BlackBerry OS 5.0 to have tabbed browsing
You know us; we have nothing for love for RIM but it seems that its case of ADD is a lot worse than previously thought. For the better part of a week we've been playing around with a new beta build of OS 5. and noticed that it has a new feature …
Context & Ripple Effects
Boy Genius Report's scoop continues the outlet's long-running watch on RIM's touch-era pivot: its live shots of the BlackBerry Thunder in June 2008 and Unstrung's 2007 report on RIM's touchscreen plans charted the hardware side of that shift, and this OS 5.0 beta leak now shows the software side moving too.
The significance is that the native BlackBerry browser — long treated as a utility rather than a selling point — is gaining a feature, tabbed browsing, that has become table stakes on rival smartphone platforms. A week of hands-on time with a beta build suggests the change is real and reasonably far along, not a wishlist item.
First-order effects
- Testers running the leaked OS 5.0 beta get tabbed browsing in the built-in browser for the first time, closing one of the most visible gaps between RIM's browser and those on competing handsets.
Second-order effects
- The leak puts RIM's rollout scope under scrutiny: once the feature ships officially, owners of older devices will judge the company by whether OS 5.0 reaches existing handsets or lands mainly on new ones.
Third-order effects
- If RIM keeps answering competitive pressure by layering features onto its legacy OS rather than delivering a clean-slate successor, the platform accumulates patches where rivals are rebuilding — a structural tension that shapes how long the installed base stays loyal.
The trend: Smartphone browsers have become a primary competitive battleground, forcing incumbent platforms like RIM to retrofit desktop-style browsing into aging operating systems.