What do you want your mobile phone to do?
Daft question, eh?
Not really. I have a Nokia N73 and I got it mainly because I needed a new phone (my Treo having been superceded by a Blackberry).
The problem is that as a phone it’s merely ok, which is a pretty damning. My first mobile was an Ericsson GH788 and the comparison is interesting (the photos aren’t to the same scale!).
 |
 |
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| Released | 1995 | 2007 |
| Weight | 170g | 116g |
| Dimensions | H: 130mm | H: 110mm |
| W: 49mm | W: 49mm | |
| D: 23 mm | D: 19mm | |
| Talktime | 2h | 6h |
| Standby | 33h | 350h |
| Features | Calculator, | Calculator, Calendar, Browser, Bluetooth, |
| SMS | SMS, Camera, Music player, Radio |
Ok, so you get a bit more talktime and a bit more standby time nowadays (down to better battery technology), but other than a passable address book (with clunky synchronisation) what’s the difference?
It’s in all that other stuff - a camera (3 megapixels, but the picture gets taken aboput two seconds after you press the shutter), a browser (decent), a calendar (painful), a music player (it’s no iPod) and a radio (good).
On top of that with the Nokia N73 (even with the latest firmware) there are noticeable delays when pressing keys and if you want the keypad to lock automatically you have to use a bit of software written by Petteri Muili (Nokia seemingly believe that you’d prefer to unlock it with a five digit PIN every time).
Now, in my book that’s not a huge amount of progress in 12 years for the mobile phone.
One plausible reason for this lack of progress, is that manufacturers of consumer electronics don’t know what we want and so pack in additional features just to get us to buy new stuff. Mark Hurst of Creative Good writes about this, referring to an article that appeared in the New Yorker this week.
And you know what? That’s why I got the Nokia N73. It wan’t that I needed a camera or a music player or a browser, it was just that I thought they might come in useful (admittedly the browser does). The other stuff, I don’t need. What I would like, though is a phone that works how a phone should - without the horrible lag I get when I want to go from the messaging menu to the calling menu, for example.
The important message here is succinctly put by Mark Hurst so I won’t mess with his words:
A company’s best bet, in the long run, is to deliver what customers really want: and that often isn’t an endless list of features, but a genuine benefit - like productivity - or better communications - or some new skill. Delivering on the long-term value might require more disciplined product development, but it pays out in the end.
As we move forward with Project Red Stripe, we’ll need to keep this top of mind.
June 13th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
What you need in a telephone is something that ‘just works’. I used the Apple advertising slogan intentionally. It is my belief that the old ‘green screen’ system was a system that ‘just works’.
To be honest, when several media platforms are crammed into one device, the consumer surely does not know where to turn and eventually just uses only a certain number of the device’s functions. The only time all the functions are used is in the initial show-off period shortly after the initial purchase.
I must admit the iphone has approached this in the right way, in my opinion, because as you navigate your way through the device’s functions it is as though the iphone ‘becomes’ the music player or phone or video player or internet browser.
Perhaps consumers are not yet accustomed to the fact that you can entrust so many areas of your life to one device.
July 29th, 2007 at 11:17 am
I have the same phone but I use the camera, radio, browser and mp3 player almost every day. It’s on 3’s X-series platform too so I have (and use) Skype, MSN Messenger and Mobilcast.
Horses for courses I suppose but I am in the minority.
July 30th, 2007 at 8:25 am
Stephen, ok - I use the MP3 player quite a lot now just because I didn’t want to carry an iPod and phone around. However, the process of getting music onto it, whilst not torturous, is less than ideal. As for the camera, the shutter lag time makes it pretty difficult to use reliably - though I see that you seem to do ok - do you have any hints?
And Google Maps is pretty good on it too.