RIM’s legacy is writ large on the world around us. Almost every major enterprise mobile system is patterned on their excellent email and PIM solution. But they are now slaves to their own success. They can’t sell anything other than a keyboard-candybar phone in an era where the keyboard is increasingly irrelevant or hidden away until needed. This failure of imagination in both consumer and manufacturer is their curse. In a world where every phone is smart and every phone does email, there is little to recommend any RIM phone over any other. It’s over and now we’re just waiting for the buy-out and inevitable disappearance of one of the greatest mobile companies in modern memory.
(Via MobileCrunch.)
It’s so often a mistake for your current customers to determine your product roadmap. Current customers can be a fickle bunch. You need to figure out what future customers will want. I’ve often heard that the “only” reason my friends stick with their Blackberries is for BBM. When the one thing keeping your customers is a service that can be and is now replicated, you have a serious problem. You need to be different in a way that motivates your customers to pay you and not someone else.