After starting her career in New York’s financial services industry five years ago, Carrie Sin was rarely without her BlackBerry. Like millions of white-collar workers around the globe, she felt a sort of enforced allegiance to it. “I always had it for work and it was easier to stick with one device. Also, I was used to the keyboard,” she says.

But the appeal of her BlackBerry began to wane as more of her friends bought iPhones. Socially, it was like being stuck at the office while everyone else was at a party. “I was left off group texts and the running joke when my friends would email about new apps would include something like: ‘Carrie has a BlackBerry so her only app is [to use it as a] paperweight’.”

So in May, she finally made the switch. The experience, says Ms Sin, was “life-changing. Really.”