BlackBerry Messenger has been a favourite tool for fans of BlackBerry for many years, and now BlackBerry is hoping to spread the love on the iOS and Android platforms.

But this announcement has many wondering: is giving away BBM really such a great idea?

On the surface it certainly looks like they are giving current BlackBerry users one more reason to join the mutiny to Android and iOS. If the core reason for staying with BlackBerry up until now had been staying in touch with BBM contacts, then there is no reason to stick around any longer.

These users can now ditch BlackBerry and gain access to popular apps, like Instagram, Vine and Spotify, plus they can keep pinging their friends and work colleagues on BBM without any sacrifices.

The effect of this move may be felt most in emerging markets,especially in South East Asia where BBM (and the unlimited messaging plans that come with it) are mostly responsible for the huge popularity of the BlackBerry brand.

BlackBerry is hoping it will have the opposite effect and drive people to the platform. But will anybody buy the BlackBerry cow if they are giving away the milk for free?

This isn't a short-term strategy, and cross-platform BBM is more likely to damage the BlackBerry subscriber base in the near future than help grow it.

Current BlackBerry users are keenly aware of the reasons they want to switch (if they do), while iPhone and Android owners generally don't think much about BlackBerry at all.

To this end, cross-platform BBM will invariably build BlackBerry's brand awareness. Every time BBM shows up in an app search on iOS or Android, that's a win for BlackBerry. Every download of the app is a new customer.

If these new users start to use BBM as their IM app of choice, then it will plant the seed and give BlackBerry a better chance at a sale the next time these customer's contracts come up for renewal.

Of course, the big variable here is whether these people end up actually using BBM, and there is already strong competition on the other platforms.

What's app, doc?

With the rise and rise in popularity of the Whatsapp instant messaging service, no BBM announcement is complete without pundits drawing comparisons between the two services.

Whatsapp is already cross-platform, boasts twice as many messages per day from a user base which is now nearly three-and-a-half times larger than BBM. With so many people on Whatsapp, will anyone even bother with BBM on iOS and Android?

BlackBerry's offering will have a richer feature set though, with video and voice calling coming to the iPhone and Android by the end of the year.

There is also BBM's unique screen-sharing capability, where you can stream a mirror of your display during a call, letting your friends browse through your image gallery with you, or share a map while planning a get-together.

But ultimately smartphone users aren't loyal to one service or another. At the end of the day, it all comes down to where your friends are.

If you have friends among the 60-million people who use BBM, chances are you will download it and get in touch with them. You'll install both Whatsapp and BBM, plus Twitter, Skype and Facebook Messenger and happily switch between them all.

This multi-service usage is good news for BlackBerry. Ultimately, it just needs to be part of the conversation, it doesn't need to dominate it.

Win, win?

There are hearts and minds to be won on the competing platforms. Still, this is a big gamble for the company formerly known as RIM that could backfire.

BlackBerry believes that this is the "right time to do it". Many of the executives at BlackBerry Live used exactly the same phrase, saying that the company believed that BlackBerry 10 has enough uniquely attractive features to draw in customers besides BBM. It no longer has to rely on BBM to keep customers in the ecosystem, so the company can afford to share the love.

Being more inclusive of the other platforms is a great way to reach out to millions and millions of users. But does BlackBerry need to give these users everything? Would a cross-platform text-only service be a smarter play?

Give Android and iPhone users a taste - a nibble of the possibilities - but make them switch to a Z10 for the full suite of tools, especially the awesome screen-sharing functionality.

Either way, we'll be rooting for BlackBerry in the meantime. It's nice to watch a company getting back up on its feet with innovative ideas at the core of its strategy.

With stealthy automatic updates, you might not know that the Firefox 21 release date was today, but you may want to know about the its new features.

The official Firefox 21 release notes begin with the browser's integration of three additional social media networks.

"Today, we are adding multiple new social providers Cliqz, Mixi and msnNOW to Firefox," wrote Mozilla in a blog post today.

This is in addition to the inclusion of Facebook Messenger for Firefox, which has been baked into the browser ever since FireFox 17 released in November.

According to Mozilla, these real-time updates will "help you stay connected to your social networks, no matter where you go on the Web."

What's new in Do Not Track, bug reports

The second pillar of what's new in FireFox 21 is an enhanced three-state user interface for Do Not Track.

The tweaked Do Not Track feature, located in the privacy tab, gives users the option to tell websites that they don't want to be tracked, do want to be tracked, or tell websites nothing at all.

More importantly, the third big change in today's Firefox download is the debut of Firefox Health Report.

The new feature should help users improve the browser's start-up time and reduce crashes thanks to tools that help them understand and actually fix problems.

Firefox users will no longer just encounter a somewhat useless "Report crash to Firefox" error screen, but have the chance to log and remedy the problem.

Firefox for Android update

Mozilla has kept its promise to simultaneously release Firefox for Android updates, launching a new version of the mobile browser in the Google Play store today.

The release notes for this pint-sized Firefox browser state that it adds access to recent history through the back and forward buttons and now includes the ability to save files via a long tap.

Mozilla also improved the fonts rendered by this browser in what it dubbed "Project Readability."

Mozilla's rapid release cycle estimates that the next Firefox browser update is due out toward the end of June.

Today's Nokia Lumia 925 launch event in London came and went without being coupled with an announcement of a Nokia tablet for 2013.

However, the Finnish phone manufacturer doesn't sound as if it is ruling out releasing a Nokia Lumia tablet in the near future.

"We're very interested in tablets and that's an area we're looking at," said Nokia executive vice president of smart devices Jo Harlow, according to CNET.

Nokia is "looking at" tablets, but not ready to officially announce a device just yet, as she added, "I don't have any product news I can share."

Staring contest

Nokia has been on the record as "looking at" tablets for more than two years now.

In 2011, the company's CEO, Stephen Elop, said "Our team right now is assessing what's the right tablet strategy for Nokia."

More recently, Elop used Harlow's talking points, saying, "It is something we are clearly looking at very closely."

The only concrete evidence that Nokia has taken more than an eyes-on approach to making a tablet comes from design head Marko Ahtisaari, who confirmed "We are working on it" more than a year ago.

Nokia tablet with Windows 8?

Microsoft was roundly criticized for being late to enter the tablet mix with the Surface in 2012, but its chief phone partner, Nokia, is taking an even longer time to produce a full-sized device.

Although Nokia is the No. 2 handset maker, it trails Apple, Samsung, LG, HTC, Motorola, Sony, and even Blackberry in releasing a tablet with a modern-day operating system.

Speculation about a Nokia Lumia tablet immediately points to a device running either Windows RT or Windows 8 Pro given its close partnership with Microsoft.

Whether or not it's a keyboard-equipped Nokia Lumia tablet remains to be seen.

However, new phones people are willing to buy like the Lumia 925 and the debut of a tablet could help put Nokia back on top as it was in its Symbian days and avoid it from resorting to its back-up plan.

The newly-announced BlackBerry Q5 handset will be winging its way to the United Kingdom in July, according to high street retailer Phones 4U.

The retailer is the first British outlet to confirm it'll be stocking the more affordable Q5 handset, which is BlackBerry's attempt to put its BB10 operating system in the hands of more users.

Following its unveiling at BlackBerry Live in Orlando, Florida, the company was vague about launch details, claiming the device would be targeted at emerging markets primarily.

The device, which will come in three colours, will be pushed as a QWERTY alternative to the flagship BlackBerry Q10 device, which is available SIM-free for a whopping £579.

The Curve to the Bold

The Q5, if you will, is the BlackBerry Curve compared with the Q10's BlackBerry Bold.

The Q5, which will come in red, pink and white, packs a 3.1-inch LCD display, 1.2GHz dual-core processor, 2GB of RAM and 8GB of internal storage.

It'll also boast a 5-megapixel rear camera, a front-facing webcam, the all-important 4G connectivity and a 2100mAh battery.

We've already enjoyed some hands-on time with the device at BlackBerry Live, so check out our initial impressions for a hint at whether this could be your route to owning a BB10 device.

Via CNET