Obama BlackBerry alert: it's a BlackBerry
By Joshua Topolsky 
posted January 29th 2009 6:29PM
posted January 29th 2009 6:29PM
posted January 29th 2009 6:29PM
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yes the world hasnt come to a stop because the president is using the phone he enjoys useing :D
I hate it when people accuse Obama of being treated positively/unfairly by the media .
Everything about him is historic and revolutionary.
* he's raised more money than any campaign...ever
* he's the first non-white president
* he's the first president to use a PDA (which is historical for the electronic field)
The list goes on and on.
Technicaly, this is gadget news and it IS IMPORTANT.
Furthermore, Blackberry should be honored he loves their phone because I personally think Blackberry's are pitiful in the face of other devices out there.
In fact, as an American President - I personaly would be using an IPHONE designed by American rather than a Canadian designed Blackberry.
What RIM should really do is build a new Blackberry called the BB CHANGE.
@ Flashpoint
Wow......it's truly amazing how you can turn any post into an "I'M AN IPHONE WHORE" rant.
The post screams, "I LET STEVE JOBS SPANK ME."
Either way, both phones are Chinese built, where design doesn't matter.
F
how much do they pay you to kiss Steve's butt??
i mean.. really! have you seriously own a blackberry in your life?
my blackberry is rock solid. my friends have iphone and often complain of it. they reset iphone more than they would like to.
Name 1 phone better than the iphone that does everything it does and is the same size or smaller?
CAUSE YOU CAN'T.
I believe that one of the blackberrys are thinner than the iPhone.
They are more feature rich, too.
Unlike your iPhone that has cute little games and gadgets.
So tell me sir, if the iPhone is so good, then why is the president holding a blackberry?
Failure to you, sir.
I doubt that the president has much of a need to download songs and check facebook on his phone, he's using it for important things. The same reason blackberries are popular in business, unlike iphones.
Guys, stop this already, really.
@Flashpoint
United States president and other high ranking officials use blackberry's.
Senior class presidents use the iPhone.
Get your markets right.
@Flashpoint
"Name 1 phone better than the iphone that does everything it does and is the same size or smaller?"
well can the iphone:
-copy/paste
-transfer files through bluetooth
-stereo bluetooth
-send picture/mms messages
-run multiple apps at once
-record videos
-does it support flash
-download files through the internet
plenty of other phones can do that an more.
and heres one phone that does that and more the htc touch hd.
Hell, I rather have the President use a Blackberry. Judging from the productivity loss my iPhone causes me in College, I don't even want to think of our President using it. I mean playing Tap Tap in a Homeland Security meeting is very unprofessional.
Obama is holding a Blackberry cause its all he knows.
thing is, there are lots of disenfranchised STORM owners out there.
Flashpoint, when there are that many people disagreeing with you and low ranking you, maybe you've said something wrong or that they don't approve. Now at this point, I have a suggestion for what you do next:
STFU!
(really, it's ok to like a product, especially iPhones which are subjectively very good, but there is a fine line between appreciation and fanboyism, and you've crossed it)
I'm the senior class president for my school and I use a Bold. And alot of people think it's cooler , or just as cool as the iPhone... though this usually happens before they actually use it.
"Does it have a touchscreen?" *all excited*
"No. I don't need one. But see all this stuff it can do?" *starts to try to show blackberry awesomeness*
"Oh. (insert condescending'iPhone therefore iBetter than you' face) Do you have iSteam? Coolest app ever. Here, bring up the App store real quick..." *reaches for phone*
"/facepalm" *sometimes I actually say "/facepalm" just to see their reactions*
"What?" *confused*
"Type on my keyboard real quick." *prepares for victory*
"HOLY CRAP LOL I CAN TEXT SO MUCH BETTER ON THIS THING" *starts actually noticing how cool the phone is*
"Yeah, and my 3g speeds are pretty fast too, not to mention I love the browser on it" *starts to open intertubes*
"But... doesn't only the iPhone have 3G? And what's a browser?" *acts puzzled*
*Pause* "Hey can you take a video of me doing x real quick, and then upload it to youtube. Just copy and paste the link into an email and send it to me then too, so i can upload it to my facebook." *prepares for victory, pt II*
*Yeah just a... oh, wait."
Sometimes I wonder how a nerd like me got elected.
@Flashpoint
I don't give a rat's ass how small the thing is so long as it fits in my pocket and has some semblance of 21st century design - Nokia N97 blows the iPhone out of the water.
A Black Berry, for the black pres!
Omaba!!! :D
I don't really comment often here on Engadget, but lemme ask Flashpoint, do you have any idea how pathetic you act like?
Bush had an Iphone... Obama know better.
Damn I got 3 of those in a box somewhere. get you obama phone on ebay bitches!
@imayam
I don't know if you noticed but you said omaba
Flashpoint,
Rule number 1 of Internet forums is not to feed the trolls, but I guess rules are meant to be broken sometimes.
To respond to your challenge, I can name you several phones that can slap the iPhone around 6 ways from Sunday.
No bluetooth music streaming and/or file transfers (video is out of the question)
No drag and drop file juggling
No Flash support inside Safari (where the heck is Opera Mobile for this thing)
No Java
No copy and paste
No front camera
No video recording
No video calls
No user replaceable battery
No radio
No VGA resolution
No IR port (it's something I take for granted, using my phone as a remote for well...anything just about)
No physical keyboard
No external storage card support (Micro SDHC cards are up to 32 GB now, 8GB is NOT enough these days, especially for a media device)
No voice command (WM devices and even some "el-cheapo" phones have featured this for years now)
No MMS (it doesn't have phone-to-phone MMS, it has phone-to-air-to-phone picture sharing necessitating a data plan)
No Live TV (that doesnt require you to be connected to an app like Orb on your home PC, which defeats the purpose, why would I want to watch it on a dinky non VGA screen instead of just on my home PC when im at home anyways)
No multitasking
No camera flash
No camera zoom
Same old, subpar, 2 MP camera for that matter
Limited video format support
Limited picture format support
Limited file format support in general
Only 128 MB of RAM (cant run many apps simultaneously, new WM phones are getting 256+ MB of RAM, with 220+ MB free on bootup, and with the Appstore opening up and 3rd party apps making their way to the phone, Apple is behind on the times)
Do you want me to continue, because I can?
I can furthermore name you dozens of phones that can do the aforementioned and more, things that completely elude the iPhone.
Touch HD ring a bell?
Touch Diamond/Pro?
Omnia?
Xperia?
The endless array of phones out in Japan perhaps?
Seriously, you sound fairly ignorant of the market and other market forces out there, as you have nestled yourself away in a safe little Apple bubble of ignorance.
Obama is likely using a 8830 because you cannot take a camera phone into secure facilities. Cameraless phones are a commodity these days.
@AK66
RIM's devices are not manufactured in China. They have their own plant in Waterloo, ON (Canada) and have contract manufacturing through Elquotec in Mexico and Hungary. If the big O's using an 8830 it was guaranteed to be manufactured in North America.
Even though I love my iPhone, I thnk it's really cool that Obama uses a BB. As far as I know it's a really secure phone. Man the things I would do in order to have his BB PIN.
Man I cannot begin to explain the things I would do to have his BB pin.
actually Obama had an iPhone at some point:
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2008/05/friday-afternoon-apple-links-obama-on-iphone-edition.ars
That's actually not a bad point... shouldn't he be stimulating the economy by purchasing an American-made phone? It doesn't necessarily have to be an iPhone, but he probably should have a phone made in the USA.
@Flashtroll umm, you could never be president. And Canadians are Americans, NORTH Americans. I love my iPhone, but I love Blackberries also. Both are well designed and fun to use, so STFU and stop sounding like an idiot.
I know you aren't an iPhone fan, you just write that shit to get everyone riled up.
And you can not spell... still.
@loocas
Maybe somebody already educated you on your ignorance, but the word being implied was not "negro" (which is dated and out of touch at best, and possibly offensive in and of itself), but a highly derrogatory derivitive thereof. If you don't know what you are talking about, then don't say anything. Since you are clearly not an American, I don't expect you to know, let alone understand the complicated reality that is American social reality. However, our country has a mixture of cultures nearly un-paralleled in the world. Some of those cultures joined our society willingly, some did not. This left some ugly scars across American history, which I would venture to say, none of us are proud of. Certain words and phrases, no matter what their benign origin, have taken on connotations that are plain ugly. In certain cases, groups "take ownership" of those phrases, and use them in a self-referential way. No matter what my personal beliefs are about that process, it happens. Being that I am not a member of said cultures, I do not see myself as being able to say anything on the matter. However, I do know that as a non-member of said groups, being that I am not a biggot or a racist, I wouldn't even think of using those words, jokingly or not.
So, yes, American social reality is complicated, and convoluted. But, we have one of the richest (in a cultural, not financial sense), broadly accepting societes in the world, and all of the member cultures help to make it that. We have come a long way, and change is always happening, but we can't simply forget 300 years of history.
So, I won't pretend to understand all of the realities of where you hail from, and you can stop being condescending towards a society which is very visible in the world, but you clearly don't actually understand.
HA! Loves it. You know the First Brotha got the NSA to give him a tricked out version of whatever the hell he wants. This is America.
yeah soon hes gonna get the presidentail limo rollin on "22's"
and hes gonna get the plane from soul plane in place of the air force 1
I was thinking he'd be using that new Nextel push-to-talk BB.
"YO BIDEN, WHERE U AT?"
being a black man u crack me up hahahahahaha! next the movie soul plane will finally come true!!!
Bidden: "SHIT N%$&*, YOU KNOW WHERE AM AT!"
OneLove, that's an extremely offensive word (when used by a non-black). Such offensive words should never be used in the company of blacks (unless you're black). I don't think Biden (who isn't black) would ever say that word to Obama (who is black). Mmmkay?
Negro is an offensive word? Why? I'll never be able to understand americans' hypocrisy...
@Gad Get
I'm black and I find that word offensive no matter who uses it. Anything else is just hypocritical.
@gad get: Thanks for the education. :|
Am sure that's what biden is thinking. I don't trust him.
I wonder why he doesn't have a Blackberry storm, not a big fan of the curve.
Because the president doesn't have 2+ minutes to painstakingly type out a short reply?
I'm guessing because he has a brain.
What does a curve have to do with anything? He has an 8830.
Ummmm....not a curve...8830 not 8330...not a true crackberry fan huh....
I'm guessing RIM isn't feeling so hot about those "security issues" which delayed its launch.
While its great to see him using a Canadian product, his views on Canada-American relations are not good for Canada. So I guess this is bittersweet for me, sortof how a blackberry tastes.
Yeah, you know that Canuckistanis are going to be listening in on him... or trying, anyways.
Blackberries are generally sour/sweet. But sometimes they'll just be sweet and rock!
@Erwos:
+1 for Canuckistanis--I'll have to try that out on the hosers at work.