Counterclockwise: BlackBerry, the king of keyboards, was killed by the touchscreen

All chat clients these days have “delivered” and “seen” labels to reassure you that your message reached its intended recipient. But what if getting the message delivered was literally a matter of life and death? Enter Research in Motion or as it would later be known, BlackBerry.

In 1996 the company introduced its first product, the Inter@ctive Pager, a two-way pager built on the Mobitex data network designed for emergency services (police, ambulance, firefighters).

Another pager, the BlackBerry 850, would give rise to the iconic name – its distinctive keyboard was reminiscent of the…


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