RIM's president calls BlackBerry Storm a small netbook

Clearly, Mike Lazaridis has the chops when it comes to running a business. What he clearly lacks, however, is a firm definition of the term "netbook." To his credit, we still feel the exact boundaries for netbooks have yet to be determined (fret not, Psion Teklogix is hammering out those details), but calling a BlackBerry Storm one is -- how do you say? -- a bit of a stretch. During a recent sit down with RIM's president, CNET Asia heard the bigwig answer like so when questioned about viewing netbooks as competitors: "No, I think I can put netbooks in here [referring to the BlackBerry Storm]. These are netbooks. They are just smaller." Wait, Mike -- don't you think smartphones are more like MIDs or UMPCs? Or do we just have you all wrong here?

[Via phoneArena]

[Samo @ Dec 31st 2008 6:53AM]

If BB Storms are Netbooks, Then Nokia Communicators are ultraportables... ^^

[Shinigami @ Dec 31st 2008 7:34AM]

They are "multimedia computers" as Nokia calls them.

[ILoveApple @ Dec 31st 2008 7:47AM]

No, Nokia's communicators are not multimedia computers. That's the Nseries. Do you see any Nseries communicators?

[p3ngwin @ Dec 31st 2008 8:00AM]

my 2005 HTC Universal must be a netbook then too.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qtek_9000

i'm replacing it next week with a HTC TOUCH HD. (it took that long for a device to beat it for my needs)

[CAHLITO @ Dec 31st 2008 8:33AM]

eww you had the same phone for more than two years?

[Nicholas @ Dec 31st 2008 12:09PM]

You seem to have forgotten where Symbian came from. The Psion NetBook ran a mobile OS, not a computer OS. My definition of a netbook is a decent screen and decent input with moderate computing power. Jotting notes, and communicating are the main aspects of the experience.

BB, Apple, Nokia, could all turn their systems into usable netbooks. They are not there yet, and why Nokia never considered the option is beyond me. BB's development platform leaves a lot to be desired. Will Apple do it? I wish, but doubt it.

[Matty @ Dec 31st 2008 2:26PM]

And the iPhone must be a supercomputer!

[L @ Dec 31st 2008 1:47PM]

I'd say that Nokia's Internet Tablets are actually the closest thing to netbooks among the stuff you mentioned. Very flexible little devices (you can get Debian and OpenOffice to work on them with a little hacking, and they're probably the best Android devices out there at the moment :D), built-in keyboard (N810) and/or support for Bluetooth ones...

[Krush @ Dec 31st 2008 3:56PM]

Bah - it's nothing but a "Storm in a Teacup"

[eric @ Dec 31st 2008 6:56AM]

"If the iPhone is a game console... then hell, the Storm's a netbook!"

[humps @ Dec 31st 2008 7:11AM]

for once, engadget hasn't got the word 'iphone' in a post about the Storm and you had to say it!

[Pradster @ Dec 31st 2008 7:24AM]

I agree, Hyperbole cant be limited to one party..everyone should be allowed some drunken fun!

[Poom @ Dec 31st 2008 8:14AM]

eric, you are a genius.

[Hamidxa @ Dec 31st 2008 11:00AM]

Took the words out of my mouth...now someone should take them out of Apple's so they never juxtapose the words iPhone and game console ever again.

[Charbax @ Dec 31st 2008 7:07AM]

He is right. Netbooks are Laptops. Laptops are machines to browse the Internet and write documents and such.

Blackberry is an ARM based pocket device. All Laptops will soon be ARM based cause it's much cheaper, uses less power, more compact and better for browsing the Internet and writing documents.

Thus all pocket devices are going to be ARM devices and NOT that Intel netbook Atom crap.

[Derry Quinn @ Dec 31st 2008 7:09AM]

I disagree

[chefgon_ign @ Dec 31st 2008 7:31AM]

I'm not sure what kind of 1990's definition of Laptop you're using, but modern laptops are every bit as capable as any other computer out there. They definitely aren't restricted to browsing the internet and writing documents.

[Charbax @ Dec 31st 2008 7:35AM]

90% of what people do with a laptop is browsing the Internet and writing documents.

Sure you've got multimedia features also, like playing all types of video and audio formats and creating multimedia files.

You can do all that using ARM much better then with Intel netbook processors.

Put a bluetooth foldable keyboard with your Blackberry and you've got close to a dual-pocketable laptop experience.

Netbook is just a Marketing word employed by Intel to promote an Intel market domination strategy. Intel limits screen size, keyboard size, memory and features on purpose cause Intel is scared to cut on their shrinking laptop market profit margins.

[dan @ Dec 31st 2008 8:05AM]

Shrinking laptop market? Laptop sales outstripped desktop sales for the first time in 2008.

As for "Sure you've got multimedia features also, like playing all types of video and audio formats and creating multimedia files. You can do all that using ARM much better then with Intel netbook processors." - this is complete nonsense. ARM processors are great on small mobile devices due to their low power consumption. Low-power x86 processors like Intel's Atom are aimed at larger devices with larger batteries, and also have the large advantage that the majority of available operating system and software binaries are already compiled to run on them. They aren't even really direct competitors just yet, since their potential applications don't overlap much.

Oh, and Intel are one of the licensed manufacturers of ARM chips. Just so you know.

[ACM @ Dec 31st 2008 8:12AM]

90% browsing and writing docs? WTF? There are millions of people using laptops as their ONLY machine! For 2 years, I used my MBP exclusively to run Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects, all of CS2 for that matter plus the whole Final Cut Pro Suite. I edited HD video, rendered out complex animations, o right and browsed the internet as well. And guess what? So did thousands of other students and professionals across the country. Since im not all that familiar with what windows running laptops have become over the last few years, you could possible have a point when it comes to them but my MBP did and still kicks most peoples desktops ass. If you defend Mike Lazaridis all the time, your going to be defending some really off the wall statements like this!

[Charbax @ Dec 31st 2008 8:31AM]

dan, I didn't say that the laptop market was shrinking. I said that Intel's profit margins per laptop are shrinking. What would be the point for Intel as a corporation with share holders to sell more laptops if they make a smaller profit overall?

ACM, your usage of Photoshop, Illustrator, HD video editing makes you not part of that more than 90% of laptop users. Most people are NOT IT profetionals, most users are casual computer users, most people just want a Browser and sometimes want to write documents, but you can write documents using the browser anyways.

As for the amount of applications available for ARM, there are more than 5000 Linux applications available for ARM already. It doesn't make much sense to say that ARM software doesn't exist. In fact ARM software is already much better optimized then X86 software when it comes to all the features that comes in the Google Android ARM based OS for example. Yup, Google Android is an Intel netbook killer OS as well.

As for doing advanced multimedia things on an ARM processor, you use a DSP anyways for high graphics and high resolution decoding anyways. Intel does the same using what Intel calls the Poulsbo chip on all of their netbooks. Thus video playback is done by a DSP anyways. Also ARM laptops will probably be able to use cloud computing to process large tasks. For example, to edit and compress HD videos, using cloud computing will be perfect. As long as you can upload your HD footage fast enough. Since more and more people have Fiber to the home using Cloud Computing for HD video editing will be perfect. Especially for encoding, you can encode an hour of HD video in just seconds using cloud computing, something that takes hours even days using the most expensive, most power hungry Intel processors. Same thing with animation rendering, even photo rendering, all these things will be better managed by cloud computing. Thus ARM laptops will be perfect for that.

The best part of the ARM laptop is that it has at least 15 hours of battery life, perhaps even more than 20.

[michas_pi @ Dec 31st 2008 7:11AM]

Why don't they just give free money to Psion? I mean, RIM is definitely profiting from the Storm (are they?), which is now a small netbook.

[Akshay @ Dec 31st 2008 7:12AM]

Great, first sub-notebooks, then UMPCs, then netbooks and now 'small' netbook? What next? Small PDA?

[KarlW @ Dec 31st 2008 7:12AM]

Watch him get sued by Psion!

[Mariano @ Dec 31st 2008 7:14AM]

He has been drinking a lot lately =/

[spellprince @ Dec 31st 2008 7:28AM]

This is INTENSE!

[chefgon_ign @ Dec 31st 2008 7:28AM]

So does everything just bump up a level automatically now? Is my calculator watch now a smartphone? Is my cable box now a HTPC? Is my regular butter now peanut butter?

[Gad Get @ Dec 31st 2008 7:36AM]

...Is your iPhone now a game console?

[Dan @ Dec 31st 2008 8:38AM]

Haven't you heard? "Worse" is the new "better".

[durrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr @ Dec 31st 2008 10:46AM]

so thats what bush meant when he said going into iraq was for the better...
amazing how clear life is on new years.

[Questionmark @ Dec 31st 2008 7:28AM]

It lacks the "book" part of netbook.

[Questionmark @ Dec 31st 2008 7:30AM]

He could call it a "netbrick"...

[Smi @ Dec 31st 2008 7:32AM]

Or a 'netblock'

[Gad Get @ Dec 31st 2008 7:39AM]

Or better still, a "netbar"!

[chickenator @ Dec 31st 2008 9:03AM]

this is confusing!

[y3k.nik @ Dec 31st 2008 9:26AM]

How many beers have all of you had? No way you can come up with this sober!

[Gad Get @ Dec 31st 2008 7:30AM]

"These are netbooks. They are just smaller."

Dude, he's obviously not being literal! He means that smartphones pack a lot of the functionality of netbooks (plus some) into a smaller package. He doesn't actually think they're netbooks! So, yeah, you just have him all wrong here!

[reisa @ Dec 31st 2008 7:40AM]

Meh. Steve Jobs said the same thing about the iPhone. They're both trying to push convergence before it really happens.

[Baz @ Dec 31st 2008 8:00AM]

Yeah, Jobs said the same thing about his smartphone.

Sounds more like RIM and Apple are talking up their products rather than compete directly (and financially) with real (that is, subnotebook) netbooks.

[nxp3 @ Dec 31st 2008 7:45AM]

Is this guy saying he'd like to be sued by Psion also? Great!

[Mischa Lockton @ Dec 31st 2008 7:48AM]

CE OH NO he didna'

[SPOKE @ Dec 31st 2008 7:56AM]

the device is confused, no wonder it crashes all the time. Its fallen off the wagon.

[Rob @ Dec 31st 2008 8:12AM]

Call it what ever you want, Storm selling like hot cakes because it can do so much. Maybe they will invent a new name just for it.

[Jason @ Dec 31st 2008 11:23AM]

Yeah! Now what would say "Raging fury of dynamic activity"? Hmm....they could call it the Buzz. It's a netbuzz.

Hmm, no that's crap.

[Level 5 @ Dec 31st 2008 8:03AM]

Call me way out in left field here, but why are smartphones put into other categories? Aren't they in fact, their own category? The Smartphone? Saying a smartphone is akin to a small netbook is like saying my blue shirt is just a little bit yellow.

[Tony @ Dec 31st 2008 8:04AM]

If BlackBerry Storm is a small netbook, it need an external drive for sure!!! :P
http://www.bestdealsonar.com/discount-best-external-dvdcd-rw-drive-for-a-netbook/

[That Fender Strat Guy @ Dec 31st 2008 8:18AM]

A netbook now?

This is just another example of how confused RIM is about itself, and their Christmas Turkey that is the Storm.

Who do we market this to? Business users? Consumer users? Mobile Internet Device users? All three? What year is this? Where are my false teeth?

Mike Lazaridis' comment was more likely out of desperation than anything else.

[Gad Get @ Dec 31st 2008 8:24AM]

Everyone leave the troll alone!

[Henry @ Dec 31st 2008 8:46AM]

Where are you getting your statistics about 90% of laptop users only use their laptops for Internet and writing docs? It will be interesting to read.

[terry @ Dec 31st 2008 9:09AM]

See, these fools try to imitate Apple but all they do is get carried
away. Apple drops a hot piece of tech swag, the industry copies but
they can't actually compete with Apple. NO! What they do is bell and
whistle the fuck out of what ever they copy, in an attempt to out do
Apple.

Then their business model dictates that they must refresh their
products at a fever pitch rate. Meanwhile Apple is on their first
generation and kicking ass at a reasonable pace while the competition
chases it goddamn tail trying to out do themselves brought on by
trying to outdo Apple. Look at the iphone. just 2 models in two
years. Now look at the competition. A slew of so-called iphone
killers. And because they didn't spend one waking night doing what
Apple did with their iphone(and they ipod), making it freaking
awesome, the copy cats just roll out a bunch of mindless ODM junk
that they discard like yesterdays newspaper.