End of an Era: Blackberry Company to end Service for Handheld Devices Today

We don’t see many of them around anymore, but anyone old enough will remember that these devices were the first on the scene of handheld smart devices—and dominated the market for many years before they were eclipsed by “smarter” smartphones.

The once-indispensable device for so many executives, journalists and politicians is going extinct after today, when the company will pull “life support” for the services of most Blackberry devices.

In 2016, the company announced that they were transitioning to being a software company, away from producing phones—however, they continued to support the software on existing phone as a courtesy to their loyal customers through January 4.

The author of one popular site dedicated to Blackberry’s lamented the demise of the company, pointing out a sad fact that is breathing its last in these very moments: “[Blackberry’s] enhanced productivity without all of the distractions that come with iPhones. It feels like they’re causing A.D.D. for most of us, rather than productivity right now,” he said of iPhones. “We went from analog phones to the pendulum swinging too far. You can’t actually get anything done on it because you’re constantly bombarded by sensory overload.”

A statement from Blackberry late last month read: “As a reminder, the legacy services for BlackBerry 7.1 OS and earlier, BlackBerry 10 software, BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.1 and earlier versions, will no longer be available after January 4, 2022. As of this date, devices running these legacy services and software through either carrier or Wi-Fi connections will no longer reliably function, including for data, phone calls, SMS and 9-1-1 functionality.

“We thank our many loyal customers and partners over the years and invite you to learn more about how BlackBerry provides intelligent security software and services to enterprises and governments around the world.”