Blackberry hype in Indonesia …

If you live in Indonesia, you’ll notice the blackberry hype building up amongst the society. Why? Let me point them out. You won’t believe the amount of conversation that starts with “what’s your bb pin?”, “give me your bb pin” and what amazes me most is people will assume you’re a blackberry user nowadays.

Coming from me who loves gadgets and technology, I’ve used a blackberry device before in 2004/2005 and only because my work requires me to. At that time, blackberry is known for work related usage, you know, the push email , VPN accessibility, and nobody really made a big deal on blackberry messenger (BBM) (we have other ways for messaging, such as MSN/YM/ICQ) but realistically, who wants to carry an bulky device around? (I remember those days when my friend made fun of it as being a bulky calculator rather than a phone). I can say I’m a fan of phones with keyboards and have been using them until the birth of iphones.

Here are the reasons why blackberry is so popular in Indonesia:

• the simple step needed to activate the service (activation is by SMS or you can activate through customer service from your provider), and what makes it attractive is that users can pick their own plan between daily, weekly and monthly, depending on their needs (you can deactivate and reactivate the service only when you need it without penalty).
  
• Once activated there’s no further configuration. It’s always online as long as you are in the coverage area of data networks. Compared with the nokia or other brands, you need to enter additional settings (some requested by OTA) which is both confusing and considered troublesome by many.

• email account is not needed anymore because every blackberry device has a built in PIN that acts as your ID for your IM (as compared to other IM applications, you need an email account). Surprisingly I noticed a lot of blackberry users in Indonesia do not have an email account. Blackberry users will prefer to use the BBM application to chat with their counterparts than email as their daily activity.

• the price of blackberry service is dirt cheap, US$10-18/month in Indonesia for unlimited data (excludes tethering the device as a modem for your laptop/desktop, you need to pay extra for this service). As for the daily plan, you can get it for as low as US$0.50 per day. There is even a separate blackberry service only for emails and IMs for US$6-9 (depending on the provider). BELIEVE IT.

The latest blackberry releases do have some improvements in the design, especially the blackberry curve 8900 and the latest Blackberry Bold 9700, while the curve 8520 is still the highest demand for new blackberry users.

I won’t recommend anyone using the “overrated” blackberry, unless they:

• like to chat all day with their counterparts using the tiny keyboard – BBM
  
• frequently update their facebook status to let everybody know what they’re doing, where they are or what just happened to their life (had to put that in).
  
• cannot take the peer pressure any longer from their friends to join the circle of bb users (some say it’s beginning to become a cult).
  
• like to pose and send photos to their friends or upload them instantly on facebook (you can do this with other mobile phones with a good built in camera and Facebook mobile).
  
• have an identity crisis and want their phones to look the same as everyone else on the table.

There has been no significant change (or dare I say, any improvements at all) in the OS since I last used it. The only noticeable improvement is the internet browser on Bold and Javelin (which is still less desirable compared to other competitors on the market) or maybe some may claimed the new BBM 5.0.

Are you one of these people?

* Thanks to Charles Jap for contributing to this post and Vincent Mananta for lending me his Bold 9700.

Tagged as: blackberry hype, blackberry indonesia