The Richter Scale^®

There’s a lot of panic out there - among politicians, lobbyists, lawyers, CEOs, managers, and just about anyone else that uses a Blackberry-branded hand held communications devices.

Rumors abound of a possible injunction by NTP, a small Virginia-based patent holding company, against Research In Motion (RIM), a Canadian company which makes the extremely popular Blackberry family of devices. An injunction would mean that the Blackberry data services - in particular e-mail - would cease operation for as long as the injunction is in place (which could be forever in the worst case scenario).

The basis of the rumored injunction is that NTP has patents claiming certain technology, and RIM has been found to infringe. NTP, as
the owner of the patents has the right granted to anyone who holds the patent, namely to prevent others from making or using their owned invention. Most recently, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear RIM’s appeal.

NTP has asked for a rather significant license fee from RIM, but as with all things, it’s relative. NTP has an expectation that it should be paid for the use of the inventions it owns, and that is not unreasonable. And Blackberry cannot afford to be selling devices and technology which is crippled by injunction. Ultimately, the two will come to some sort of compromise - they have to. NTP’s shareholders will not want to walk away empty handed, while RIM shareholders (and clients) have an expectation that the company will remain solvent and viable.

But will an injunction be so bad?

Sure, there would be the physical twitching - thumbs and fingers going through motions to scroll through lists of messages which are no longer there. These physical manifestations of information absence would undoubtedly be analogous to withdrawal symptoms when one goes cold turkey from alcohol or drugs. But after a few days those would go away.

There would still be the occasional forlorn gaze at the now purely decorative (if that’s what you can call the ugly lump of plastic that is a Blackberry) device void of electronic life. It might still be usable as a phone, though.

The twitches would come back when the despairing Blackberry user saw people with Treos or with Sidekicks, of course - much as an ex-smoker reputedly gets cravings for a cigarette when in the company of active smokers.

However, without the Blackberry to distract them from daily life, thumbs will regain their proper shape and be less sore, and ex-Blackberry users might realize they have friends and family who have been neglected in favor of getting that one last message out before dinner or going to sleep. They may realize that what they really had was an addiction to the illusion of data mobility.

I speak from experience. Last March the data network supporting the T-Mobile Sidekick II data phone went out for about a week while I was at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. I went through all the above symptoms and scenarios. It was a real eye opener. Sidekick users had no warning, and support calls claimed nothing was wrong. Blackberry users have it so much better - they have warning that something drastic may soon happen and can prepare contingency plans. They can organize their support groups in advance. Heck, they can even practice Blackberry abstinence now in preparation for the likely injunction.