top | item 28519726

(no title)

The only BlackBerry I ever owned was the BlackBerry Classic, back when that was still contemporary. Best phone I ever had. The UX was very consistent between apps, everything targeting it natively tended to be quite speedy, and the keyboard was excellent.

I also miss the "BlackBerry Hub" feature, which would aggregate your emails, BlackBerry messenger messages, and SMS messages into a single UI. It even pulled in notifications from Android apps, though opening them switched to that app rather than letting you reply in-line.

I bought mine after they had already released Android compatibility for any APK you cared to load, but unfortunately I think that feature was too little, too late.

I've been on an iPhone SE since around 2016. If I had the option to go back to using the BB Classic hardware/OS as it was when I switched, but with third-party app support and security updates, I would do it without second thought.

discuss

tomaskafka|4 years ago

I still want Apple to make a Hub thing inside iOS. I hate having to use 6 messaging apps to reach people I love, but as a 'data providers' I'd keep them installed.

Analemma_|4 years ago

Microsoft tried doing something like this with Windows Phone. It was OK, but the fundamental issue here is that the messaging apps themselves absolutely do not want such a thing, because it would commoditize them and keep the user away from revenue-boosting gimmicks and dark patterns. They will never allow it to be built. RIM was only able to do it before companies realized the value of messaging lock-in; even if it still existed in any real capacity today, this feature would not.

skinnymuch|4 years ago

There’s startups focusing on this. https://Beeperhq.com and https://texts.com

rbanffy|4 years ago

Blackberry Hub was a thing of beauty. A single message queue for things I need to be aware of would make my life so much easier.

afandian|4 years ago

I agree, it was wonderful on a Passport.

But I do wonder what a mess would result if it had collided with mass market Android and the shovelfulls of sofware that treats the notifications like a 90s systray. BBOS 10 not being Android might have been a bit of a moat against that.

vjvj|4 years ago

This. I started with a BB Storm and stayed through several BB10 handsets up to the Passport. There was no second guessing the UX with Blackberry. The menu was always in the same place and Hub was great when you have so many accounts.

I found the UX in iPhone apps so irritating. Settings could be virtually anywhere and were commonly scattered across multiple places.

That said, I now use my iPhone very differently to how I use my Blackberry and I wonder if I would still appreciate Blackerry features if I go back.

By this I mean I get virtually no notifications. I don't have work emails on my iPhone and only the red badge icon turned on for personal email accounts. Whatsapp only fetches new messages when I open the app. The only app notification I get is from screen time every Sunday.

One of the best things about Blackberry was the subtlety of notifications but I've just chosen to go low-notification with iPhone and I don't think I'll ever revert that.

christophilus|4 years ago

Windows phone had a hub-like UI, and I absolutely loved it.