Diaries of a Nokia Fan Boy

Ok, this is more of a rant than anything, but I just have to get this out.

I’m really upset at Nokia at the moment. Here I am deciding on which cell phone to buy next, obviously thinking the N900 will be priced out of my budget and that I should get something like the N97 or N97 Mini instead. Well out comes Nokia, pricing the N900 at $650 USD MSRP. And I think, “OK, its still more than the N97, although if it had North America 3G I’d start considering it.” Then Amazon pop’s up and prices it at $510 USD. Now I’m thinking that this is a really good deal, its even cheaper than the N97/Mini that I’m considering, but it still doesn’t have North America 3G and I’d rather pay extra for that, even if I’m really curious about Maemo 5. But no, that’s not good enough, Amazon just had to go and price it even lower, at $480 USD! Well this just feels wrong! I mean here is a phone, a very powerful phone, with a sexy OS, and pretty much all the features I would like, and yet! It still doesn’t have North America 3G!

Please, Nokia, PLEASE! RELEASE THE N900 WITH NORTH AMERICA 3G!!!!!!!!

This rant has been presented to you by the Diaries of a Nokia FanBoy.

-Nokia FanBoy

N900 on Amazon

Wow, it’s only been a couple hours but it seems Nokia’s reply to replacing Symbian with Maemo on their N-Series devices is already out!

If you ask me, this non-confirmation-non-denial of the leaked information means that at the very least they’re thinking about it, and at the most have already decided but still need to market it correctly. Nokia is saying that they’re strongly committed to Symbian, but that really means squat if you ask me. That’s the short and sweet of it, but decide for yourself. Here’s and excerpt from Nokia’s reply:

While it is our policy not to disclose details of our product roadmap, we’d like to explicitly communicate that we remain firmly committed to Symbian as our smartphone platform of choice. Any speculation on what our 2012 roadmap, including operating systems and product branding, are completely premature.

Along with a comment from Nokia on expanding their mobile OS portfolio from a couple months back:

As we have stated earlier, Nokia has multiple platforms to serve different purposes and address different markets. Symbian is more successful than ever in bringing smartphones to the masses. Maemo is our software of choice for devices based on technology that you’d typically find inside a desktop computer. It delivers a different user experience and enables us to widen the market we can address.

Ok, but desktop computer technology can be found in just about any Nokia high-end phone, so that doesn’t tell us much either.

I guess this update doesn’t really tell us anything we didn’t already know. But the update itself, the wording within in it, and context around it can tell us quite a bit.

-Nokia FanBoy

via: Symbian Freak (read)

I’ve been wondering for a while about what Nokia is going to do with their OS portfolio, and just where they’re going to take it. Symbian is obviously much more stable than most other operating systems out there, and does wonders for the Enterprise-class devices, however it has little “sexiness” to show for the phones that are supposed to be, well, sexy. There are many apps the Ovi Store, but their extent just doesn’t reach that of say Android’s Marketplace. The home screen on Symbian, too, is better suited for the Enterprise.

Of course out comes Maemo 5, bringing lots of sex-appeal to a Nokia operating system, and immediately raising hype in the industry. Much to my disappointment, however, the only phone available with this new, sleek OS doesn’t have the 3G frequency of the cell phone providers in my area. ****! (sorry, a little bitter on this one)

So for a while now I’ve been waiting to see a Nokia cell phone with an operating system other than Symbian, and was kind of hoping it would be Android. For the most part because Windows Mobile didn’t really appeal to me and iPhone OS / WebOS / BlackBerry OS aren’t exactly an option.

Well back to the topic at hand: some information has been leaked and it appears that Nokia will be adopting their Maemo family, starting with Maemo 5 for their N-Series devices. The idea (or rumor at any rate) is to have all N-Series devices run on Maemo by 2012, that is unless the world tears itself apart… I’m actually fairly excited about the switch-over, however I’m not sure which one is better suited for the job: Android or Maemo. And of course, it still stands to see just how stable Maemo 5 turns out to be.

What does this mean for Symbian? Really, nothing. I expect Nokia to continue putting out Symbian S40 basic phones, and S60 on their E-Series. Its the X-Series and the yet-unannounced C-Series that I’m still not sure about, however I’m getting the feeling that X-Series will see Maemo adaptation as well.

Personally, I would like to see Nokia do something similar to HTC and allow users to upgrade their OS as they see fit via ROM files. And in an ideal world a single phone wouldn’t be constrained to a single OS either, but would have the ability to work with Symbian, Maemo, Android, etc. with little effort. (maybe we could even get dual/triple boots going with a shared memory!) But I’m afraid at this point its just wishful thinking, even if there is nothing technological stopping this from happening.

-Nokia FanBoy

via: Engadget (read)
and: my twisted imagination

Nokia The Way We Live Next 3.0

Nokia astounded us before with their idea of “The way we live next,” including the Morph Concept. And really it makes sense, every company has their idea of the way the future is going to look, and they shape their strategic visions around those beliefs.

Well Nokia believes that in 2015 we will all be connected to the cloud, and clearly for Nokia that cloud will be, at least in part, based on the OVI set of services. Clearly in the next 5 years we will all have high speed connections able to transmit audio/video feeds at low cost. The ideas are really interesting, and I especially liked the TV teleconference with your friends in other parts of the world.

I can’t help but think that the technology is progressing too fast in order for culture and lifestyle to catch up. I’m a little worried that soon enough we will be interacting only through electronic devices, and have long distance relationships, in virtual worlds, with people we rarely see in person. Of course various aspects of our beliefs will come into view and go under scrutiny, and I just hope that the end will be a happy society, and not a sci-fi thriller of technology destroying humanity as we know it.

The video is, sadly, just a home video camera recording of the presentation, but if I see the real video I’ll replace it here.

-Nokia FanBoy

press release
via: Engadget (read)

I just had the pleasure of viewing the rather interesting commercial that Nokia came out with for their N900 device. To be honest, I am seriously considering the N900, however I’m not made of money so we’ll just have to see if I can afford it.

The ad places you in focus group inside what appears to be either a mental institution or more likely a research facility. Both somewhat creepy and unusual places for phone development. The filming has a bit of a Cloverfield or District 9 feel to it, and starts off a little slow, but picks up rather quickly. There are two test subjects and two officials of sorts, the test subjects spit out import specifications for the ultimate phone, when the second test subjects starts going insane.

The entire idea is that the phone is not just a phone but a tool for content creation, sharing, spreading. The ad looks really good and is actually rather interesting, so take a look.

-Nokia FanBoy

via: Engadget (read)

[caption id="attachment_862" align="alignright" width="164" caption="BlackBerry Curve 8520"][/caption]I was taking a stroll through the mall with some friends over the weekend and I happened across a Rogers booth with some dummies displayed. And me and my friend started talking about the build quality of the two phones.

Immediately after picking up the BB Curve 8520 I felt like I was holding a cheap plastic toy. Sure it was lighter than the E71, but the cheap plastic made me want to turn away from it right away. Then having picked up the Nokia I felt like I was holding a real phone: there was no hesitation as to how long the phone would last, no confusion on the price range of it, it just felt like a solid piece of equipment that could take abuse.

My friend, on the other hand, had another idea. She felt that the lighter phone would benefit her more due to the reduced weight, and complained about the E71 as being “too heavy”. Of course this is also the girl that is regretting having picked a “pink Telus phone” as it is falling apart on her and generally not working as she would like it to.

Of course I understand that I was only holding dummies, and not the real phone. I would be the first to commend BlackBerry on their construction and durability (after all, my 8100 Pearl is still going strong after 3 years of constant use), however I believe that today’s feature phones should be constructed out of metal for its durability, and general appeal. But that’s just my two cents.

-Nokia FanBoy

Ok, so these aren’t actually new phones, but Nokia seems to be releasing special editions of phones every now and again, and this one follows the same theme. These are basically Nokia 5530, 6303 Classic, and 6700 Classic, the only special part of them is a specially designed housing, along with some special bundled accessories, like a pink leather strap or a pink case. The phones do not seem to demand a premium for their lavish redecorating, and are already available for purchase in the UK on mobiles.co.uk. Really this isn’t anything special, but for the fashionistas out there these could make a nice accessory to an evening dress.

Now why is it that all the special editions seems to be geared towards women? I believe there should be more Samsung Giorgio Armani’s out there, and in a Nokia-smartphone flavor, not Samsung-dumbphone.

Nokia 6303 Classic

Nokia 6303 Classic

Nokia 6700 Illuvial

Nokia 6700 Illuvial

-Nokia FanBoy

Nokia 5530 Illuvial (specs)
Nokia 6303 Illuvial (specs)
Nokia 6700 Illuvial (specs)

via: Engadget Mobile (read)

[caption id="attachment_295" align="alignright" width="150" caption="Nokia"][/caption]So I was browsing the interwebs today and came up on a great article regarding the Nokia vs. Apple lawsuit, written by Engadget’s staff. The article looks at the validity of Nokia’s lawsuit, the potential consequences, as well as Apple’s next moves. I’m not going to summarize it here, but I will say the article was written with the expertise of a lawyer and paints a picture of Nokia that I am happy to stand behind.

Okay, that’s a lot to think about, but let’s just back up a second here and consider the big picture: this has nothing to do with Nokia’s handsets versus the iPhone in the marketplace, and everything to do with the fact that Nokia’s intellectual property is a critical part of making modern mobile phones work. The real questions are how much of that intellectual property is in the iPhone, and how much Apple’s willing to pay — and neither has a simple answer.

Make sure to read through the article as it outlines the lawsuit in great detail.

-Nokia FanBoy

via: Engadget (read)

Well this is interesting. If anyone remembers that resistive display technology that was able to detect multiple input points as well as the pressure applied to those points, this looks like very similar tech. In fact, I would question whether Nokia is developing the interface for that very display in order to incorporate it into their next generation of cellphones!

The idea is fairly simple: instead of just identifying multiple points, have the device identify the pressure which is being applied to each one. This could allow for more realistic game play, such as playing musical instruments, as well as I’m sure that some more practical applications will be out there.

This of course is not the first time that tech like this has been developed. Some companies use the surface area being touched at a single point in order to identify the intensity, however that tech is not very accurate.

I am, however, hoping that this is the implementation of the prototype resistive display we saw before, and there are a couple reasons for that. First, resistive displays permit the use of styli. Second, resistive displays are less power hungry. A potential down side, and something I am slightly concerned with, is just how they plan to make the screen – namely, I like the way a glass, capacitive screen feels.

Anyway, interesting technology, really exciting potential products, however its still only a patent application and its likely that we’re at least a year or two away from seeing it in practice.

-Nokia FanBoy

patent application
via: Engadget Mobile (read)

Well this is rather interesting. I have always disliked the way Apple used the courtrooms to their advantage and was rather pleased at just how little court time Nokia puts other companies through. Now if Nokia sued a different company I would have been upset, however this being Apple I am torn – on the one hand I disapprove of suing just to get your way, to postpone the launch of a product, etc. but on the other hand, this is Apple we’re talking about, the company that seemingly sues left, right, and center.

The details of the lawsuit aren’t exactly open to the public as yet, however we do know that it is due to some patents regarding GSM, UMTS, and WiFi, among others I’m sure. Also, the cause of the lawsuit is, of course, Apple’s iPhone, and Nokia states that 10 patents have been infringed on.

A brief history: Nokia has an amazing patent portfolio, having invested well over EURO 40 billion into R&D. Nokia’s patents are considered essential to industry standards. And Nokia has also successfully entered into patent agreements with over 40 companies, including some of the leading manufacturers.

I am really interested to see where this goes, and I am really quite torn on the matter. Of course its going to last quite a while so don’t expect updates too often.

-Nokia FanBoy

read: press release
via: Symbian-Freak (read)