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Comment by EnderMB | Hacker News Reader

I don't claim to be an expert on Blackberry, but for me the real sell for Blackberry has always been BBM. Kids today all have mobile phones, and most of them in the UK have Blackberry's solely for contacting each other through BBM.

I feel that Blackberry could save themselves by targeting both those who love BBM, and those who want a simple, cheap phone. I think parents and kids would love to have a basic phone with a physical keyboard, BBM and a great new UI.

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There was a significant BBM push that I recall last year[1]. I'd always heard great things about BBM, but it requires everyone to have a blackberry, no? That won't work in a diverse ecosystem; iPhone's Facetime is another example. These are standard features, not "killer" nor innovative features. Text messaging is the standard. Anything else can be had in an app (e.g. Kik Messenger [2]) that is at least cross platform.

[1] https://www.google.ca/search?q=blackberry+bbm+ads

[2] http://kik.com/

I've never understood why people like BBM. It's almost no different from texting except you need to have another number and both people need blackberries.

It's because you don't have to pay per-message, and there's groups.

i.e. cheap and fast.

Like iMessages (iPhone) and Google Voice/GroupMe (Android)?

but don't you have to pay the blackberry monthly fee or something?

Groups are convenient I guess.

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