A colleague back in 2010 turned me onto the BlackBerry smart phone devices while I was volunteering most of my time in civic and entertainment organization "multikulti," where I had co-founded the community radio station
Que4 as their lead radio engineer. Prior I just upgraded to an Android from using an iPhone 3GS. My colleague had upgraded from BlackBerry after the Palm line of phones ended line of service. Once I got use to using the Curve and then the Bold, I found luxuries in having a removable battery to allow for extended batteries by third parties, a physical QWERTY keyboard with quick access buttons that made it possible to operate everything efficiently WITHOUT a touchscreen interface. And the devices were the size of my palm; I can type and operate with one hand if needed. My colleague had recently suffered an injury to one of his hands and it became essential for him to be able to operate his phone with just one hand which he was barely able to do with the Key2.
I want to focus on the features that made BlackBarry so successful all the way up to the Bold 9900. With reflection from BlackBerry's CEO John Chen he wanted someone to make something like the Bold and at the time that was not going to come from BlackBerry (source.) Their interest was to explore and expand their market while leaving behind their once loyal market of folks that tried everything they could to hold on to their BBOS devices. The BB10 devices lost some BB loyals while gaining some market interest from non-BB users. And that has created a new fringe market of people that are just loyal to the BB10 devices. The best compromise in that situation was the BlackBerry Classic which unlike it's predecessor had no removable battery; though it did have the classical Bold/Curve buttons including the trackpad that allowed most if not all operation without the need to interface with the touch screen.
1. Removable Battery: The BBOS devices would sometimes freeze and this gave popularity to the "battery pull" phrase. Although this was not the only "benefit." Having a replaceable battery can disabled the phone completely if needed as well as create the market for third party battery extenders. Not being married to the wall's outlet has been a blissful experience that I missed with the Bold 9900 that I became to experience again with my use of the Unihertz Titan. Not having to charge for three days of use is a huge blessing. And for those weary of "deep State" Government spying can rest assure their privacy is secure when they can simply remove the battery in their phone.
2. QWERTY keyboard, Convenience, Trackpad and Menu buttons, the BlackBerry way: BlackBerry has made their ground footing and name with their revolutionary and well polished keyboard layout, trackpad and menu buttons. The trackpad is not only useful for navigating menus it is essential for positioning your cursor during editing type. The touch screen methods of positioning your cursor for editing is very frustrating. Why would BlackBerry ditch that design to flow with the mainstream?
3. Palm Size: Today Unihertz sells a palm size smart touch screen phone (The Atom) and a Passport sized rugged phone with QWERTY keys (The Titan.) If the two would be merged we'd have something like a Bold 9900 for today's market. And as I had iterated earlier with most phones and earlier BB10 phones, you needed two hands to fully operate. Also the palm size is just practical for it's easy handling: Not too big, not too small: just right. My colleague would joke often about the size of the Titan comparing to an article he found of someone carrying their iPad in their big pocket pants.
4. Touchscreen Toggle Off/On Switch: In a market that has become consumed by touchscreen devices there have been no market offering of a smart phone device that can operate without the use of a touchscreen. Not being able to grab a phone securely with the possibility of touching something on the screen causing an unwanted event is cause for folks dropping their phones and not getting a good grip. It is a very practical and simple notion to be able to grip one's phone without dialing someone or opening some app. The over-saturation of smart phones equating to touch screens is frivolous however people are forced to this option because it is the only option for a smart phone. BlackBerry with their BBOS devices started to transition to the mainstream slowly with the touch screen option of the Bold 9900 and the full touch screen slab, the Torch. This may have led the path for market exploration and eventual failure in their attempt to homogenize with the rest of the market that really has nothing more to offer today other than more pixel peeping cameras (of which because of small sensor size most pixels at 100% zoom are garbage taking up unnecessary space) and battery sucking processor speeds -- this is a ridiculous market cry of obscene glutinous proportions. The BlackBerry phone needs to be a business phone, not a toy and not a dubious replacement for a wedding photographer.
Conclusion:
While I am currently enjoying the Titan, I am still holding onto my breath of BlackBerry Onward-Mobility to come out with a device that mirrors as much as possible the BBOS era of devices with a focus and emphasis on the practicability that made those BBOS devices successful in the business community. I did not touch on security because that has been emphasized a lot already and is already an all-around focus with BlackBerry.
Extra features to continue or look at:
1. The Speed Key and the Locker application experienced on the Key2 is a novel idea for efficiency and secure privacy respectively and should continue.
2. Option to change layout of physical keyboard to other types INCLUDING Dvorak. Yes there are die-hard Dvorak users. I know one of them that has been waiting for a physical keyboard phone to offer a software keyboard to allow the layout to become Dvorak.
3. Desktop software for local (not cloud dependent) backup of files and contents.
4. Option to disable Play Store for those crazy about "Deep State" immunity.
