Molecularist

My first mobile phone was a Nokia 5160.

Link: Nokia – PCS’98: Nokia introduces new TDMA digital phones designed for consumers who value ease of use and individuality – Press Releases – Press – About Nokia.

The Nokia 5100 series further demonstrates Nokia’s commitment to individuality and ease-of-use, featuring Nokia’s innovative and highly intuitive Nokia NaviKey concept- a new feature that lets phone owners use a single button (the NaviKey) to easily access all the powerful functions of the phone.

Can you imagine what my experience with mobiles would have been if I had started with another phone from a different manufacturer? I so took to the phone that, thereafter, I flogged every non-Nokia phone I reviewed because they were so hard to use (I had something to compare them to). I remember, for example, using a phone that was impossible to use and having a hard time doing anything basic, like saving numbers to the contacts or trying to call an already-dialed number from the log. Sheesh!

I’ve been a bastard about the mobile experience ever since.

What really puzzles me is that the phone came out about 7 years ago and still manufacturers are struggling with their phone UIs. What’s that all about

Hugues J. De La Vergne, from Gartner, has come out with a brief report, suggesting what Nokia can do in North America. On one side, he’s right. On the other side, he’s just so wrong. On the whole, the analysis is not new, but at least a year behind everyone else.

Link: Nokia Can Avert Disaster in North American Mobile Phone Market.

Nokia is fast losing ground in this market. To turn things round, it must offer clamshell designs, bolster its CDMA range, expand its midrange and high-end portfolios, and meet carriers’ demands for customized phones.

Where he’s right: Yes, Nokia can do well playing by the historical
rules of the North American market. Indeed, the same rules can be
followed in the rest of the world to – do exactly what operators want,
deliver what users think they want today.

Where he’s wrong: This recipe is formulaic and reactionary. It only
addresses the market today and sets up for disaster any company who
follows this recipe. The more control we allow the operators to have,
the more they will think they have, the more they will dictate the
whole ecosystem. That’s bad for innovation, for growth, and for
everyone who is not an operator. And, yes, I have my own view of how
Nokia can kick some serious butt in the US, but won’t talk about it
here just yet.

Credit where due: Hugues is quite right in that the other half of the
argument is simply Nokia doesn’t seem to have a broad enough offering
in CDMA and GSM in North America in general. I think they are offering North America
phones designed (separately) for the European and Asia market. Also,
they just need to put out more phones in CDMA – though, in that market,
that means designing phones for operators.

 

Well, it’s not all that bad to design phones for specific operators. And I think it would be cool for Nokia to do that. But, I feel that the operators and Nokia are trying to do a fusion of different opposing product creation techniques instead of choosing one (let Nokia design it) or the other (let the operator design it) for specific phones.

 

Oh, and get off this thing of clamshells. That’s so 2004! To suggest Nokia make clamshells at this point in time is well over a year past due.

Here’s a good conversation thread basically saying Web 2.0 is not about technology, but about attitude. Indeed, for a company like Nokia (where I am still working at), where the industry is still young and in a closed proprietary money-grubbing lock-in-those-customers state, it will be a nifty challenge to take on the open and linked attitude of Web 2.0.

Link: peterme.com: No. Really. It’s not *about* the technology..

APIs facilitate openness, but they’re meaningless if your organization doesn’t have the conceptual underpinnings to take advantage of it.

Sigh. I have so much to say on this topic, but it’s a jumble of notes.

Some day. Some day.