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Fake BlackBerry or not? You decide…
Posted by Rae on December 31, 2007
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So, Joe made a post this morning about how the BlackBerry 9000 will reportedly not have a touchscreen after reading a post about the leaked pictures of the model at Electronista. Electronista reported:
A photo allegedly taken near the company’s Waterloo, Canada campus reveals a device that offers a major redesign of the BlackBerry Curve but retains the chief formula equipped with a conventional screen, it also keeps the trackball of the earlier model but includes larger, easier to hit keys on its keypad and is thinner overall than its predecessors.
We’re not quite sure where they obtained that information as the “leak” on the BlackBerry forums never said in the initial reports where the picture had come from. He only left the picture and then in a subsequent post, claimed to have seen the same device (though never saying the one in the picture) in use at the Waterloo offices of RIM.
When subsequent posts pointed out the picture had actually come from an ebay auction, the original poster admitted to lifting the picture from the auction, but kept with his story that it was indeed the 9000 series phone he has seen in use in Waterloo.
Later in the thread, member cheshillsgolf mentioned:
Take a look at “BlackBerry” on the top of the device. It appears that the “B” in Berry is backwards. I smell photoshop
And then Cooper (not the Cooper in the BB forums thread) Lang - one of the guys in our office - mentioned that he had thought so too, and that he also noticed that unlike any other BB we had seen before (as the comments will show below, I don’t look at the curve much - apologies), this one also had the RIM/BB logo to the left of the “BlackBerry” (edited to add: which would help support the claim that it is a curve). We blew up the picture in photoshop and sure enough, the second B in BlackBerry does indeed appear to be backwards. We’ve pointed out the oddities oddity below (click the picture for an enlarged version).
The picture certainly does appear photoshopped, but it also makes no sense that an ebay seller with a very high number of auctions and a very low number of negative feedback scores would be selling a phone with a photoshopped picture. So, does the new 9000 series have the BB logo next to the word “BlackBerry” now? Is the backwards B some way of identifying prototypes? Is this even the 9000 series at all? Guess we have to wait and see.
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Hmm…I’m with you on the “B” being backwards but my at&t Curve 8300 has the logo to the left of the word BlackBerry.
Our apologies - actually, MY apologies. I fully admit to not being a *personal* fan of the curve (though one of the staff here adores his and does most of the “curve related writing”) and as such, haven’t looked at them much - didn’t realize the curve has the BB logo on it… Thanks for the clarification.
Being the “original” Breaker of the news I can tell you the following.
I’ve got friend who work at RIM which never give away the ’secrets’… Which I admire them for because I don’t want them risking their jobs. I typically talk to RIM employees I do not know asking them simple questions like “how’s the 3G working these days” and I’ll sometimes get a suprised response like “you’re not supposed to know about that”
I have seen this device being used in Public near RIM by an unknown employee with a completely red badge (I’m guessing it’s R&D or high security), and NOT at the Waterloo offices. I do not work at RIM, nor do I have access to the offices.
The person who used this device in public was the one who told me about HTML e-mail and also admitted he shouldnt even be using the device (which he wouldn’t if it was a 9000) in public.
I know someone who does some device testing there who confirmed this was a 9000 after I had already found the picture. He, along with other friends I have there will never show me new devices and I have the utmost respect for that.
Just a little bit of extra info for you… I wouldn’t want my RIM friends getting in trouble for spreading information they didn’t give me.
Ya well, I’m in no way calling you a liar coop, only speaking from my own personal experience, but I as well have plenty of friends that work within RIM an lets just say when this….thing…was pointed out to them they laughed hysterically at it…They never give out information either but the sheer fact that this pic brought tears to their eyes from laughter is telling me RIM has more in store for the next series of devices then some cheap looking moto qh knock off.
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