This year's share price gains for computer companies on the Nasdaq have been wiped out in the past few weeks. In aggregate, Nasdaq tech stocks were down 3.76 percent for the year by Thursday's close. The Nasdaq inched downward again in Friday afternoon trading even though the other major exchanges were up for the day.

One of the biggest losers of the day was Research In Motion, which Thursday announced that it for its fiscal first quarter but also lowered its guidance for the current quarter. Generating US$4.9 billion in sales for the quarter, company revenue was below the consensus forecast of $5.1 billion from analysts polled by Thomson Financial, even though the analysts had already lowered their expectations due to prior warnings from RIM.

RIM shares are in free fall. Even before Thursday's announcement, its share price was half of what it was in February. On Friday afternoon, it was trading at $27.74, down by $7.55.

For the current quarter, RIM said it expects earnings per share of $0.75 to $1.05 on sales of $4.2 billion to $4.8 billion. This is drastically below analysts' forecasts of $1.40 and $5.5 billion, respectively, according to a Thomson Reuters poll. Though updates to RIM's PlayBook tablet device are due over the next quarter, early reviews panned the device for missing critical applications that business users have counted on, such as a built-in e-mail program. The tablet's interface, based on software acquired from QNX, has been praised, but other devices built around the QNX software are not due until next year, and meanwhile users have been frustrated with delays for a touchscreen BlackBerry Bold.

"While management remains bullish on its prospects for the PlayBook combined with its new BlackBerry 7.0 smartphones launching in volume by Q3/F2012, we maintain our more cautious view as we do not believe RIM is accurately portraying the increasingly competitive smartphone environment," according to a report from Canaccord Genuity analysts T. Michael Walkley, Charles John and Matthew Ramsay.