Supreme Court will not hear RIM appeal

Yesterday:

 

"BlackBerry maker Research in Motion was dealt a setback Monday after the Supreme Court turned down a request to review a major patent infringement ruling against it. The move takes away yet another barrier between BlackBerry users and service interruptions. There are more than 4 million users of the BlackBerry e-mail service. Research In Motion (RIM) had petitioned the Supreme Court to review a federal appeals court ruling that could lead to a shutdown of most U.S. BlackBerry sales and service."

 

It seems like this case has been going on forever. Last quarter RIM added 650,000 new customers, given the contradictory information from the courts and the patent office, it looks like Blackberry users have been lulled into believing that a shutdown will not occur.

 

In the December 8th, Wall Street Journal article about the RIM patent infringement court case, the first sentence exclaims; "Email To U.S. Blackberry customers: Judgment day is looming." From everything I have read, U.S. District Judge James R. Spencer will not let this drag on too much longer. He is known to issue no nonsense rulings and is not afraid of breaking precedent.

 

Is Microsoft missing a golden opportunity (from one my previous posts)? I have emailed Robert Scoble (Microsoft blogger extradinaire) to see if he would comment on the question.

 

As reported by WSJ, the Gartner group is advising customers to hold off on any new Blackberry purchases. This seems like a golden opportunity for the Windows Mobile world to gain some market share against a venerable competitor. The Exchange team is ready for push email with the release of Exchange 2003 SP2. The Windows Mobile 5 side has to be ready as well, the Exchange team would not have included the "Direct Push Technology" in a production service pack without proper testing. Yet OEMs (hardware and telecom vendors) won't ship units with the update until February 2006. Is Microsoft's delay in providing users with the Windows Mobile update for push email going to become a lost opportunity? What is the hold up? Could it be the way updates get distributed via the OEMs? There have been no guarantees by any of these OEMs that current WM5 devices will get this update. If this is the case, my commentary on the major distribution models Microsoft uses and my concerns with the current Windows Mobile model in this thread are justified.

 

Interestingly there were few comments, but all were in favor of a model similar to the one using for Windows PC. This model provides OEM's a path for innovation using a single kernel image while allowing Microsoft to distributes updates directly to the consumer. It gives Microsoft the ability to deliver a consistent message and control of the release schedule. The lack of comments leads me to think that the majority of folks may not be concerned. The status quo works fine for them, and without any feedback, Microsoft has little motivation to change.

 

I de-converged from my iPAQs hw6315's lack of phone quality. I miss the simplicity of having gold standard PDA functionality integrated with a phone, but being able to hold a conversation without static or the unit locking up, finally forced my hand. Now a new generation of better WM5 based PPC Phones are available but the Telecoms in the US will not release them without the Direct Push technology. Who is holding up the deliveries? You can buy these devices at a premium today (without the Direct Push update), so it is not the manufacturers, could it be the way the update is distributed? I think so and it is too bad since there is an immediate need today. What do you think?

 

I am on the list to purchase a T-Mobile MDA, hopefully it will include AKU 2.0.