I Need a New Phone

My third Nokia N900 lost the ability to recognize a SIM card recently.  And the usual home repair tactics (bending the SIM, adding padding between the SIM slot and battery) had no effect.  I tried a cold reflash to no avail.

So I went back to my previously-trusty Nokia E71x only to find that the infrequent odd behavior it had been exhibiting (mainly going unresponsive when I needed it most) has now become the norm.  The little thing spends most of its time now in a coma and requires measures just short of serious abuse to awaken.  Factory reset didn’t help there, either.  It’s also not a mobile computer.  

Nokia’s N9: Cool, Cruel and Unusual

source: http://swipe.nokia.com

Unlike many friends and former Nokia colleagues, I have not had the pleasure of fondling a sexy new N9 so this won’t be a product review as much as a process and philosophy review.  That means something a little less structured than usual and loaded with unabashed opinion, pontificating and ranting.

So buckle up, this should be a ride that would do Tomi Ahonen proud.  

Mobile Computing: What’s in a Name?

source: maemo.nokia.com

Smartphones (aka “converged mobile devices“) have been around in one form or another since 1992.  The moniker itself has elicited snickers and outright derision, but the mobile industry grasped for a good description of where cell phones were headed and this is what stuck.  It still sounds silly, but has defied reason by surviving… but probably only due to lack of a clear competitor.  

Maemo is Dead… Long Live Maemo

Source: http://www.maemoit.org

Before I launch into coverage of the MeeGo Conference in San Francisco this past week, I’d like to touch on a touchy and related issue:  the future of Maemo.

As most readers here are already aware, Maemo was Nokia’s enigmatic attempt at a Linux operating system for mobile devices.  I don’t want to go into the history in this article; it’s easy enough to find on this blog and elsewhere and I want to focus clearly on the future.  

Seeding MeeGo

Propagating a novel operating system (OS) can often be a frustrating chicken-vs-egg scenario, as many abandoned platforms and even current ones like Linux can demonstrate.  An OS won’t gain many converts without a reasonable stream of ready-made applications as well as the necessary ecosystem support (especially device drivers).  In open source contexts, this is compounded by Digital Rights Management (DRM) and similar sticky, usually legal, bogeys.

Maintaining a compelling closed ecosystem, such as Apple has chosen with its various OS offerings, certainly goes a long way toward solving those hurdles.  On the other hand, Google’s breadth of services, brand recognition and sheer size have quickly carved out secure toeholds for the more open Android and undoubtedly Chrome OS.  And there are already several well-established (although shrinking) platforms occupying the rest of the market slots… so where’s the space for upstart MeeGo?

The recent article here rhetorically asked Why MeeGo and that’s not the point today.  Rather, I want to cover what’s going on in porting and packaging, and what that might mean for MeeGo’s possibilities.  

N900 Multitasking: Nokia wants your input

Own a Nokia N900?  Peter Schneider of Nokia Maemo marketing has a challenge for you: he wants to know how important multitasking is for N900 owners, and exactly how they take advantage of it.

A new poll at talk.maemo.org breaks it down by number of concurrent windowed applications on the desktop.  The poll has a slight design quirk (it has categories for 0, 1 to 3, 4 to 6,  6 to 9 and > 9 apps, whereas 7 to 9 might be better for the 6 to 9) but it’s not enough to undermine the purpose.

So if you have not already, take a moment to respond to the poll and then post your typical use cases that either require multitasking or explain why it is unnecessary for you.  Your input could be valuable for future product considerations!

This effort has the endorsement of the maemo.org community council.

UPDATE: It was brought to my attention the poll has already closed.  I am very sorry that I didn’t notice.  I’m quite frankly surprised it was not allowed to run longer.  However, posting comments may still be helpful.

The N900 microUSB defect, and your chance to do something

Does this look familiar?

After my post-mortem on the Nokia N900 microUSB failure fiasco I received an interesting offer from Nokia: collect the Care experiences in a clear, objective format, and the situation(s) would be investigated.

An offer I can’t refuse.

To start this off, I am reintroducing the survey that galvanized the maemo.org community.  That survey has closed but had collected a significant amount of data beforehand.  The challenge here is to bring respondents back to the table.  Even more critical, to obtain a reasonably accurate picture of the problem’s scope we really need response from as many people as possible, especially those not having any problems.  More on that later in the article. 

MeeGo for the Enterprise? Part 1: RIM Takes a Hit

Open Source and commercial interest can be odd bedfellows.  The former depends of course on transparency and high access to thrive, while the latter tends to fall back on secrecy just to survive.  Detractors of Open Source will even claim that there’s no such thing as a successful open source project, especially a profitable venture.

There are certainly exceptions to that broad allegation.  Red Hat is an oft-cited one.  So was MySQL even before (and likely the reason) Oracle snapped it up.  And the list definitely doesn’t stop there (read the comments after this linked article). 

Post mortem: Nokia N900 micro USB detachment

A while back I reported on my original N900 losing its microUSB connector, then followed up by expressing disappointment in Nokia’s poor handling of the matter once many more people began experiencing the same failure.  I have intended to turn it into a trilogy for some time, waiting until the reports of Nokia claim denials dried up.

But even though unresolved complaints did dwindle down, they didn’t disappear entirely… and tonight I got to experience why complaints keep coming: yep, my replacement N900 lost its connector, too.  Despite extreme care. 

How Nokia can retake the US Market… and more

I’ve recently chastised Nokia for various failures, some broad and some specific, and I also promised to get out of the negativity rut and start proposing solutions.  So brace yourselves; the ride begins and (inspired by Tomi Ahonen) it’s a long one.

First though for the sake of those who don’t know me: I was a product developer, technician and change management guy who Nokia hired in 2005 to support process improvement activities under the auspices of Quality Assurance in the former US Alliance factory. When the factory closed I moved to a brief stint trying to bring the lessons learned into all American factories, and from there to a global role as logistics business analyst and application specialist.  Even though my last position was eliminated and I fell out of Nokia in 2009, the time spent in various roles helped me get a big picture understanding of Nokia’s challenges, particularly in respect to struggles in the US.  I think it helped that I brought in an outsider’s view– prior to Nokia, I had never even used cell phones!  (for you Nokia employees, I had an internal blog called The Long Tail.) 

With that out of the way, I want to share my perspective on how Nokia could improve its prospects here, for whatever it’s worth.  Few of these ideas are new or original, but they all represent thoughts with which I am in agreement and consolidate some of my scattered-but-related thoughts.