Blackberry subscribers are seeing more shades than Verizon red, after their very own paid Verizon Wireless cellular network provider has forced a Bing app shortcut upon them-straight onto customer mobile Blackberry phone devices. Like it or not, customers are seeing Bing. Bing, Bing, Bing. And that's making customers mad, mad, mad.
Customers apparently weren't aware of giving Verizon consent to be stuffing that app on the Blackberry devices they paid for, under the guise of an 'upgrade'. Of course anything involving Microsoft means it's gotta be in those fine print terms somewhere. Verizon customers aren't happy about the Bing app, since it's not optional and they're now stuck with the shortcut link. But Verizon isn't letting up-Blackberry customers are keeping that Bink apps link whether they like it or not.
Many customers seem to relate to this beauty:
"Verizon is pond scummmmm"
"I remember having a state of the art Motorola web enabled phone with bluetooth a couple years back and these SOB's at Verizon made Moto disable the ability of the phone to directly download photos to my computer via bluetooth so that I would be forced to buy their data plan to get MY photos off MY phone. And now they are trying to force feed their users with MSFT c***... two wrongs (VRZN and MSFT) don't make a right. I left them then and will never go back."
From another previously-loyal Verizon Wireless Customer:
"Cream rises to the top. c*** sinks to the bottom. Microsoft and Verizon are on the same level. They deserve one another."
Comments like the above are stacking in up like crazy, and it's wack as wack can be out there: it seems neither Verizon Wireless nor Microsoft's Bing (and its questionnable) Cash Back programs are at the top of consumer 'Most-Wanted' lists-only these are the 'if I find ya, I'm gonna shoot ya' types of list. Or more along the lines of headhunter types fo programs. In short, people are pissed. And those people, Microsoft Bing and Verizon, are your customers-your very own customers whom feel violated, voiolated by you.
Despite whatever fine print Verizon may have worked into its Blackberry customer contracts, forcing ads or services upon customers usually doesn't end up to be a good thing. Microsoft's Bing seems to be a big fan of forcing its way into personal internet space, but that's a whole 'nother story. As one Verizon Blackberry user put it,
The Verizon cellular network provider gives its own customers no option to remove the Microsoft Bing shortcut installed on their devices via new firmware upgrade. Customers generally view the term 'upgrade' as a good thing but, for this firmware upgrade, Verizon customers seem to have gotten more than they expected-at least based on the number of consumer complaints popping up all over the web and in one-on-one conversations. Advertising is one thing, but this scenario Verizon and Microsoft have teamed to create for customers is wack: customers can't remove the new Bing link from their Blackberry devices. Verizon is providing customers help to move that Bing shortcut link on the Blackberry device, but not to get rid of the Bing link altogether.
Verizon is trying to spin the alliance with Microsoft, and subsequent Bing promotion its forcing on customers, with claims that Verizon isn't hurting existing services. Hmmmm...and how is that relevant to sticking on app link on someone's device whom both paid for that device and is also paying you for a service? When customers pay for a service, the reason is because they're getting a service, not because they're paying the company not to be 'hurt'. For those Verizon claims that it isn't 'hurting' other services, it apparently isn't exactly helping those services either: Blackberry subscribers with Verizon Wireless are denied the option of using Google, Yahoo or others (except, surprise, Microsoft's Bing) in the BlackBerry web browser's search bar.
The genius Verizon statement, from Corporate Communications VP Jim Gerace: "Verizon isn't blocking or degrading anything; just providing a great option for customers." Interestingly, the Bink app link isn't exactly being provided as an 'option' to Verizon Wireless customers that are having the Bink link forced on their handsets or subscriptions.
This situation is more than a bit wack for Verizon customers: the term 'option' typically infers choice, while Blackberry subscribers with Verizon have got no choice in this Microsoft Bing scenario, and that doesn't appear to be changing. As everyone knows, once a deal with Microsoft goes down, the odds of a 180 are nil. Verizon is obviously locked in tight-and that's exactly what Verizon appears to have done with its customers, with this ever-appearing Bink link.
Android and iPhone operating systems also use new 'features', embedded in code and known as 'passive updates'. The difference with those updates is that most are chosen by user or subscriber choice on firmware upgrade. The Microsoft Bing shortcut, to be removed, is not optional for Blackberry users and was not chosen by Verizon subscribers.
Of course, the forced Bing link probably doesn't come as a huge surprise to those spending routine hours on the internet: Microsoft's new Bing search engine is a violator. That's the nicest way to put it. Bing violates and violates, when no one asked it to open. And when you finally do get the damned thing to close, it reopens another one after only seconds. And, this is confirmed, those damned Bing pop-up ads that continuously open under the guise of 'helping' user, open without even without rollover. The difference for ailing Blackberry users is that they probably weren't foreseeing having a forced application pushed onto their own mobile devices, while paying monthly subscriber fees.
People generally don't like anything forced on them; paying customers really don't like things forced on them. But then that's never really mattered for Microsoft or its Bing-and then again, if the company is listening to feedback and not just those happy faces it's paying for, it'll realize it's not too short of death, which just might be a happier experience for us all. Bing has created needs that we don't have-and those 'needs' aren't really appealing enough for us to accept them.
So goog luck, Bing. And Blackberry users: free yourself from any provider that finds it ethically possible to trap you into that kind of scenario-if necessary change phones or devices, to get out of that contract. It's wack to be paying your own money, on a device you also paid for, only to pay a subscriber whom views you as so worthless that it's willing to sell our your private space to a company that will invade that private space.