I need help figuring out the best way to communicate with my students from the trail. blackberry or pocketmail? also, i need some figures as far as costs goes. i know the pocketmail is about $100,but what about the blackberry??? it sounds like the best idea, but i cannot find the cost on their website. please help if you have any info. my mom is willing to transcribe my journals as a backup plan if i don’t figure out either one of these.
amy
My personal opinion is that the coverage is still too spotty for Blackberry. I haven’t tried it firsthand, but I know that people who use cell phones on the trail have sporadic signals. You can almost always find a pay phone in town. I think (I’m not sure) the cost of Blackberry is something like $50/month. Pocketmail is much cheaper. My vote goes to Pocketmail.
TANK
Pocketmail is a system that allows you to send e-mail through a payphone or other telephone. The plus here is that there are many payphones along the AT and it is simple and inexpensive. The negative is that it’s a hassle.
Blackberry is a great systems that does e-mail extreamly well. The only issue you might face is that it’s only going to work where you have radio coverage. Blackberry is aimed as the business users in cities, so I don’t know how good the coverage is on the AT. As far as cost – if you get a Blackberry that only does e-mail, expect to pay $40/month with a year contract. If you get a combo cell phone/blackberry, expect to pay $70/month. O, and the device will be another $300 or so on top of the monthly charge. To get specific price information, go to the provider’s website, such as www.verizonwireless.com. Cigular and T-MOBILE offer Blackberry as well but the converage wont be as good.
Bob
I was looking at using the balckberry myself but decided not to because you can only useit in the digital coverage areas. Which is only on major highways and cities. 90% of the time you will not be able to use it. But pocket mail you can use with cellular coverage and depending on your carrier, you will be able to get a lot of the time.
Buckwheat
I’ll toss in my “for their worths” here. I’m going to give my Blackberry a try. As stated above, a lot depends on the carrier you use when it comes to coverage. I use AT&T/Suncom, and have had good experiences so far on my section hikes with reception. If reception is sketchy I’ll just switch to my ole reliable pen and paper.
The cost can be prohibitive. If you want phone and text, it can run anywhere from $75-$125 for monthly service, and $350-$500 for the device. Pocketmail devices are much less expensive.
Mayfly
Just out of curiosity, why do you need such constant converage? If you are going to town 3-5 days a week isn’t that enough to send out an email via pocketmail? Do you need to send out a daily update?
FWIW, I like the simplicity of a pen and paper myself when writing a journal. Even in the “real world”. Something about the simplicity lets my thoughts flow. Be it sitting by a stream somewhere in Colorado or sipping a cup of coffee somewhere in Boulder. YMMV.
Mags
I think it is really just a matter of personal preference. I prefer the B.Berry. For me it is easier to use (and type on) than the pocketmail. It is also a little more manageable at around half the size. I also like the fact that no matter how many times I drop the dang thing (which is often) it never breaks.
I also enjoy pen and paper, but my handwriting is horrific, and I have a tendency to scratch out, reword, edit, erase…whatever you want to call it, constantly. In other words, even I cannot always go back and interpret what I was trying to say sometimes. For me it is just easier, faster, and neater to type.
Accessiblity is nice, but not really the driver. For me, it is more about ease of use and preference. Some write, like the pocketmail. Everyone has different modes of communication and journaling. I like the B.Berry.
Mayfly
I’m curious about editing your work on these devices. I notice a lot of typos on journals posted from pocketmail that were very obvious and should have been corrected. Things like transposing letters, most commonly “hte” instead of “the”. Can you go back and easily review your work and make edits on these devices? Do they have spell check? A useful tool if you spell as badly as I do.
Big B