Today's BlackBerry 10 event wasn't a product launch. It was a funeral.
Image by Shannon Stapleton / Reuters
"This is for you, BlackBerry developers" says Alec Saunders, BlackBerry's VP of developer relations. "You think you took a leap of faith? This is a leap of faith."
He's staring directly into the camera, dressed in a loose powder-blue bodysuit. Seconds later he jumps from the top of Stratosphere hotel in Las Vegas.
"Oh my god," he shouts through the wind, "we're on the way down."
His jumping partner, BlackBerry exec Marty Mallick, cuts in: "BlackBerry 10 ruuullleess..."
The video of the cable-controlled jump, which not-so-subtly recalls Google's mega-viral Project Glass skydive stunt, was posted to BlackBerry's YouTube channel, and subsequently to the front page of CrackBerry by Kevin Michaluk, the most widely read BlackBerry blogger in the world.
The basejumping video was published at what should have been the peak of BlackBerry buzz — the day before the company introduced a total, long-delayed revamp to its operating system, BlackBerry 10, along with two new phones. At the time BlackBerry executives were taking the stage this morning, the video had just 6,000 views.
It was clear that BlackBerry had lost the last thing it had going for it: Its once-loyal fan base has stopped caring.
Michaluk, for his part, had promised not to cut his hair until BlackBerry 10 came out; today, during the launch event, the emcee snipped his ponytail with scissors, on camera. A handful of people clapped tepidly, and Michaluk sat down.
In a post in late January, Michaluk told concerned CrackBerry forum members that he had seen "a fairly steady decline in US traffic over the course of 18 months, [which] then flattened out (the people left were the faithful in the USA)."