to respond to this problem or the mounting frustration of their users. For many, myself included, the loss of any service above 1xRTT started yesterday evening – not this morning – and it took this long for Verizon to even acknowledge as more than a “just restart your phone” answer from #611.

On a positive note, reviewing the news, this outage marks the first major issue for Verizon’s LTE network. From my perspective it’s the first hiccup and hopefully one that will be short lived. Even at that, it’s worth it for the speed and performance (if not battery life) that I have been getting with my HTC Thunderbolt on the Verizon San Francisco Bay Area 4G LTE network.

geek

Cisco Axes 550; Kills Flip Video

geek — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 00:13:07 +0000

Cisco has announced today that they are killing off the mildly successful, consumer-oriented Flip video camera line and eliminating 550 related jobs. Once the darling of the blogosphere and often given responsibility for jump-starting the handheld video market, Flip’s camera hasn’t kept pace with advancing video-equipped smartphones like Apple’s iPhone.

As someone that’s been back and forth with Flip over the years, this isn’t a surprising move to me, although I would have expected Cisco to try and sell the line before shedding it off into oblivion. Knowing my parents (and other people just like them), it just seems like there’s some life left there for people that aren’t ready to carry around a $500 phone. Apparently Cisco doesn’t see it that way, or the sale price wouldn’t be worth losing the long-term potential of reviving this brand.

Lot of other stuff going on at Cisco, most of it about saving money in hopes of reviving this former Wall Street darling, but I suspect that most of it will simply eliminate a free-fall and not change the direction of most high-tech companies. In my humble opinion, Cisco needs to beg, borrow, buy, or steal some revolutionary technology to enhance their bottom line and bring back the growth that made Cisco so popular.

More information at Cisco.com.

geek

Mother Nature is a Bitch

geek — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 18:38:09 +0000

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_b-2iByqHVI
It should be interesting to realize, even as you watch the above video, that tsunami is the Japanese word that loosely translates to “harbor wave.” Ask the typical American (before the recent earthquake) and they likely would have called it a tidal wave, which is woefully inaccurate. A tsunami is a large displacement of water most often caused by earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, or explosions beneath the water’s surface.

Rather than being a wave – a few dozen meters in length – tsunamis are surges that don’t raise the water very much but can push the water many kilometers into shore. Wondering what kind of power we’re talking about? The video above shows one viewpoint of the amazing power of the Japanese tsunami.

geek

Donate To Japan by buying “Songs for Japan” MP3s

geek — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 19:33:14 +0000

Apple’s iTunes music store is offering dowloads of “Songs for Japan“, featuring 38 songs from world-renowned artists including John Lennon, Queen, Katy Perry, Lady GaGa, Justin Bieber, Foo Fighters, Shakira, and others for a total of 38 songs. At just $10, with all proceeds going to the Japanese Red Cross, this is not just a great way to get some good music at a great price, you can feel good providing a bit more support to those in need.

geek

Apple Releases iOS 4.3.1 – Available Now

geek — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 18:02:28 +0000

As if all the exciting iPad 2 announcements weren’t enough Apple for the day, Apple has released iOS 4.3.1. Fire up iTunes and download the hefty 666.0 MB upgrade.

Some of the highlights:

Fixes an occasional graphics glitch on the iPod Touch (4th generation)
Resolves bugs related to connecting and activating on some cellular networks
Fixes image flickering with Apple’s new Digital AV Adapter
Resolves an issue authenticating with some enterprise web services

Curious to hear if you find anything else, but there you have it for today’s excitement.

geek