BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development • Hacker News Board

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#61

Post by camelNotation » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:40 PM UTC

laumars wrote: post #53

camelNotation wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True, but then you sacrifice other features in the package. You can't pay with NFC on a cheap phone. The cameras suck on cheap phones. The screen quality sucks. The build quality sucks. There are tradeoffs if you just go cheap. I would pay flagship prices for a hybrid phone that focused on productivity and ignored entertainment.

Android and Apple do also focus on productivity as well as entertainment. It sounds like what you're asking for is basically a high end phone but only supporting a subset of apps and a slide out keyboard. This sounds like commercial suicide in my opinion. As much as I'd love to see more handsets with physical keyboard, they never seem to sell well enough for manufacturers to invest in releasing more models. And I rea…

> "As much as I'd love to see more handsets with physical keyboard, they never seem to sell well enough for manufacturers to invest in releasing more models."

Because like the Priv, they attach keyboards to massive screens. Those screens aren't necessary in a productivity phone. They make it unwieldy and ridiculous to use. The form factor of a Blackberry Classic is all you need, just integrate with Android.

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#62

Post by LeoPanthera » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:40 PM UTC

jagermo wrote: post #34

PhantomGremlin wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. Yeah, but does that really matter any more? I've found that my iPhone's speech-to-text is pretty darned good, as long as I speak with a slightly staccato cadence to make it clear where the word divisions are. I can do that much more quickly than I can type. Generally I only have problems when the connection to the server doing the conversion is poor. I've never used Android's s…

Does it work without Internet? Tbh, I find it kind of creepy to have Apple, Google, Microsoft or Amazon listen to everything I say. I prefer keyboards

iOS dictation does indeed work without internet. (Siri does not, however.)

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#63

Post by graeme » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:41 PM UTC

riyadparvez wrote: post #57

camelNotation wrote: post #35

There is a growing market for "dumb phones" among those of us that are disillusioned with the smartphone lifestyle. It's not enormous, but it's out there. Blackberry needs to target them. If you buy a dumb phone, you not only give up the life-sucking abyss of social media and mobile gaming, but you also give up decent cameras and useful tools like navigation, group messages, and keyboard typing. For those that want t…

Just out of curiosity, why can't you uninstall the apps that you deem unproductive or distracting? I have uninstalled all the social, distracting, unproductive apps from my smartphone. Granted, most smartphones don't have keyboards. Other than that you should be ok with a smartphone.

There's a difference between "impossible to install" and "must restrain self from installing".

Not OP, but I'm guessing that's where they're coming from. I've had situations where "impossible" was significantly more productive for me than "difficult".

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#64

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:43 PM UTC

wreft wrote: post #49

TruthSHIFT wrote: post #26

"We'll be fine." -BlackBerry CEO Jim Balsillie

What was he supposed to say? "We're fucked, sell the stock, guys."

[deleted]

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#65

Post by bdcravens » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:47 PM UTC

amenghra wrote: post #60

BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?

There were plenty of consumers buying Blackberries. As sales contracted, most companies will try to regain that, as opposed to admitting defeat and refocusing on core competencies, especially when you're publicly traded.

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#66

Post by pwthornton » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:48 PM UTC

amenghra wrote: post #60

BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?

It eventually became a point where the iPhone was a better consumer and professional device. The Blackberry simply wasn't a real smartphone with a real OS.

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#67

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:49 PM UTC

amenghra wrote: post #60

BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?

[deleted]

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#68

Post by tacostakohashi » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:49 PM UTC

amenghra wrote: post #60

BlackBerry had a fine product for a specific market segment until the press/media started comparing them to consumer devices. What if they had focused on what they were good at?

They did. They just weren't as good at that as everybody else.

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#69

Post by snuxoll » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:50 PM UTC

Cuuugi wrote: post #13

Cuuugi wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIRC their big money maker is the Blackberry Enterprise Server, or BES. I'm not up to date on the feature's so don't quote me on it. It used to partition my phone so i had a Work/Personal work space (so that work could wipe my work related info) They pivoted to a multiplatform system back when things started to look grim for Blackberry, and that's probably whats kept them afloat. It's massively overpriced for what it…

Oh, Yeah! To add on to my point, Blackberry released their private keys to the RCMP, so all BBM traffic could be decrypted. They didn't release the BES keys though because feature? http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/rcmp-blackberry-hack-montr...

Can't release BES keys unless BlackBerry put a backdoor in the software, the whole point of BES is you don't go through the BIS but communicate with the BES directly with encryption managed directly by it.

Re: BlackBerry confirms it will end in-house hardware development

#70

Post by Osiris » Wed, Sep 28, 2016, 4:53 PM UTC

maxsilver wrote: post #15

whitecarpet wrote: post #9

I've been never more productive with my smartphones than with a Blackberry. The BB's keyboards are still unmatched. While I can type as fast with my iPhone 7 where cursor control is thanks to 3D touch great a BB Classic is still better—reasons why: - You can rest your fingers on the keyboard like on a real keyboard without pressing the keys (you can't do that on a touch screen) - After a short time you start to touch…

> I don't get why the CEO didn't do this as the first thing when he started his Android strategy. I don't think Chen understands device strategy, or cares much for it. Because every BB user has been asking for the exact same thing you just mentioned -- for years -- and they still haven't done it. It'll never beat Apple or Samsung in popularity. But if they just released a single solid high-end Android phone with a re…

I completely agree. I had a T-mobile G2 with a Z spring keyboard, and I loved it. Even with swype motions in the Android keyboard, I still have to make a lot of corrections. I could type entire emails on a hardware keyboard. With a software keyboard, I try to keep things as terse as possible because it just takes too long.