BlackBerry: A decade of connectivity
Author: vodafone
Category: Arts and Entertainment
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Although the market is now awash with smartphones that combine advanced computing facilities with telephone functionality, the unit that really kicked off the craze was developed in the early 2000s by a Canadian firm called Research In Motion and called the BlackBerry.
The very first Blackberry, introduced in 1999, was not a phone at all, but a handheld wireless two way pager with PDA functionality.
The first BlackBerry smartphone was released in 2002, and became an instant success, propelling RIM from being a small company on the fringes of the PDA market to being market leaders almost overnight.
BlackBerry smartphones are capable of mobile telephony, SMS text messaging, internet faxing, push emailing and web browsing as well as full PDA functionality.
Although there were already several devices on the market, most notably the popular Nokia 9000, that combined a QWERTY keyboard with a mobile phone to give it full PDA functionality, the BlackBerry smartphone introduced a number of innovations which allowed it to steal a march on its rivals within the business market.
The most exciting feature of the BlackBerry was its ability to send and receive emails on the move, using a technique known as push emailing. In a nutshell, push emailing allows you to use your works email account anywhere in the world, with automatic updating and downloading of new messages and contacts between the main server and the BlackBerry.
The name BlackBerry is derived from its unique keyboard, whose bulbous black keys made the unit look somewhat like the aforementioned small foodstuff. The first models came with a side mounted tracking wheel to allow navigation through the menu system, but later models came with a trackball, which allowed far more flexibility and ease of use, particularly for those used to working with a mouse.
Some models featured a Push-to-Talk function, which effectively turned the unit into a two way intercom system across long distances, which took the concept of the portable office that one stage further.
Companies who employ a lot of roaming staff found BlackBerries to be a perfect way to achieve office-style integration within a more flexible spatial framework. Keen executives and workaholics were delighted that they could now stay in touch and carry on working while on the move, and as a result the units became an increasingly popular sight on public transportation during office hours.
One of the great advantages of the BlackBerry email system is that messages could be written and replied to in circumstances where reception is less than optimal, such as on a train, as the unit can queue information to be sent and received whenever transmission is possible.
A handy feature of the BlackBerry is its trilateration function, which works a little like a GPS device, but without the need for connection to a satellite. It is particularly handy for bosses who need to know the whereabouts of their employees, or for finding people in busy thoroughfares that you have never met face to face before.
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Keywords: mobile, sim only
View Count: 66
Date Submitted: 6/12/2009
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