Here's some Wednesday coffee break reading: you'll remember Steve Jobs claiming in 1997 that the original iPhone was five years ahead of the competition? Now AT&T's CTO has been bragging that "in the past 3 years, the US has been the clear leader when it comes to phones, design, operating systems and applications." Like a red rag to a bull - top industry analyst Tomi Ahonen here rips into the claims and points out the innovation from Japan and Finland, among others. His metrics also point to the USA now rising to 19th in the world in terms of mobile adoption and technology, now level with, ahem... Portugal. Grab a hot drink and treat yourself!
Read on in the full article.
Here's some Wednesday coffee break reading: you'll remember Steve Jobs claiming in 1997 that the original iPhone was five years ahead of the competition
If the iPhone had come out as you say in 1997, it would have been about 10 years ahead of its time, and we'd have the iPhone HD13GS or something now. 😊
Gosh, what a pointless rant from Tomi.
And aren't RIM of Blackberry fame Canadian?
Everything I read by that bloke makes him sound like he's in the throes of a nervous breakdown. Calm down man, geez! His horrible anti-americanism does him no favours either.
He seems pretty calm to me and neither is the rant pointless. Any of you armchair warriors disagree, why not go and rebutt his points. He seems very open to criticisms as well.
Contrary to the other commenters here, i know Tomi personally and have attended mobile industry events with him. He is VERY well respected globally in the industry, and is FAR more of a mobile expert than ANY tech journalist out there or for that matter most industry professionals including the head of AT&T. The world's biggest mobile co's pay him for his opinion. Just because you don't like or agree with what he's saying doesn't mean he's wrong, unless you can justify and prove it.
The US is a heavily introspective, biased and limited place in the mobile world today, and them thinking they're leaders will only damage their position. As Tomi says, other places are far in advance. Anyone thinking iPhone or Android is state of the art needs to educate themselves. There's a reason Nokia are the global leader in smartphones and will remain so, and the N8 is yet another example of why.
He is obviously one of the leading and most respected experts on the industry. IMO he is just a bit too hung up on words and text book definition of them. "Innovation" for example (not that Mr. Donovan used the word). 😊
ps. I did post an ameteurish (that's all I am) comment along the same lines on his blog.
Unregistered wrote:He seems pretty calm to me and neither is the rant pointless. Any of you armchair warriors disagree, why not go and rebutt his points. He seems very open to criticisms as well.
Why when Tomi is answering a claim about "when it comes to phones, design, operating systems and applications." does he need to rant on with several paragraphs about how many people in the US have a phone/data contract? (market penetration). What does mobile take-up by consumers in the US have to do with the ability of US developers and engineers to produce leading mobile products and software?
He is actually arguing a claim that the boss of AT&T didn't make, which is what makes it pointless.
Unregistered wrote:Why when Tomi is answering a claim about "when it comes to phones, design, operating systems and applications." does he need to rant on with several paragraphs about how many people in the US have a phone/data contract? (market penetration). What does mobile take-up by consumers in the US have to do with the ability of US developers and engineers to produce leading mobile products and software?He is actually arguing a claim that the boss of AT&T didn't make, which is what makes it pointless.
Why dont you pose that question to him directly, instead of slagging him off here. He answers every questions. Go get your answers!
Unregistered wrote:Why when Tomi is answering a claim about "when it comes to phones, design, operating systems and applications." does he need to rant on with several paragraphs about how many people in the US have a phone/data contract? (market penetration). What does mobile take-up by consumers in the US have to do with the ability of US developers and engineers to produce leading mobile products and software?He is actually arguing a claim that the boss of AT&T didn't make, which is what makes it pointless.
Its to back up his point that the US are *not* the global leaders in mobile communications. For the most part the rest of the world have generally ignored the totally unfounded claims made that the US leads in this arena.
The article was a tad long-winded, but it did make sense, quite a coherent argument. Although if I'd been asked to review, i would have added a few more points ....
clonmult wrote:Its to back up his point that the US are *not* the global leaders in mobile communications. For the most part the rest of the world have generally ignored the totally unfounded claims made that the US leads in this arena.
That makes no more sense than the article. The AT&T guy didn't claim more market penetration. He claimed leading produts in the marketplace.
Unregistered wrote:Why dont you pose that question to him directly, instead of slagging him off here. He answers every questions. Go get your answers!
So you are suggesting that, even though there is a link to the article and a discussion forum attached here, the article should not be discussed here?
On holiday in Sweden I entered a 3 (Tre) Shop, got a prepaid Broadband-SIM-Card and a Huawei E122 USB-Modem for SEK 199,-- (appr. � 20,--). It took me five minutes to get it. The package includes 1 week mobile broadband (3.5 G) and also works in my E52 perfectly (incl. tethering, it's a nokia, not a iPhone).
Try this in the U.S.! See http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/news/item/11247_The_All_About_Symbian_Challeng.php.
Ahem. 1997 = 2007. Corrected.
[shucks] I'm ALWAYS getting the decade wrong, still can't get used to the fact that we've now had a DECADE in the 21st century. Amazing.
Unregistered wrote:So you are suggesting that, even though there is a link to the article and a discussion forum attached here, the article should not be discussed here?
I'm suggesting the article makes perfect sense to me, but apparently not to you. So go get your answer from him, coz nobody here can answer on his behalf. The man's got the data and the facts (and the balls) to counter any arguments thrown at him, in a very civilised manner. You should do the same.
Unregistered wrote:I'm suggesting the article makes perfect sense to me, but apparently not to you. So go get your answer from him, coz nobody here can answer on his behalf. The man's got the data and the facts (and the balls) to counter any arguments thrown at him, in a very civilised manner. You should do the same.
Fortunately we don't all live by your rules.
There is no answer to my critique, which is why you are evasive and offering only a straw man.
i only say that in the states networks abuse the costumers, in europe and other parts of the world there 's an option for almost anything, paid contracts pre paid, same thing in mobile internet, try this in us. their advance is only in their minds.
Jesus, lads, if you're going to have a flame war in the comments, at least identify yourselves - it's like listening to a schizophrenic...
BOC wrote:Jesus, lads, if you're going to have a flame war in the comments, at least identify yourselves - it's like listening to a schizophrenic...
I'm monitoring it. So far they are at least discussing the topic of the thread (in an abstract sort of way, I'll admit). I've seen worse.
But (and this is for the unregistered commenter's). Have your discussion about the subject at hand, but refrain from escalating into personal attacks.
I am sorry, and I say this with all due respect, the man sounds like a total douche. Take a valium and breathe deeply - it does wonders.
Unregistered wrote:I am sorry, and I say this with all due respect, the man sounds like a total douche. Take a valium and breathe deeply - it does wonders.
He's gone a little OTT on the wording at times, maybe, but the facts that he presents are pretty overwhelming.
But of course, you probably didn't actually rtfa?
UKJeeper wrote:But (and this is for the unregistered commenter's). Have your discussion about the subject at hand, but refrain from escalating into personal attacks.
There is a disussion going on about whether Tomi's diatribe is actually relevant to what the AT&T guy said. Tomi writes several paragraphs about the lesser market penetration in the US compared to Europe. I suggest that the AT&T guy made no comment about market penetration, and that he was commenting on the porducts that engineers working in the US have developed.
I see no personal attacks in this thread at all.
Unregistered1 wrote:There is a disussion going on about whether Tomi's diatribe is actually relevant to what the AT&T guy said. Tomi writes several paragraphs about the lesser market penetration in the US compared to Europe. I suggest that the AT&T guy made no comment about market penetration, and that he was commenting on the porducts that engineers working in the US have developed. I see no personal attacks in this thread at all.
You are right, it has not boiled over. I was responding to the person who expressed concern about this being a flame war. As i said, it isn't yet. And i was letting the other posters know that it won't be.
Does Tomi not know that Canada is not part of the USA? This is probably the worst thing that Tomi has ever written.
Of course the AT&T boss is going to make statements like that, it's his job to talk things up in his favour. Should be taken with a pinch of salt. Tomi has taken it far too seriously.
got a great historical perspective in nokia devices..its really funny I remember 4 years back when my cousins from the states couldnt believe i was doing mobile banking transactions and bills payment in my phone ...
Hi Steve and readers of the All About Symbian forum
Hey, thanks Steve for mentioning the blog article. And boy, I would expect the sniping at some other forums of - well, other brands of OS haha - but to be called names at the Symbian forum, ouch! That hurts. I thought I was one of 'us' fighting the good fight haha (and yeah, ok, I am not really devastated by the personal attacks, I think my enormous ego can take it haha.. )
Hey a couple of quick comments - first, I'm sorry it is a long blog. Those who follow me regularly know that I do have a very busy full day job. The blog is totally a hobby site, there is no advertising, so I am sharing info there purely out of the passion to engage with fans and talk about our industry (and try to bring some sanity to it sometimes when a CTO of one of the industry's biggest companies makes blatantly faulty statements). So yeah, it was long, but honestly, I am not a 'journalist' and its only a 'blog' and I can't take the time to edit it cleanly down to reasonable size. Some of my fans appreciate the raw thinking there, others can't stand the long length of most of my blogs and never return. Its a fair judgement haha..
About the US leadership/lag stats - yeah, the AT&T guy talked about handsets. I wanted to start with the point about the 3 measures of global leadership - the only 3 - for which we have a standard metric. These are used by all major analysts to indicate global leadership. He did suggest the USA had overtaken the other countries. These are the only objective measures - any other measure is subjective - and I thought it is fair to first show the real metrics that exist - all three of them - and that by all three, the USA has fallen further behind, and is very far from the leaders.
But I recognize, that is not directly responsive to the AT&T guy's comments. I did address all of them separately, after the stats first. So I think I still did the right thing in replying to the points as well.
So I will also return here and discuss more with you.
Tomi T Ahonen 😊
www.tomiahonen.com
A great read. Americans may cringe, but should read every last paragraph. A bit pro-nokia, which I personally don't agree with, but as the Author pointed out, that's just what he knows. You could substitute any docomo phone in it's place, and the article would read the same (which Tomi has acknowleged)
Here's a quote from Steve, while defending the iPhone 4 design mistake: (verbatim from Engadget, which incidently didn't see fit to capitalise the K in korea!)
"what would you prefer? That we were a korean company, that we were here in America leading the world with these products..."
I think most folk would prefer that their phone didn't drop bars. And (rightfully) wouldn't give a toss where it was from.
It does make me wonder if there is some element of xenophobia ingrained into the USA phone tech culture. This 'U-S-A' mentality is not at all present in the general windows/linux dev scene, so seems out of place in the phone tech industry, which is quick converging with the traditional dev community.