Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Some people try to do the same thing again and again and expect different result :)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

But "doing the same thing" is not the same as "making the same product", as you can make the same product in many ways ;)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Doing same mistakes. i think you share the same mistake as Jolla does. Product is important part, but it's not about product. It's about platform and moreover - support, communication, interaction, inovation, cooperation with 3rd parties and indie devs.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

All those Jolla revellers, every time you are about to post again how fantastic and absolutely faultless Jolla is in every aspect, please remind yourself this one crucial thing:


That single thing explains everything. It is the corner stone of understanding Jolla's behaviour. Yet it seems like some people's memory is comparable to a koi carp's.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Nokia's biggest failure was to listen to american shareholders. Jolla seems to have learned from that, by not having any.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Without product, none of the other parts have no relevance. Also, latter reside on sufficient amount of resources. Which leads to conclusion: for big money and big corporations only. Startups, don't bother.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Again, i did not told you that product is not important. but smartphone is not phone. It should do more than just call. And don't start "but it's linux", I can have n900 and it's more linux. Btw you can have a lot of linux stuff on android and even on jailbroken iOS(unix after all).
It's about platform. And platform is not golden shinny brick, but something that is working, have support and applications/features developed by 3rd parties, which is more important for "startup" company.
As about "startup" - they are here for a really long time already, but yes, on every failure we call them startup. It's there problem and it's not an excuse. there are plenty smaller companies that succeeded more with lower investments at the beginning (they had from Nokia some $ as help for ex-nokians, not even talking about meego related parts they got access too and experience).
They are company with small amount of people, but not a startup. On their own words they had mature product for a while ago. but they failed to get developers and 3rd parties interested in them, by trying over controlling and doing everything by themselves behind walls (not even share info they had to. e.g. is current situation and no update for a really long time).
no one forced them to conquer the word, they could go smaller first and use money wisely. i'll remind you that all huge corporations started as small companies, but those days there was no such definition as "startup", so they had no excuse.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

True.

I won't as for me it being Linux is mostly a "means to an end"-kind of thing.

True, however, doing it "the right way" (whatever that means as mostly people can only describe that it is not...) requires resources, money, good will and luck. Which leads to the same old thing: without backing of big money, chances are you will fail.

Show me one such startup that has done something of same magnitude as Jolla has using less resources and being profitable since from the beginning. Shouldn't be a problem as I get the impression there is one on every street corner... :)

Fundamentally it all boils down to one single problem that is common for startups: money. No matter how you twist and turn it, it has been the number one problem since from the beginning. So we can call them startups or non-startups or whatever you wish, as it's mostly irrelevant to the root cause of the problems which is money and resources.

Possibly. It was the cost of not fragmenting the platform, which was major PITA in Android years ago until Google decided to take it more strictly under their control. If they didn't try to control it as tightly, they might have attracted couple of other companies, which is why they are likely to change that in the future. It may or may not attract other companies to do some of the lifting, now that the basics are mostly in place. Remains to be seen.

Also, I really don't see how you make mobile OS by going smaller. There are functions that must be in place and the foundation has to be solid and there are no shortcuts for achieving them. Also, you will need to have something to show (like products someone is actually using). So, if it was going "smaller", it would most likely be something very different than independent mobile OS. Of course there would be nothing wrong with it per se, we just would be discussing about something very different thing than we currently are.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

You don't have to look far.

There was once this guy called Linus, from Finland.

Or some British guy working in Switzerland.

I think what ZogG is getting at is Jolla needed to get a lot of people on board and they squandered it by having too many barriers in the way. eg. limited docs, api, no paid apps, limited developer outreach...

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

...and it what time frame was all of it succeeding, in what king of environment/market? How many mobile phones or comparable products Linus launched? Time is not an infinite resource when creating complex commercial product. :)

Yes. However, some of the api-restrictions were there because of unstable Qt-version they had to use, which IMO was good reason to restrict them. Don't know about current restrictions though. Also, having all of those other things doesn't come free either and having too much of "administrative burden" may have undesirable results. That's why there has to be something in place to begin with and when it's opened, all of the documentation, api's, bug trackers, infrastructure to support public contributions etc etc have to be in place in such way they don't need to be parsed by developers in difficult and painful way (which is the main reason there's so little interest in contributing to ie. Nemo-project). Doing all of those takes resources, which has to be derived from resources and time used in developing the platform itself, which means there are choices to be made how they are prioritized. Usually they are always prioritized "wrong" as there is always the army of people who know better how to do things even without having insider knowledge from company. :)

Another thing is that there will always be that one major gripe that was there in the Nokia days also - some things have to be kept out of the public for certain periods of time (ie. regarding new products and their features), which has to be solved somehow without making it all a huge mess. So, I don't really believe there are easy solutions for these things until the resources problem (sustainability of the company) is solved somehow. We may hear something tomorrow, let's hope it's good.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Every time I see or hear "yes, however...", my attention drops. My experience teaches me that what is about to follow is a stream of excuses. I was not disappointed this time either.

I think the difference between successful people and losers is that when the former fail, they look back and ask, "Where did I make a mistake? How can I learn from that?", whilst the latter look back, shrug and say, "It was the circumstances".

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

That is unfair. Reasons and excuses are not the same thing.

Jolla is in the crapper and their decisions helped them get there. HOWEVER, saying that a new mobile os could have been successful on any kind of substantial scale if it had been done differently, is pretty far fetched.

This community was the only community that cared about Jolla, and that just wasn't enough.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

No one is blaming them for failing to beat Apple. Not that I know anyway. All the objections I have read so far are about them failing in areas that were under their control. Public relations. Customer relations. Technical support. Ecosystem support. Bug fixing. Communication.

I have just come back from yet another company meeting. One slide showed an equasion:


Why multiplication and not addition? Because if any component is zero, the whole thing is zero. This seems obvious but perhaps not to everyone.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Are we talking about HW only?
Cyanogenmod. And don't tell me they had Android. Mer and Meego where there for a while too :)
Pebble
NextThing
Oculus Rift
A lot of 3D printers companies(their own SW and HW is more complicated)
puzzlephone is boosting

And please do not tell me, that Jolla did more. Yes they made mobile OS, but they had Mer and meego already, those people worked on maemo before (they used it in PR, so why can't I point that out). They provided updates, but basically long changelogs did not include a lot of new features. There are a lot of bugs that still are there from the begining. And if they decided to throw all the money in that and tried to conquer whole world(in their case it was EU + some more countries), but not proceed slower but in great acceleration — their fault. I see it as someone who know to run sprints and trying to use same method to run marathon. The problem that he will loose all his strength at very first kilometers.
They had enough time and money and if they decided to use not wisely and ask for more and more, then all your "they have no backing and they are small" is an excuse. Because if you know that, they should know it better and do not try to jump over own hands. They had connections, they had first investments, they had community behind, but they blew it all away. Their management lost mind in fame at the beginning and ran away from boat :)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

If analyzing and trying to understand rationale behind certain decisions and circumstances that lead to those decisions is just "excuses", then so be it. But then I guess there is nothing to discuss either. It's not enough to just point out mistakes with more or less incomplete information about backgrounds etc. To learn you need to analyze and find the exact points and reasons why certain things failed AND trying to figure out how alternative decisions could have altered the outcome, both in good and bad ways. Point is, doing things the opposite way than in failed attempt may also end up in failure as every decision will have it's consequences, which may or may not be foreseen and/or desirable. But to me it looks like some here are more or less preaching how to do it all The Right Way(tm) without any consideration to circumstances, trade offs etc. as if the way their preferred way was something like the absolute and final truth about the matter, applicable to every single situation, project and company. Pardon me for lacking faith in it. Call it excuse it you wish.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

I totally agree. My point is, even if they perfected "product = hardware x software x support", they still wouldn't be able to make it. Longer and more productive, perhaps, but what is happening now was inevitable.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

No. We are talking about the whole package, including SW, HW, infrastructure, SDK's, marketing, support, funding etc etc.

None of them are of the same magnitude. We can of course just ignore it.

But let's just agree they failed on loads of things. There's no point continuing this further as we already know that's just about the only thing we can agree on this and either one of us haven't been able to bring any added value to previous discussions/arguments.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Good link,thanks!

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

I agree that we are in the loop :)
But just to point out that pebble has own os, hw, sdk, apps and market and as well integrated in several OSs. And they built it from scratch with no mer, meego or maemo behind :)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

A smartwatch OS is a tiny amount of effort compared to a mobile linux distro. I love Pebble and they've the only company to get watches right, but I don't think they'd agree to that comparison themselves.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

It's puzzling that Pebble have, correctly I'd say, gone for a tight small OS (FreeRTOS) when the big guys are putting full linux and unix distros on their watches.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

You'd think people liked charging their watches every day.

I think it shows a difference in approach. The big guys are trying to put small smartphones on people's wrists, because they can keep bloating them with the sort of gimmicks they use to sell everyone new phones every year or so. The guy who made pebble just wanted to be able to see what his text messages said when he was on his bike.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Come to think of it, I wind up my mechanical watch every day too.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

And do you have to put it off for this and does winding up take you approx. 2 hours? :)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Imagine: I used to have a solar powered battery driven outdoor watch. And I never took it off (or charged!) for a few years.

Now it is in the shelf and awaiting to see the next summer ...

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

can you rephrase a bit as i didnt understand insted confused would like to know as i like to improve my langague skills too :)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

What do you not get?
[rephrase]
I have a watch which has a battery and a solar dial (clock face). It charges itself and I have used for a few years without the need for taking off and/or charging/winding it manually.
[/rephrase]

That would be something spectacular for such gadget but current power hunger is the barrier.
My first phone lasted for a week. And even more than 2 days playing mon-stop with it.
But that is not to stop or change.
And definitely full OT, so I will break now :D

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

To get somehow back on topic, for the series 'where is Marc now', he just signed the latest blog update on the Indiegogo campaign of the Asmo charger(*): https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/a...-year#/updates

(*) which has faced some delay in deliveries due to CE approval process

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Seriously. I will never support Anything closley related to that man again. It's so easy to start things but you need to follow throw. Or it's fraud.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Absolutely right, Dave! In fact, you should avoid any and all start-up companies, as the significant majority of startups fail early; the free market is merciless in thinning out the crowd, regardless of how good their ideas may be.

And heck, I've gotta say that even market giants like Microsoft are having troubles in the mobile market these days. Microsoft keeps feeding money and resources into their Windows Phone platform, even tying it to the Windows Desktop platform (which in past years was always a key to success), and still they are making no significant progress.

So really, Dave, your best bet is Apple. They've got the financial wherewithal and the design expertise to bring the products they choose to make to market successfully. You'll never have to worry about them not following through on their products.

So, I expect you'll be a happy iPhone user in the near future?

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Cop. I invest in start-ups on a daily basis.(Shares)

Bought an iPhone the other week ;) I'm happy with another phone in my collection. You want to know more?

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Marc Dillon Takes CEO Role At Smarter Mobile Charger Startup, Asmo

http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/04/mar...asmo/?ncid=rss

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Good. Then I should stay away from that campaign. Thanks for the heads up.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

That made me laugh hard but not because of fun:

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

The sentence before that is even better:

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

But this is now over the border, isnt it?


Good luck to all Asmo backers!
(I admit I was tempted to join last summer)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

I was under the impression that all modern chargers don't use power untill you plug in your phone, is Mr Dillion selling more bullsh1t ?

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

Modern chargers use very little power on standby, in the order of costing pennies per year. But not zero. The Asmo idea is that the charger will disconnect completely, even if still left plugged in the wall socket.

Of course, once disconnected, it cannot provide power to the phone. Rather, the phone needs to provide a little power to the charger first to switch it on. That means that a) it will not work with ever phone, only with models with OTG and possibly an appropriate "app" (ruling out Marc's own first creation) and b) it will not work if your battery is completely dead.

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

I think he may be trying to make a point (that an NDA or gagging clause has prevented him from making clear before now ...)

Re: Marc Dillon left Jolla
 

hahahahahaha

All I get in my minds eye with that statement is...
the "It's" man...
the weary travel worn ...trekking across tundra "It's" -guy...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=063jQAM6N8I