4th June 2019

BlackBerry Messenger Is Dead, But Its Influence Lives on

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By PC Mag

BlackBerry Messenger is shutting down for good today, and with it a part of the history of early mobile messaging.

The app was first released in 2005, when the only other option we had for mobile messaging was SMS. It was a way to instantly message other BlackBerry owners without eating into your monthly SMS allotment. BBM also introduced group chats to the mobile device, something we take for granted today but was new and exciting at the time.

Emtek, the Indonesian company that partnered with BlackBerry in 2016, announced on its blog last month that it would be permanently retiring the app on May 31, citing the difficulty of attracting new users.

"We poured our hearts into making this a reality, and we are proud of what we have built to date," the blog post read. "The technology industry however, is very fluid, and in spite of our substantial efforts, users have moved on to other platforms, while new users proved difficult to sign on.

As consumers moved away from BlackBerry and into iMessage, WhatsApp, and group chat platforms on social media, BBM's relevance declined. It launched on iOS and Android in 2013 and later joined forces with Emtek in a bid to compete, but it never happened.

The tech it pioneered lives on in BlackBerry Enterprise, the company's cross-platform messenger service for businesses, and BlackBerry Secure, an integrated mobile security package.

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