A couple weeks ago, Bloomberg news reported that RIM was working to make its BlackBerry Playbook tablet compatible with Android apps. The report cited only unnamed sources and seemed to be a strange development.
Price comparison app ShopSavvy says that notion may not be so strange after all. According to its logs, the ShopSavvy Android app has been running on a BlackBerry 8300, 8520, and 8600. The logs appeared on four separate dates, all originating in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Yes, that’s Waterloo as in the city that RIM calls home. More after the break.
It’s possible that this is being done by some enterprising person who is not affiliated with RIM at all. He or she may just love BlackBerry enough to want to develop a Java Virtual Machine that could run a coveted app. But it’s also very possible that this supports Bloomberg’s previous reports about RIM working to support Android apps. I still find that hard to believe. One would think vanity would make RIM want to encourage development on its own platforms and help restore the company to a higher position in the mobile OS wars. Providing direct support for a competing product is admitting defeat.
What do you think of all of this?
[Source: images from Androinica]