In the past few days I have run into two Blackberry Tour users. One had positive things to say and one terrible things. Om Malik sums up the problems. In short, Om got his social circle to switch to the device and then ended up with egg on his face as it failed to perform adequately for his friends. Let’s keep in mind Apple has one platform for their smartphones and it still has problems – even after a few generations. In fact the company is looking to fix a battery drain problem as you read this. What do you expect from RIM, Nokia, Samsung, HTC and others?

If there is a silver lining here it is that the Tour seems like it has the right specs and if the bugs get worked out, the next gen device should be much better. I heard similar complaints which led to praise about the Storm. And it is not like RIM is a novice in this space – they are a major smartphone force with over a decade of solid experience. That’s what makes these missteps so surprising to me.

For smartphone companies there is obviously tremendous pressure to get to market quickly but it seems obvious to me the negative press surrounding buggy launches makes it risky business to introduce  a less than perfect consumer electronics product.