Hey Steemit,
I've been thinking about BlackBerry (and more broadly the role of the smartphone culturally now) and have put together a rough outline of my thoughts. I wanted to get some feedback, opinions, start a broader discussion. I figured I'd ask my favourite community on the internet right now to chime in first :)
- Smartphones were the minimum viable product; pocket sized general purpose computing the natural extension of the idea
- The market was primed for a device centered around consumption
- Apple was able to recognize and capitalize on this with a product centered around effortless and beautiful consumption
- The iPhone was the perfect product for the market at the time
- The ethos behind every iPhone was elevating consumption to a level of art; the evolution of the display is an apt metaphor
- The iPhone has gradually started to compromise sane user experience purely for aesthetics
- That's why every model of the iPhone has been feeling slightly worse for the past few generations
- The consumer is now willing to accept compromises on behalf of consumption for a more general purpose computing machine
- Software keyboards are objectively worse than a well made hardware keyboard; see the BlackBerry Q10
- You can also swap the battery, which lasts for days, easily
- It is by no means perfect, BlackBerry certainly needs a creative vision
- They need to realize that their niche is broader than executives and professionals; it's really for creatives and creators.
- That is, power users who wish to produce and not consume
- People who do not mind minor compromises for the sake of durability, better battery life, cheap and easily replaceable components
- People do not want a device with a programmed lifespan of less than two years
- Even if BlackBerry marketed a device exclusively at writers (with a few software modifications as well) they could easily expand their market
- People are yearning for a device which gives customization and production more equal weighing to consumption and ascetics
P.S.
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