BlackBerry 10 is now here and the formerly Research in Motion team should be proud that they have brought their Berry-lovers the next generation of mobile. Thorsten Heins did a marvelous job of bringing the QNX-based OS to the stage this past week, and brought with it a pretty surprising amount of name-brand developer support. However, one aspect of the development front has me worried. Android apps are not the answer.
For those who don’t have a PlayBook, or lucky ones with a Z10, BlackBerry has added an Android runtime environment to the QNX system that allows for Android apps to run on the devices. While this does a decent job of allowing for quick “porting” for Android developers, it doesn’t send a clear message of how developers should approach BlackBerry 10.
BlackBerry, and 3rd party devs, have proven, on both the PlayBook and Z10, that a great native app is possible. This should be BlackBerry’s focus. Android apps are a bandaid, and a poor one at that. I cannot speak on the Z10, but on the PlayBook, while they work, the experience is not very clean.
Android apps run inside a walled environment in this situation, and is very disjointed at times. You are truly inside Android when you run these apps. The buttons, navigation, and general feel are all Android.
This is not what BlackBerry needs. The gesture-based OS has a learning curve just to use it, so while it shouldn’t be a problem after five minutes of use, the additionally confusion of the Android emulation is an unnecessary hassle. BlackBerry needs to persuade devs to build a native app ecosystem, and not one that can be “functional” in five minutes.
BlackBerry 10 shows a lot of promise and has a legitimate chance to become the number 3 platform in mobile, but after waiting this long to come to the table they have to make the experience a truly great one. Bringing the big-named apps will make a splash, but quality niche apps will make the platform succeed. BlackBerry needs to make the hard choice and drop Android support and focus on the native experience.
Posts
