The reality of our object is that as of writing this in 2024, it it is completely obsolete. The operating system no longer functions, and there is no longer an audience of people able to use it. Technology has progressed, leaving this as just an object—essentially without use. As of January 2024, services for BlackBerry 7.1 OS and earlier ceased to exist, and the BlackBerry Curve 8900 device ran OS 4.6.

Our approach to telling the story of our device was largely shaped by our research findings, which were somewhat limited. It is important to note that RIM is a private enterprise, meaning they have no requirements to keep public archives of their products. As a group, we consulted the third party archives such as the WayBack Machine, but specific pages from the BlackBerry Website concerning our specific model were not thought to be of importance, thus were not archived. Even when archived, we faced issues loading the webpages, and were unable to view them.

This experience speaks to the importance of proper archiving and preservation of information, particularly concerning internet resources. In the digital age, we assume that everything will always be available online, but our experience completing research on our object proves that to no longer be true. Many old support pages, forums, and company websites have been removed or taken down, with no documentation. The digital world we currently live in is not permanent, and we need to keep that in mind going forward as a society.