Ahead of the Curve?
 

Nope, the Blackberry Curve beats the iPhone.

RIM's BlackBerry Curve Outsells iPhone in Quarter

By BEN CHARNY
Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry Curve outsold the Apple Inc. iPhone during the first three months of the year, market tracker NPD Group reported Monday.

Boosting Curve sales was an aggressive "buy-one-get-one" promotion by U.S. carrier Verizon Wireless, owned by Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group PLC, according to NPD.

The marketing, and the Curve's widespread availability in the U.S., drove its market share 15% higher annually, while the iPhone's U.S. share fell 10%, according to NPD. The researcher did not provide unit sales figures for the devices.

Four major U.S. carriers sell the Curve. AT&T Inc. sells the iPhone under an exclusive arrangement with Apple.

Apple's iPhone 3G had been the No. 1-selling U.S. smartphone between June and December. An Apple spokeswoman had no immediate comment.

Overall, U.S. sales of smart phones during the first three months of 2009 were "steady" despite the recession.

Smartphone sales rose an anemic 1% annually, while revenue from sales dropped 2% on a dip in average smart-phone prices, NPD reported.

Write to Ben Charny at ben.charny@dowjones.com

I have a Curve. The buttons are too small and the camera sucks. JMHO :D

I really like my Treo Pro. If they come out with a 3G Treo Pre that works with T-Mobile, I will seriously consider it.

I can understand why the Curve sells such volume, but the Bold is awesome.

Is anyone suprised that iPhone sales are down? It used to be hip to have one, but now everybody does. It's a nice phone, but there's a lot of things that the BB does better.

they can have my curve when they pry it from my cold, dead hands.

the camera does suck though.

I like my Curve, and the buttons are just fine, even though I have huge hands.
Camera sucks, but isn't it a phone?
Can't wait for the new slimmer 3G version for Verizon

My wanted one, and I bought the flip curve. On T-mobile, it is wifi in the house, with no per minute charge.

Every large company I associate with the blackberry is their enterprise cell phone / mobile e-mail.

RIM makes a great product. Still more of a "corporate" product given weak in web-browsing, game-playing, app store. With most corporate IT depts still not supporting iPhone, lots of natural buyers for RIM.

That actually is the real deal. The iPhone is not a "smartphone" in the sense of a Palm, WM or RIM unit. It is a combo cell-phone and iPod touch, and it does that very very well.

There is no "right" answer. The right one for you will be obvious to you, when you use it. Me? Treo Pro is right, right now. Treo Pre maybe in the future. I want a one hand thumb-able keyboard. Any I can use my Celio Redfly with the PRO, making it almost a laptop.

"There is no "right" answer. The right one for you will be obvious to you, when you use it."

Bingo. They each have their advantages. The I Phone allows me to take megabytes of music with me wherever I go. It has a lot of unique and useful apps the BB doesn't. I can control my stereo when I'm in the yard or garage for example. The camera is surprisingly good and it links perfectly with my home network and MAC computers (I HATE MS).

OTOH battery life is ridiculously short; my company won't support it and AT&T wouldn't be my first choice. So I have to have the blackberry for work. And I like the BB keyboard better.

I wish I could get the best of both in one device.

Coming soon . . . Palm Pre . . . worth a look, has the keyboard plus the big screen, and the O/S looks great. Initially on Sprint only, but that won't last for long.

My wife and I have become big BlackBerry fans. In the last 4 months I have had a Motorola Q, a HTC Touch Pro, and an iPhone. The first two sucked eggs. The Windows Mobile platform is years behind the competitors. The iPhone was OK, but the battery life was horrible.

I got a BlackBerry Storm about a month ago. At first, I didn't like it. But, I upgraded to later software that isn't available from Verizon yet. That made a world of difference. This thing does everything I need it to. While its main usage is as a phone and email device, I carry around a lot of music on the micro SD card and it works very well for web browsing.

The battery life on this thing is fantastic. I carried around extra batteries to make it through the day with the Q and the Touch. I needed to recharge the iPhone in the middle of the day most days. The Storm lasts at least two days between recharges and I use this thing heavily.

My wife has the BlackBerry Bold. I like that device even better. But, at work, we have consolidated all of our mobile phones to Verizon.

Yep, as soon as Palm gets a GSM version with 3G out there, I think we will have a winner. And, they have announced that there will be a "Palm Classic" emmulator, so you can run the old Palm applications.