Blackberry Pearl – I want one, I got one

One of my friends was hassling me the other day. He said I never found anything good to say on this blog. Commenting it’s easy to tear something down than to build something up. Fair enough. What irks me though is products/services where it’s apparent not much serious thought was put in them. And more amazing that investors pour money into these companies.

So here is a positive product review. The Blackberry Pearl (8100). I have it, I love, I’m keeping it. I justified the purchase based upon a number of "improvements" made from my previous Blackberry, the 7100T. I can list them all. You can read extensive reviews elsewhere on the web, all generally favourable.

But really, down deep, the reason I have this new phone is simply — vanity. I think it’s cool. I especially like the white Pearl trackball that illuminates in a darken room, everyone notices it’s different. I notice others who have this new phone (there are few) and immediately assume they are "members of the club" similar to myself. When I see someone sneaking a peek, like a proud father, I show it to them and they marvel at it with just a ting of jealousy.

When Cisco introduced their VoIP PBX, they paid liberally to have the Cisco 7960 phone used liberally on various "cool" television shows. Hence your office became "cool" if it had one. Though it did precious little more than an age old Nortel PBX phone. I have no doubt that Cisco sold countless systems for no other reason than the business owner wanted to be "cool".

That’s what’s missing from VoIP, no cool devices.