By Saira Hussain.
The news that Blackberry is set to roll out its messenger BBM to iOS and android, came as a shock to many. A press release issued by the company claimed that the launch will take place this summer.
In the past, Blackberry always asserted on keeping BBM an exclusive service for Blackberry users. It was BlackBerry’s sole silver lining. BBM’s setup compared to that of viber and whatsApp was the only unique feature of Blackberry.
So far, the Blackberry team claims that 60 million people use BBM every month and more than 51 million people use the BBM service for more than 90 minutes every day. They also declared that the messages sent through BBM per day are more than twice as many as other apps such as whatsApp. The tech-media people are actually eager to see how Blackberry’s BBM picks up against its rival services (Viber and WhatsApp).
While choosing services people have their own set of preferences, for some being user-friendly tops the list while for others privacy is more important.
There is no doubt that whatsApp is user-friendly but then the privacy issues remains unsolved. Anybody can go through your name and details if they have your contact number. Whereas BBM only adds the contact if the other person has your BB pin.
On the other hand whatsApp is already available for iOS, android and blackberry therefore its reach is much wider unlike BBM.
This expansion somehow seems like a desperate move by Blackberry.
