I used a retro slider phone for a week, and the learning curve was steep

Back before Apple and Google conquered the entirety of the mobile phone space in the 2010s, there was a brief period of time in which BlackBerry was an industry juggernaut. The Canadian-based company earned a reputation for offering phones that were excellent business companion devices — their physical keyboards and the built-in BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) texting service were undoubtedly the focal points of the overarching experience.