When is a phone not a phone any longer?

Great article Steve :icon14:

The Only good advantage of the touch screen mobiles,is there very good indeed for images an videos on a mobile phone,but you do not want a Wide an Heavy phone like the N900 as when you put this phone in your trouser or shorts pockets it sticks out to much,so we want slimmer mobiles all the time not the bulky types we are getting released nowdays

the n97 is a good phone! yes it has its problems but it still works fine and i love it!! who wants a "pc" in his pocket should buy a n900. but i saw a vid where the n900 was not able to show a flashvid without jerk! ive tried the same site with my n97 and WOW! i can look this vid without any kinds of problems 😊

Re: Two handed versus one-handed. Some readers are puzzled as to why I think this is crucial.

OK. Try carrying a bag of shopping down the street while replying to a text on your N900 or HD2. Try holding your child's hand while looking something up on Google. Try playing a game in bed before sleep while lying on your side. Just three trivial examples, I can give many more.

To remain OnTopic
A phone is a phone when you mainly use the device to get in contact with others, use sms, take pictures, use a small agenda, memo and reminders and send pictures using MMS.

A phone became a PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) or a smartPhone when the software that operates the phone allows you to do more things, use 3-rd party software or get your life organised and yoy syncronise it with your PC.

In my opinion a SmartPhone should be smart enough to replace the PC and allow you to use latest technology
Internet
Online
Organiser
document view and editing
use sotware programs according to your needs and preferences...
I might go on describing what I di think a smartphone is but i think is enough..

regards,

TheSpecialBoy

Steve - you are Da Man as a previous poster says but surely the examples you have given seem to illustrate the benefits of one-handed use over two-handed use. They are not critical in terms of the definition of what is a phone.

More generally, I don't feel a lot of love towards the N900 from AAS at the moment. I think it would be great if your Nokia friends lent you one so that it could get the full Litchfield treatment. Might change your mind then. 😊

slitchfield wrote:Re: Two handed versus one-handed. Some readers are puzzled as to why I think this is crucial.

OK. Try carrying a bag of shopping down the street while replying to a text on your N900 or HD2. Try holding your child's hand while looking something up on Google. Try playing a game in bed before sleep while lying on your side. Just three trivial examples, I can give many more.

So by your definition, voice control and no-hands operation is out of the question for a device to be a phone 😉

Another good commentary for sure.

Perhaps the nomenclature of "phone" and "MID" has become too narrow for this class of device and trying to pigeon-hole one of these devices into these labels is simply a subjective marketing exercise rather than one of true classification.

The discussion could just as easily apply to "Is it a phone or a camera" or "Is it a video camera or a still camera."

Convergence is certainly the current trend and a "converged device" might be the best new label to be applied.

That said, I have to say that one- or two-handed nature of a device is probably too vague of a distinction to use for this endeavor.

My approach would be to classify the device based on what its primary user control is.

The identifier for a telephone, today, is certainly the distinctive 12-button dial pad, virtual or physical.

The N95 and N96 is definitely a phone, it has a phone dial-pad and you can start dialing a phone number immediately.

Pretty much all the Nokia Communicators are phones as well, again, you can dial a number and the default control on the device is that of a telephone dial-pad.

Now, look at the iPhone, N97, N900, HTC Touch and other touch-primary devices. As they are designed now, I would consider them to be hand-held computers or PDAs that have phone features primarily because the telephone dial-pad isn't the first interface exposed to the user.

That doesn't mean a touch-only device cannot primarily be a phone, but the software designers certainly didn't approach it that way with "non-phone-dial-pad" home pages and screens.

As another example, let's look at the Phenom or the LG GD910, are they phones? If I apply my above process, I would call them watches with phone features. Form-factor aside, their first screen tells time.

Williamoni wrote:More generally, I don't feel a lot of love towards the N900 from AAS at the moment. I think it would be great if your Nokia friends lent you one so that it could get the full Litchfield treatment. Might change your mind then. 😊

Umm... you're on the wrong site. The N900 *isn't* Symbian!! Try our own sister site All About Maemo!

sapporobaby wrote:Probably one of your best articles Steve. Exactly spot on in my opinion. While the N900, N97, iPhone, et al have phones, I consider them to be platforms more so than phones in the traditional sense. My N86 is a phone, as is my E75, but my iPhone, and my soon to be purchased N900 will in my mind be media devices that use the telephony functions as enablers to access wider functions. Without the telephony aspects, these devices would be severely crippled as they rely on an Internet connection to round out the "complete" package. The fact that they require two hands to complete tasks is simply part of the game. I can do a few things one-handed on my iPhone but I also run the risk of dropping it as it is sort of too slippery to do things with one hand. Maybe we are seeing an reversion back to two-handed operation.

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slitchfield wrote:Umm... you're on the wrong site. The N900 *isn't* Symbian!! Try our own sister site All About Maemo!

Yes, I know.

It doesn't matter though, AAM or AAS, I'd still like to see your review of the device. That's a compliment by the way.

And to be fair, you've included discussions about the N900 in AAS podcasts...

Here's my opinion:

With modern devices being more or less everything-enabled, I think an important category can be delimited by the simple criterion "pocket-sized", i.e. fitting comfortably in a normal-sized pocket. Typically, this would also ensure that one-handed operation is possible.

Additionally, I support the view (of another poster) that to be considered primarily a phone it should be designed as one, i.e. the phone interface should be prominent when no other application is in the foreground - not something you have to bring up before you can make a call.

Yes, I am totally agree with you.I think Nokia have been quite careful in their description of the N900, mainly because it is quite large as phones go. It is described as a sort of computer-platform which CAN make calls, in the same way that a laptop can be used to make calls.I like it so much.

Steve - I love the Phone show and all your other contributions to the mobile world but seriously this article is very much NON SEQUITUR!!! You might as well have started with your biased conclusion and then lamely tried to support it (or not) with your totally unrelated premises.

Riddle me this - if a device is only a phone when it is used more than 50% of the time one handed in a portrait position, will a N900 suddenly become a phone if I use it 100% of the time just to make phone calls???? Furthermore - the screen on my E71 (which I believe may pass your phone test) is in fact landscape - go ahead check it out... and believe it or not I reckon I use it 90% of the time with both hands (confused? me too).

I think a previous comment sums it up - phones stopped being just phones a long long time ago. The N900 is combined sublime progress - think Wright Brothers and their first attempt at a plane - many years later we have the Stealth fighter - put them side by side and I defy you to tell me one is not a plane. Progress like water in the hands will always seep through - some of us will embrace it others will deny its very existence.

Consider approaching this from a TASK requirement delivery and experience. We only buy these things to do tasks, be it make calls, take pictures, video, blog, email, browse the net etc - if they can achieve those tasks and more and do it efficiently then what the heck - the one that does it best will be hailed king, be it a tablet, phone, pda or even a TENNIS RACKET (used one handed or two handed in portrait (lob, smash and serve) or landscape (forehand, backhand ).

F3arsy