I believe this a matter of mass hysteria in the blogosphere going on recently. w00t did a fine job of explaining the situation over at iGadget. Let's face it, blogging is becoming more and more mainstream day by the day down here in the US. Americans want flashy, easy to consume toys for cellphones that will keep up with their simple minded, 30 sec attention span, aka iPhone, which is a genius idea, given the target demographic. Android is in the same boat. The MeeGo and Symbian 3 direction is great. It doesn't alienate the existing customer base but also competes with the iPhone. Anyone who thinks Symbian is dead needs to get out of the United States or the blogosphere bubble. Get on a plane to an international destination and see how many times you hear the Nokia tune.
Nokia needs time. It is a company that has over a hundred corporate offices worlwide. It cannot shift direction like some smaller companies that JUST showed up. Yes, 3 years is a JUST in terms of corporate strategy, vision and implementation. The developer base will come along with the App ecosystem with more consumers, because... well a developer is a consumer first. Nokia seems coming back HARD, look at the N8. Its cheap, affordable, functions as good as a high end device. They need to be more vocal about their strategy and push it hard with developers. This is again marketing. Hosting a coding competion is no answer. Advertising is the best way to go.
Nokia is failing because of ONE factor in this part of the world. Marketing. An average consumers is not going to hear about Android through blogs, but rather, billboards and tv adverts. Nokia has the products, just needs the PR. Android is a really good example. The Droids brought it to the mainstream along with some At&t adverts. Pay attention Nokia. Focus on the N8 advertising and localization here in the United States because you need the positive PR.
The way I see it, competition is beautiful. Companies set up their game and I get a beautiful little 3.5 inch computer like my N900. So, let's be patient and enjoy what we are going to get.
In any case. Nokia is gonna fade into the background like Sony Ericsson. The ppl at Symbian Guru know it. I know it. There's just some people that haven't figured it out yet.
Like those tens of millions of people who yet by symbian this year just because they want a phone with a battery that last more than a day.
Well I wouldn't want to blog about symbian either. It would be like having a blog called skoda-guru, when you could have a blog called bugatti-guru. Symbian has it's place and will not go away, just like skoda won't. Bugattis are not for everyone.
Yes, the N900 has great hardware, but hardware is useless if not supported by good software, and Maemo is not good enough. Sadly.
......are you talking about from a personal point of view? Because as a business decision, this is NOT meant for mass consumers. And honestly, I don't think there is a software platform out there than can come CLOSE to what Maemo can do. Android still misses multi tasking, a great browser and the intuitivity of Maemo. Let's not even talk about iOS, that takes care the actual competition. If you want apps, you definitely need an iPhone, nothing else. Every platform has its stronger points, but Maemo is awesome. NOTHING on the market can rival Maemo in terms of power. I see your point though, we don't have the best.... or any kind of customer support. :P
My take on it is that it's overreaction with a basis in truth. It's fine to be skeptical about the N8 due to the N97, but lets not forget that the N97 was an isolated disaster. Talking about it like it's a pattern isn't fair.
S60v5 wasn't very good, that's true, but as an N900 user I'm sad to say that whenever I need to really rely on my phone, my SIM card goes back in my 5800. Anything faster than ARM11 consumes too much energy and the UI, while great, isn't as phone-optimized. I knew that when I bought it, of course.
This is Nokia's progression imho:
Pre-Symbian: had the best UI designers, best hadware designers and best exterior designers. Cemented the lead by building the best logistics.
Symbian first years: UI design starts becoming less polished. S60 is good, but could obviously be better. Minor unexplained annoyances. Are the best retired, fired or working on s40? Don't know. But Nokia doesn't react, because competition is worse. Still, relatively speaking, s60 isn't as good as s40.
S60v3: Symbian still stagnating without threats, but the exterior designers have become so obsessed with optimizing the materials that they forget about looks. Nokia's products are either too mundane or too crazy. They become arrogant and think people will buy their high end products even if the plastic looks a bit cheap. They are correct, but end up going too far and setting themselves up for failure later.
S60v5: the 5800 looks good, build quality and plastic are great in its price segment, But people were expecting more, for more money. Image suffers. Hardware engineers still top notch, but now Symbian is so behind there's no point to include even a gpu. Nokia isn't capable of changing everything at once, because it is now compromised on all fronts right when the competition hits an unexpected home run.
Recent years: Nokia is trying to change everything at once, looking slow and incompetent in the progress. But everything will be different in half a year, AS LONG AS they execute flawlessly. They painted themselves into such a bad corner that there's no room for any mistakes.
@Jnwi: b-b-b-ut I thought all of Nokia's "failure" are just isolated to the US soil and its virtual colonies (aka blogospheria)... And they still retain their leadership and glory for the rest of the pure world?
symbian is not dead Anssi Vanjoki revealed today that we'll see symbian^4 Nseries, the symbian no longer powering nseries after n8 thing was only about symbian^3
as usual people was too quick to jump at the opportunity to piss on symbian without waiting for facts
