Thursday, August 05, 2010

From Crackberry to Sadsackberry?

Remember in 2008 how one measure of what a hip, modern dude Barry was was that they were going to have to take his Crackberry away?

Well, apparently that's old news now, because the Blackberry is officially so two years ago, dude. You know: "Last week called. They want their phone back." Hello? No apps? How can you have a phone without apps? I mean is that, like, your mom's phone?

18 comments:

Carteach said...

Ahh.... and article about 'leashes'. That is how I term the nasty little devices surgically attached to the hips of newly initiated administration drones.

I count it a measure of my happiness in life that I do not have to accept one of those things as a price to do what I love.

Revolver Rob said...

I admit it, I text, a lot. I send on average 1000+ text messages a month. Touch screen keyboards don't cut it. A tactical clicky keyboard is like a good send, when you do three quarters of your daily writing on a little mobile device.

It maybe so last year, but I'm not so into this year, that I want the $160/month phone bill that comes with a Droid. Yes it may have better "apps" than a Blackberry, but then I haven't found where I need forty million apps either.

-Rob

Tam said...

Hey, my phone was $15.99 at Target. It doesn't have a camera or anything. No need to defend your choices here. :)

Anonymous said...

1000? I send maybe 12000 messages (text and email) in a month. I've had a month in which I've used 11 voice minutes - now that was starting to approach the ideal.

I own a Blackberry because a) it works, and b) I own one. That last point isn't circular reasoning; it's a sunk cost and I'm gonna use it 'til it sinks!

The

Drang said...

RvolverRob: Did you mean "tactile" keyboard? ;-)

One the the neat things about Crackberries is that, apparently,they piss off tyrannical towelheads.

WV: quilly. Raghead tyrants and despots get a quilly feeling when they can't monitor your calls.

Revolver Rob said...

@Drang, yes I meant "tactile" and "god send" not good send. Typing before morning coffee = nothing good.

Anon@11:04, that's a lot of texts and emails dude. I push through about 20-25 emails a day and send another 5 or 10 in response. I fortunately, do not have the email oriented business that some do. As a grad student, I just have to deal with student, advisor, and departmental emails. Almost none of them are seriously time critical.

-Rob

og said...

If I didn't have to for work, I probably wouldn't have a phone. As is, I use mine a great deal, but I wouldn't miss it too much, and I'd adapt quickly. One thing that would be hard- there are almost NO public phones anymore. Ever try to find one, recently?

NotClauswitz said...

When I saw TeeVee advertising aiming the crackerberry straight at junior teens I figures it was all Facebook Emo's T-t-twittering LEAVE CRACKBERRY ALONE! from here on out.

Sigivald said...

BBs technically have apps. Just not many, or (anecdotally, never used them) all that good.

Rob: Where do you live that a smartphone plane is $160 a month? A full-bore unlimited-SMS plan with 5gb data shouldn't be over $100, and might be more like $80.

Tam said...

Og,

"Ever try to find one, recently?"

Go to any neighborhood where there are a lot of drug dealers. There's still a market for pay phones there. ;)

Revolver Rob said...

Sig: Texas, I just priced a Droid on Verizon. To mirror the package I currently have on AT&T (two phone lines), would be $125/month. However, that is with 450 minutes and none of my family is on Verizon. So, I need to upgrade to not go over minutes (we use <60 minutes of talk time, but >500 minutes a month in mobile to mobile on AT&T), that takes me to $155/mo + taxes.

Trust me, I HATE AT&T but unfortunately, it's the best choice in town for two phone lines with fully featured. I just shopped around for phones, because we are coming up for contractual renewal and want to switch, but really can't afford to.

-Rob

sam said...

Ahem. Large companies like it because it works directly with their Enterprise e-mail systems.

Real-time shared calendars are big feature among the bigwigs at my work. And yes, we are a big Crackberry/BES shop. So much so, that iPhones are outlawed for any business use

Gregg said...

Well, Verizon is far from the least expensive out there. For the price quoted you could have 2 phones with 1800 shared minutes and unlimited text and data on sprint. Incidently, sprint also has a touch screen smartphone with a slide out full keyboard, the Samsung Moment< which has a larger keyboard and a larger screen with the same or smaller footprint of a blackberry.


The other thing is that these things are a misnomer. I don't actually carry a phone on my hip, I carry a micro computer that happens to also make phone calls. Heck this thing is more powerful than my first 5 computers combined and it has more storage space. Why spend a day in the library looking things up when you can do it from your "phone" immediately?

RevDisk said...

I use a blackberry for work, and I ran the blackberry enterprise server. Voice from blackberry is not secured, it's normal cell phone calls. Same with text messages.

It's the data that gets interesting. The crypto keys are generated on the BES, not at RIM. They can't hand over the keys even if they wanted, because they do not have them. If your admin is bright, he set your crackberry to talk back to the mothership using AES cryto. AES is pretty decent and was selected in an open competition by NIST to be the new US standard. You can also set your blackberry to store everything on the device to be encrypted. Short of rubber hose cryptography, it's not like to be broken easily.

No other smartphone provider has really put more than a few seconds thought into security. That's why you can pwn a iPhone with ease, but with a properly configured (which is pretty good by default) blackberry, it's not very easy.

og said...

"Go to any neighborhood where there are a lot of drug dealers"

Do you suppose the obverse is true?

"JESUS CHRIST LOOK AT ALL THOSE PAYPHONES! WE'RE IN THE HOOD!!! FLOOR IT BEFORE WE END UP ON COPS!!"

Six said...

Mine doesn't have a camera either. I think it has voice mail but if it does it's undoubtedly full from 5 years of my Ludditeness. Luddity?

Dr. StrangeGun said...

I'm still using the same Sanyo flip I was using when we worked together. The damn thing simply won't die... and has severely limited web access, just enough to do the 'emergency' things on occasion, that keeps it 'alive'.

I *am* on the list now for an HTC Evo 4, should I ever get a call...

Dr. StrangeGun said...

btw, 'won't die' means WON'T DIE.

Since time ago, i've dropped it hard enough to break a little hole in the case, it's been left in the driveway overnight after it fell from my pocket, it's been dropped innumerable time from waist height onto hard floors, it's been used to the point of battery death and still gives an hour talk time... it's even been on the charger a few times now during power surges and spikes in thunderstorms.

If it wanted to eat my brain, it'd legitimately be a zombie phone. I may have to beat it with a hammer, burn it, or submerge it in some caustic substance to end it all after I replace it, and I'm still not entirely certain I won't open up whatever horror I've released it to and be greeted with an earnest "Beep."

Heh, WV: Anatels.