BlackBerry Meant Well

There is a fascinating time between January 2007 and January 2010 in the world of smartphones. This short 3-year span was one where Apple was blazing a trail with the iPhone and other manufacturers responding in kind. One standout is the BlackBerry Storm phone. It was a revolutionary failure. Rewinding to Steve Jobs’ unveiling of the iPhone, we were told something we’d never considered as consumers prior: the buttons on a phone were set forever. The iPhone could change or hide buttons whenever. At this time the BlackBerry line was THE smartphone to own. Many came for it and it…

Blackberry: The End

In less than 15 years, the gargantuan Blackberry went from “must-have” to “see ya later”. If it wasn’t the iPhone who did it, Android certainly would’ve been the one to hammer the first nail in the coffin. For anyone who truly was hanging onto their “crackberry” devices, January 4th signals the shut down of everything that made Blackberry worthwhile. On January 4th, Blackberry will be shutting off all the key services — data, SMS, phone calls, and 911 support. In official terms, they are ending network provisioning for these older devices, meaning that they won’t be able to join any…