Warning: Long winded rant ahead.
So here I am, sitting on my bed at home on a fine Saturday night, because I can’t be f*cked to go out cos I’ve just spent massive amounts of money fixing my car’s radiator and camera gear and I’ve run out of clean pants to wear …let’s just say I’m too lazy to go out and spend my just-transferred hard-earned monthly salary, ok?
So what better time to bitch write about my dreaded Blackberry Gemini 8500, a year and 3+ months after I succumbed to peer pressure and bought it?
Granted, our relationship has had its ups and downs, but I’m sort of ready to call it quits and buy a new non-BB phone, if only my BB using friends would allow me. Le sigh.
Without further ado… and at the risk of sounding like a sociopath, here’s 5 issues I’m having with my Blackberry, a year later:
1. Broadcast messages
I was just chillin’ in between awake and asleep when all of a sudden my Blackberry buzzed aloud. Let’s hope it’s something important… NOT.
Oh shit, not another (two or three) pointless Broadcast messages!
Oh shit, it’s another stupid “Test Contact” thing!
Here’s a fine example stolen somewhere from the internetz, in which the sender actually expects the recipient to re-broadcast the broadcast message, making it even more irrelevant!
RIM should totally have an option for the user to block Broadcast Messages. Granted, this BM thing is only slightly less annoying than Penis Enlargement spam emails you get from time to time… cos 99% of them is just so f*cking irrelevant!
If only the obsessive senders could see how many fucks I give about their BM? Zip, nothing, nada. I don’t give a f. Neither I will forward ur BM! FAIL.
2. Stupid illegible 4l4y BBM usernames
Yes! So you think you’re cool cos you have an unique BB Messenger username sprinkled with lame-ass illegible symbols? If only you know that I am able to permanently replace your totally illegible username (example: ×÷·.·´¯`·)»DJ_ØKO_ÇøÕL«(·´¯`·.·÷×), so that it reads as something like “Djoko, annoying fat ass second cousin once removed” on my BB? You’d be really sorry that you’re not using your real name as your BB Messenger name. FAIL, Mister.
3. Crappy Build Quality
You’ve heard it from elsewhere, friends who had to replace their trackballs, batteries, ever so often? Well, in my case, it’s that dreaded keytone thing. The flexible contact sheet that goes under your keypad. For the 14 months I’ve been using this Blackberry, I’ve had to replace this stupid thing twice, at Rp. 150k a pop, and nearly had to replace it for the third time… but then it fixed by itself. I have no further comments, just ask your Gemini-using friends.
My Sony Ericsson T610 was bought in 2002 and it’s still functioning at 100% as of today. Only more evidence that they don’t make phones like they use to. Boo.
4. Long-ass startup time
OK, I’m using BB Os 5 something (cbf’ed to check). My internal memory is nowhere near full (I always periodically delete emails, sms, etc, and I don’t install a lot of apps) and so is my external memory. Everytime I do a hard restart (battery pull) it took me somewhere between 10-12 minutes to start the BB again. It’s totally ridiculous… anyone can shed a light on this matter?
During that precious 12 minutes, I could’ve picked my nose, taken a shower, wrote a song, check my email, fb, call a friend and rant about it, and throw the BB to the wall, well you get the idea.
Try it for yourself! Do a battery pull, now!
5. You cannot go anonymous or invisible in BB Messenger
The dreaded messenger… Once it’s on, it’s on. You can set your status as “busy” but you can’t be “invisible”. You can “block” contacts, but they can see that you’ve blocked them and it’s kinda unpleasant to the receiving end, no?
I get it, people use the BB partly cos it’s super fast, and convenient. I like using it too, to an extent. Now this issue is a bit contradicting to issue #2 (stupid usernames), cos now I kinda know why they chose to use those silly usernames instead of their real name – sometimes you don’t wanna reveal too much info!
I hate it when strangers, friends of friends, or potential online buyers or sellers add me on the BB Messenger just like it’s nothing personal. You don’t just give out your PIN to anyone. I am a private person. I deservez teh privacy. I don’t really like chatting with strangers all the time on my phone. You can text me or email me, even add my Yahoo! Messenger, I’m fine with that. But not the PIN. Partly because I don’t know whether having you on my contact list will be beneficial or not for my well-being. Partly also because I don’t like the potential Broadcast Messages it will bring by adding even more contacts. I’ve had enough, thank you. My PIN is only for my friends and family.
Maybe I am nitpicking, but I don’t really care!
OK that’s 5 issues I’m having with the BB right now. I’m sure there’s more if I nitpick even more… you know I was gonna make this a 10-point list… but I’m too lazy. Your opinions?
Oh and BTW as soon as I have enough budgetz I am switching to an Androidz based phone, though I’d most likely still be using the BlackBerry for its BBM feature. FAIL!
amelstrange 