I just purchased an iPhone over the last week, and looked at both. Here's the major deciding factor for me: You pay the physical cost of that keyboard 24x7 for a Blackberry. It takes up a certain size in your pocket, and you end up with a screen of a certain size. It makes the assumption that you will do so much typing on the thing that this is a price you are willing to pay. When you are not typing, the keyboard is still there, taking up space in your hand, space relative to the video screen.

An iPhone, with its virtual keyboard, takes a different approach. It says "This device can be many things. When you need to type on it, there will be a keyboard, but when you do not, you can play videogames, movies, read ebooks and so on." So for the "physical cost" of the device, you get more functionality. Know what I mean?

I hate typing on the iPhone (I had an iTouch for a year previously so don't discount my 1week of experience :)). I have had physical-keyboard devices in the past, including an early Blackberry back in the days when it was just an emailing device and not a phone, which I'm typically much happier with, although to be realistic you are still just as likely to hit the wrong key as on a virtual keyboard. So I made the judgement call that I'd rather have a device that can make use of that space in a better way for me when I'm not typing. Your mileage may vary. If you send 100 texts and 200 emails a day, you're probably gonna want a Blackberry. I use mine mostly as a phone and music/video player. Hence, iPhone.

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