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If a brand is out of fashion, of course everyone loves to join in the fun and pile on, and any innovation, good or bad, is automatically thrown onto the bonfire

If a brand is out of fashion, of course everyone loves to join in the fun and pile on, and any innovation, good or bad, is automatically thrown onto the bonfire. It's too bad because I think the screen is innovative, and I wish others would follow suit. Some extra space on the side is more valuable to me than more at the top. I tried a squarish LG phablet a couple years ago and loved it. Unhappily the software was poor and I had to switch to something with a more standard aspect ratio. Also, I trust Blackberry shares my priorities about productivity and security; anything to save me a few seconds each time I use it would be great. I hardly ever use my phones for anything else, other than occasional maps and web browsing. If it works well, I'm tempted, though its potential in the marketplace is worrying. And no, I don't care if you think my phone is unfashionable. EDIT: Added a couple words to the first paragraph to clarify.

femto113 12y ago
> Some extra space on the side is more valuable to me than more at the top Serious question: doesn't the landscape mode of rectangular screens sufficiently address this?
- redthrowaway 12y ago
  Phones are getting big enough that they're not particularly comfortable to use in landscape mode. I could two-thumb-text on my 3gs just fine; my Nexus 5 is actually pretty awkward in that regard (although swiftkey makes that a moot point anyway)
- hackuser 12y ago
  > Serious question: doesn't the landscape mode of rectangular screens sufficiently address this? Not for me, or at least not well. In landscape mode the screen is too short vertically (especially with the keyboard displayed). There's no getting around having sufficient space in 2 dimensions. EDIT: Someone else posted that it displays 66 chars per line, which is enough for my text files! I wonder how Vim works on that keyboard.
Tloewald 12y ago
It kind of depends on what you mean by "out of fashion". BB is out of fashion because it lost the plot and, producing a phone that the Verge said was harder to type on than a virtual keyboard, can't be used one-handed, which is bigger and heavier than a phablet while having a smaller screen shows it doesn't have a clue where to find it again. Who is the market? Cheapskate enterprise customers with huge pockets?
- hackuser 12y ago
  > producing a phone that the Verge said ... What the Verge says is not gospel. The Verge could be right but a product with a completely different approach, in a brand that it's trendy to mock (and The Verge is a bit trendy), is not something I'd implicitly trust them about. For example, if a reviewer, like many, has dismissed Blackberry before the reviewer even sees the phone, then they are unlikely to be open-minded to changes from what they already know (new keyboard ideas, new dimensions, etc.). Much of the review seemed to have problems with things that were different than the familiar iPhone/Android products. If we make iPhone/Android the rule, then we're choking off innovation. At least Blackberry didn't announce yet another phablet, as one competitor recently did. Also, consider that many in the industry (and I don't know about The Verge at all in this respect) sell their positive opinions to the highest bidder, something Blackberry might not be able to afford right now. EDIT: See the Register for a much more useful review. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/24/blackberry_passport_first_look/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/24/blackberry_passport_... For example, the following sounds very appealing to me, (also, it displays 66 chars/line -- enough for my text files!) > The key difference of the Passport, apart from its striking shape, is that the its QWERTY keyboard doubles as a capacitive multitouch trackpad. ... Firstly, when editing text, the phone doesn’t move in your hands, and your attention doesn’t switch quite so much. Note "hands" – plural: this is a two-handed device. I particularly enjoyed being able to select and manipulate blocks of text very quickly.

femto113 12y ago

> Some extra space on the side is more valuable to me than more at the top Serious question: doesn't the landscape mode of rectangular screens sufficiently address this?

redthrowaway 12y ago
Phones are getting big enough that they're not particularly comfortable to use in landscape mode. I could two-thumb-text on my 3gs just fine; my Nexus 5 is actually pretty awkward in that regard (although swiftkey makes that a moot point anyway)
hackuser 12y ago
> Serious question: doesn't the landscape mode of rectangular screens sufficiently address this? Not for me, or at least not well. In landscape mode the screen is too short vertically (especially with the keyboard displayed). There's no getting around having sufficient space in 2 dimensions. EDIT: Someone else posted that it displays 66 chars per line, which is enough for my text files! I wonder how Vim works on that keyboard.

Tloewald 12y ago

It kind of depends on what you mean by "out of fashion". BB is out of fashion because it lost the plot and, producing a phone that the Verge said was harder to type on than a virtual keyboard, can't be used one-handed, which is bigger and heavier than a phablet while having a smaller screen shows it doesn't have a clue where to find it again. Who is the market? Cheapskate enterprise customers with huge pockets?

hackuser 12y ago
> producing a phone that the Verge said ... What the Verge says is not gospel. The Verge could be right but a product with a completely different approach, in a brand that it's trendy to mock (and The Verge is a bit trendy), is not something I'd implicitly trust them about. For example, if a reviewer, like many, has dismissed Blackberry before the reviewer even sees the phone, then they are unlikely to be open-minded to changes from what they already know (new keyboard ideas, new dimensions, etc.). Much of the review seemed to have problems with things that were different than the familiar iPhone/Android products. If we make iPhone/Android the rule, then we're choking off innovation. At least Blackberry didn't announce yet another phablet, as one competitor recently did. Also, consider that many in the industry (and I don't know about The Verge at all in this respect) sell their positive opinions to the highest bidder, something Blackberry might not be able to afford right now. EDIT: See the Register for a much more useful review. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/24/blackberry_passport_first_look/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/09/24/blackberry_passport_... For example, the following sounds very appealing to me, (also, it displays 66 chars/line -- enough for my text files!) > The key difference of the Passport, apart from its striking shape, is that the its QWERTY keyboard doubles as a capacitive multitouch trackpad. ... Firstly, when editing text, the phone doesn’t move in your hands, and your attention doesn’t switch quite so much. Note "hands" – plural: this is a two-handed device. I particularly enjoyed being able to select and manipulate blocks of text very quickly.