Tag: Nokia

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Tim Cook’s Last Stand

Washington Post reporter Hayley Tsukayama asks, following up on a commentary by software developer Marco Arment: “Is Apple really at the risk of becoming BlackBerry?“. The answer is absolutely “No”. But the concept is right. The fruit-logo company’s dire straight is much more profoundly catastrophic. The risk is becoming Nokia, and the path to that destination is already well-trodden.

Marco calls BlackBerry “king of smartphones”, referring to its market position before Apple released iPhone nine years ago in June. The description is apt enough. “BlackBerry’s success came to an end not because RIM started releasing worse smartphones, but because the new job of the smartphone shifted almost entirely outside of their capabilities, and it was too late to catch up”, he asserts. But smartphones were a niche category in 2007, so insignificant that analyst firms lumped the devices together with PDAs. iPhone’s disruption was far, far greater—Nokia lost its perennial global handset lead; for many of the reasons Marco identifies. Nokia, and not BlackBerry, is the metaphor, and it is frighteningly foreshadowing. 

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Microsoft’s Hollywood-style Redemption Story

Satya Nadella is a man with a formidable challenge. Microsoft CEO’s predecessor, Steve Ballmer, squandered the company’s mobile fortunes. From smartphone platform leader a decade ago, the software-and-services giant is a category also-ran in 2015. Microsoft has no independent mobile platform future. The war is over. There remains this: Making alliances with old enemies to preserve existing territory, while using the foothold to reach into new frontiers.

Made available August 5th, Outlook for Apple Watch is a very smart move and metaphor for what went wrong on Microsoft mobile platforms and what has to go right to preserve and extend the legacy applications stack. While Windows 10 makes its way to Lumia devices, the future is Android and iOS and how the company supports them with contextually meaningful cloud-connected apps and services. 

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Nokia Lumia Icon takes a Trip

I cursed Microsoft’s find Windows Phone feature yesterday, after my mom misplaced—okay, lost—her Nokia Lumia Icon. I knew GPS might be a bit inaccurate, but repeated attempts to locate the device put it inside a building, then in the parking lot, then somewhere else around the facility. Icon’s location bounced around, as every effort to lock it failed and the device frequently couldn’t be found.

But I wrongly faulted the tech. Turns out, Microsoft’s service accurately provided the locations. Mom’s Icon was on the move, something that wouldn’t be known for several hours later. 

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What I sacrifice for iPhone 6

Over the weekend I started to seriously review my photos from Comic-Con 2014. Goddamn, there are some good ones—each and every taken with Nokia Lumia Icon, which is essentially identical to the 930 model reviewed by BetaNews colleague Mark Wilson. He panned the device because of Windows Phone 8.1; I’m in love because of the camera. But sometimes love is lost, and regretted. My sister has the Icon now.

I lug around iPhone 6, which camera by every measure that matters to me is inferior but one—startup shooting speed. Apple’s shooter can’t compete with the Icon. Fanboys will disagree, but, hey, they always will. The difference isn’t fewer megapixels—eight compared to 20—but the intelligence and usability baked into camera and editing app, lens, sensor, and choices the device makes when auto-shooting. 

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Apple is the New Nokia

Over at BGR, Tero Kuittinen writes: “Apple suddenly looks a lot like Nokia“. There’s no looks like at all. As I explain in my book, The Principles of Disruptive Design, Apple, like Nokia in 2007, is unable to transcend design concepts that lock it into an older UX paradigm; from top of the mountain can’t see the crumbling below; and is unwilling to jeopardize the success it has to risk something new. 

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Headline of the Day: ‘AT&T to Welcome iPhone Users to 2003 Tomorrow’

All Things Digital—and it’s an understatement. “At some point late tomorrow morning, the carrier will release an update enabling MMS,” he writes. About a minute later, AT&T’s network will go all to hell—it’s the end of the world as we know it—as iPhoners break out in one giant unison MMS.

Ah, the iPhone. A few weeks ago, I pronounced that my Nokia N97 is gone, it’s back again. I dumped the iPhone 3GS, and I’m surprised how little I miss the smartypants phone. Perhaps it was a psychological sense of missing out on something that caused the “disconnected” feeling using the N97 that I blogged about . No more.

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My Minimalistic Home Office

For weeks, I’ve been meaning to post something about my minimalistic home office. Today, jkOnTheRun’s James Kendrick posted on his “clean minimalistic office,” which got me off my procrastinating butt.

I’ve worked out of a home office for more than a decade. People don’t ask as much about it as they did in 1999, when many fewer people worked remotely. But when there are questions, the first usually is: “How do you keep from getting distracted? You know, watching TV and stuff?”

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Nokia N97 Value vs iPhone 3GS

On June 10, I sold my beloved Nokia N96 and the N79 abandoned by my daughter for the E71; the proceeds paid for the N97, which I purchased from Nokia USA. For the price of one N97, I could have bought two iPhone 3GS smartphones with some money left over. My N97 arrived on June 12, seven days before Apple and AT&T started selling the iPhone 3GS.

Why spend so much? As I’ll explain in the next post, on first impressions, the N97 is a mix of well-balanced capabilities.