Information Madness

The users of BlackBerry will get id="mce_marker"00 worth of Apps for free. This is going to be RIM’s way of apologizing for a collapse in service that had left millions of BlackBerry users around the world without service for up to three days last week. The point to note is whether the users are going to be interested in these free Apps. This will mainly be of interest only to those kinds of people who see some value in Apps.

One big problem for both RIM’s apology and its general future is the relative lack of attractive Apps for the BlackBerry, particularly when compared with Apple’s iPhone or those phones that use Google’s Android operating system.

When they made the announcement, RIM has mentioned only twelve applications that are going to be available at no cost. There is a likelihood of more Apps becoming available before the downloading period begins tomorrow.

This offer from RIM is definitely going to nudge BlackBerry users who have not gone to the BlackBerry App World previously to take a look. The negative part about it is that it might also remind them about the restricted extent of the software offerings by the Company.

For corporate and government users, RIM is providing full technical support for one month at no cost instead of offering them free Apps. The financial impact of this kind of offer on RIM is not clear. As it is, they have not been able to reach their recent financial targets. RIM will somehow have to reimburse the developers for the Apps it is planning to give away free.