They have no meaningful choice. To the degree that this does represent consumer preference, however, what it tells us is simply that touchscreen phones are preferred overall: it does not follow that touchscreen keyboards, specifically, are preferred for text-entry tasks.
I feel like, over time, they have though. Blackberry was more than willing to keep the lights on well past the point of viability. Other competitors too. They kept trying to resurrect the physical keyboard popularity and it never happened.
You can still buy niche phones with a physical keyboard right now.
Doesn't look like the Clicks Communicator is actually available yet - the website says it's coming in February - but it's good to learn that there will soon be a physical keyboard option once again. (Or was there some other device you had in mind?)
