The Argentinean government has recently banned sales of iPhones and BlackBerrys.  So what’s the point? It’s all in best hopes to reduce price inflation and to stabilize the economy within Argentina.  Currently, Microsoft, Nokia, Motorola, LG and Samsung have all opened up plants in Argentina and for that reason they do not fall under the ban.  Basically this puts Research In Motion on the spot to build a local plant in the country which will avoid BlackBerry smartphones from being imported in.

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It’s no secret that Research In Motion is a bit behind schedule when it comes to releasing a mobile device that competes with other smartphones out there.  BlackBerry 10 devices are delayed due to the manufacturing of LTE chips which are set to be ready by mid-2012.  A very sad but true statistic has come to surface today.  Apple’s App Store is worth more money than all of Research In Motion.  That’s one individual item belonging to Apple worth more that RIM. RIM’s stock has reached down to $13.44 per share and has a total company value of $7.04 billion.  This is based on last week’s stocks.

Apple’s App Store is worth $7.08 billion which climbs a bit right on top of Research In Motion.  The App Store only accounts for 2% of Apple’s value too.

 

Source: iDownloadBlog

I know many BlackBerry users still love Apple.  Some of you use MacBooks, iPads, or even have iPhones as side companions to your BlackBerry.  Either way, Steve Jobs, the man behind most of it all passed away and a theme has been created for BlackBerry in his memory.  The theme is of course Apple style and has Steve Jobs in the background in color as the image.  Features include:

• Maximum Optimization to Prevent Memory Leaks.
• Get the feel of Win Phone7 on your Black Berry�.
• 4-5 Icon home screen.
• Changeable app order.

Tribute to Steve Jobs Theme >>

Yesterday Steve Jobs, the former CEO of Apple past away.  Since then, we’ve been seeing reactions from competitors and people all over the world.  If you’re curious to see what Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie had to say, here’s their official statement:

“Steve Jobs was a great visionary and a respected competitor,” said Mike Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie, co-chiefs of BlackBerry maker Research in Motion Ltd., the company that has recently lost its North American smartphone market dominance to Apple and Google Inc.’s Android operating system. “We extend our deepest condolences to his family and to all of the employees of Apple.”

Source: WSJ

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Today Apple had their big announcements including iOS 5, which has a new service called iMessage.  iMessage is used as a universal messenger for iPhones and iPads to all talk to one another.  Sound familiar? BlackBerry Messenger is RIM’s most popular feature in the BlackBerry smartphone so Apple has taken on the same tactic in catering to iPhone users as well.

Like BBM, iMessage has delivery and read receipts and allows users to send messages, photos, videos, locations, and contacts. So what do you make out of Apple’s new feature? Does iMessage make you lean more towards the iPhone or do you remain loyal to BlackBerry?

Read more on iMessage at Apple.

I can’t really be mad at the fact that some of you out there are getting frustrated with the delayed launch of the BlackBerry PlayBook.  Patience can only go so far when a tablet is announced in September 2010, and here we are in March 2011 with nothing but teasers and public hands-on with it.  A friend of mine has been waiting alongside with me on the PlayBook to launch and we both were in the same boat of owning the first generation iPad and decided we’d wait for the PlayBook.  I’m still patiently waiting but he has gone ahead and purchased the iPad 2, losing faith in the PlayBook’s launch.  So that got me wondering as to how many other folks out there have lost faith in the BlackBerry PlayBook and have decided to go with an iPad to other tablet.

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Bayalink has been popular for their mobile solution of being able to have your BlackBerry used right on your computer, and now we see them extending out to the iPad.  Now the iPad may not exactly be a huge companion to the BlackBerry, but there are many of us out there who do own both devices.

Bayalink Liberty gives iPad users unique capability to securely connect to their BlackBerry data and interact with that data using the tablets screen and keyboard similar to how the Liberty technology has been used by enterprise customers for years on the PC, laptop and notebook. In subsequent releases, users will be able to surf the internet or intranet through the BlackBerry (with no VPN required) on a disconnected iPad via their standard BlackBerry data plan.

Hit the jump for the full press release and send an email to beta@bayalink.com to get in on the beta!

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Apple takes the lead in first place here in the IHS Global Mobile Application Store Ranking, but it’s nice to see BlackBerry App World come in second place, still nowhere near touching upon Apple’s numbers, but showing success.  In third place we see the Nokia Ovi Store and lastly Google Android Market.  Many would expect Android to come in second place, but RIM takes the lead there.  BlackBerry App World holds 7.7% of application market share with over $165 million in sales worldwide.  Keep in mind that App World currently holds over 20,000 applications, while other stores such as Android’s Market have over 150,000.

Source: MobileSyrup, Cnet

Well it’s no surprise that Apple is trying to compete with RIM when it comes to Enterprise.  We keep hearing about companies switching over to the iPhone or piloting the device for a bit over the BlackBerry.  Some interesting information came to surface today in regards to Apple.  The five employees listed below were formerly part of RIM, and have been recruited by Apple now in best hopes to increase enterprise for the iPhone.

• Geoff Perfect was head of strategic sales
• Joe Bartlett was a senior global sales manager
• Steve Marshall was a global strategic account manager
• Peter Decker was a global account manager
• Paul Alvarez was a global strategic account manager

So a BlackBerry strategy is being attempted at Apple.  This totally goes against Apple saying that they are way ahead of RIM with their products and have no concern about it.  The funny part is, this information was spotted on LinkedIn publicly where anyone can see hires and fires of employees.

Source: BerryReview, Business Insider

Browsing via BlackBerry? Click here to view video

Awesome.  I’ve been waiting to see a head to head comparison of both the BlackBerry PlayBook and the Apple iPad and here it is.  So the PlayBook is significantly smaller, but it is a more powerful machine is the video suggests.  In the video we see a few tests running as well as web pages loading with flash.  Of course the iPad doesn’t get any flash love, but the PlayBook does!