As technology has advanced around the world, we've seen several instances of governments stepping in to ban certain things. When something is banned, the motivation behind those bans can sometimes be confusing, or the real reason can become obfuscated behind misleading stories. Here's the real reason why certain technologies have been banned in certain areas of the world.
It may be hard to imagine that anyone is still using a BlackBerry device running one of the Canadian company's operating systems, but it is indeed true – although not for much longer. BlackBerry has just announced that BlackBerry 10 and BlackBerry OS device legacy services will cease operating after January 4, 2022 and has thanked its "many loyal customers and partners over the years" in the process. At this time, the company says devices running BlackBerry 7.1 OS and earlier, BlackBerry 10 software and BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.1 and earlier versions will cease to work reliably. This will impact data services, phone calls, SMS and 9-1-1 functionality.
The smartphone market is a fiercely competitive and fast-changing one. Over the years since Apple introduced the iPhone, we have seen giants fall, and new ones take their place even as Samsung and Apple continue their almost never-ending rivalry. Some of those names that have already faded into the background still evoke some fond emotions from those who may be old enough to remember them. While the chances of them returning to their former selves, let alone their former glory, is nigh impossible now, there are still some brands that we wish continued to do business in the unique way they knew how.
It's been a while since we've heard anything related to BlackBerry. After it stopped making its own smartphones, the company switched to licensing its brand to other smartphones makers like TCL. News on that front has died down as well, especially after TCL decided to end its line of BlackBerry-branded phones. Fans of the iconic brand might still be holding on to a little hope, especially now that another licensee has broken its silence to prove that a 5G-capable BlackBerry phone is still in the works, even if a launch date is still up in the air.
An almost unprecedented set of circumstances have created a situation in which normally diametrically opposed politicians agree on an action. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez just called for a hearing on (and likely an investigation into) Robinhood's decision to block retail investors from purchasing stock "while hedge funds are able to trade the stock as they see fit." AOC continued, "As a member of the Financial Services Committee, I'd support a hearing if necessary."
Robinhood, WeBull and other brokerages are down for the count, right now, thanks to extreme volatility in a wide variety of stocks across several markets. If we're looking at GameStop and AMC, we see massive market manipulation and calls from regulators to stop trading altogether. If we look at cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Dogecoin, we see a bit more of the same.
This afternoon Reddit was down for a period of time starting at around 11:29 PST. On January 27, 2021, Reddit was the subject of some scrutiny thanks to the extreme nature of stock prices after recommendations and pushes from Reddit's various stock-watching communities. The push involved stocks like GameStop, BlackBerry, and the movie theater company AMC.
Once the desire of every tech enthusiast, BlackBerry vanished from the scene gradually owing to its lack of design innovation and failing to understand the evolution of consumer-driven market trends. A major contributing factor to its downfall was not being flexible enough to evolve the QWERTY keyboard design in times when the likes of Apple advanced to the full touchscreen interface.
BlackBerry is coming back, with a new BlackBerry 5G smartphone promised that will once again drag the brand out of the history books. This time around its OnwardMobility that has licensed the BlackBerry name, after TCL's agreement with BlackBerry the company came to an end in February of this year.
For a number of years now, Blackberry and TCL Communication have been working together to release new phones with BlackBerry branding that run on Android. It looks like that partnership is coming to an end, as TCL has announced that it will stop offering BlackBerry-branded devices later this year.
With all the talk about LG, HTC, and Sony's phone businesses being in trouble, there is one brand that has seemingly been ignored. To be fair, BlackBerry has long surrendered its phone-making business to TCL but its name still used to ring in Android circles. The last news we heard from its wasn't good, with BlackBerry Messenger announced to be going away. It won't be alone, at least, as BlackBerry's other Android apps are reportedly riding off into the sunset as well.
BlackBerry has slapped Twitter with a patent infringement lawsuit, alleging that the social network copied its technology related to mobile messaging apps. The new lawsuit follows a similar legal complaint filed against Facebook last year, that likewise alleging the company had infringed its patent. In this case, BlackBerry claims Twitter has infringed upon half a dozen of its patents.