Defining the Smartphone

For me it's always been the first definition. A smartphone for me is a device that can run native applications (not java or flash apps).

I agree with your definition, Steve, but I disagree that a smartphone "is permanently connected to the Internet", I think it should be more like "can be permanently connected to the Internet", sure I'm nit-picky, but discussing how we should call our phones is similarly nit-picky. 😉

Good article Steve. If I may go further. Maybe smartphone is no longer the correct term to use but rather "smart device". The basic functions have blurred with Internet connectivity and data consumption being equally as important as telephony functions. I would gladly say that a few years ago the basic function of the smartphone was to make calls and provide ancillary functions while now the new paradigm is to provide video capture/playback, Internet functions, as well as making and receiving calls. People now place their particular desires ahead of the defining definitions of a device. With this in mind, the iPad can be considered a smartphone because of its ability to make and receive phone calls, albeit with specifically designed applications, but calls can be made none the less.

Just a thought.

Just to throw a wee bit of historical "oil" onto the debate - there's no reasons the 9000, 9000i and the early GeOS powered communicators should not be labelled smartphones.

You could write third party apps in C++ (there as a great Snake game, and I'm pretty sure an alternative fax/image viewer was available), you had PC connctivty, it was significantly ahead of ohter phones, the bundling of a "Terminal" lient and data connection was (and still is) one of the best mobile sysadmin solutions... GeOS was a multiplatform OS, it powered the Casio Zoomer (and the built in apps there were coded by the team who went on to write the Palm Computing Pilot OS).

For the time, the 9000 Communicator ticks every single box, Steve 😉

There is continued variation right from basic handsets that can so voice and messaging right up to devices like the N900. Where anybody chooses to place a line to demarcate any class of device is largely abitrary and for the most part inconsequential. I don't think it really matters a great deal.

To paraphrase Justice Potter Stewart from the US Supreme court:

I shall not attempt to define what a smartphone is, but I know one when I see one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_know_it_when_I_see_it

Definition 5b: A smartphone is always connected and can browse the full Internet

So only the N900 is now a smartphone?

Interesting article Steve. It pretty much aligns with what I've been thinking for a while now: All the "smartphone" defiintions have flaws and are a bit woolly. 😊

In one sense, all are "phones". Clearly, high-end phones are more advanced and useful than low-end ones (duh!). However, as you have pointed out - what is now "high end" will be "low end" soon enough. (I think you'll find even the lowest-end, �20 phones have HW specs that will compare quite favourably with early "smartphones" like the Nokia 7650)

To be honest, I wonder whether we need these distinctions at all. I think they have always been a bit of a marketing gimmick to make high end phones seem more special. "This is no ordinary phone, this is a smart phone!". Back in the early days, the ability to install apps was a sufficiently big differentiator to justify separating those phones into a class of their own. However, with non-smartphones gaining the ability to run stuff like Java, Flash and HTML5 that distinction has long since vanished (and don't get me started on the "it's only smart if it's native apps" because BlackBerry only runs Java apps which traditionally don't count as native and yet everyone classes them as "smartphones". Even Android apps are mostly a variation on Java (though I believe they have now added some support for "native" apps too))

Looking at the definitions Steve lists, I think they have gotten increasingly weak and desperate sounding over time. "It has a QWERTY" or "It's screen is bigger than X" sounds like companies clutching at straws to find some stand-out feature that makes their phone "smart" and others not-so-smart. What are they afraid of? Probably the fact that if "smartphone" marketshare stats were no longer produced and only "phone" marketshare stats were made instead, all the operating systems and vendors would suddenly find themselves with a smaller % number than they enjoy today.

I for one would actually prefer such phone stats. How many all mobile phones (which I'd define as "a portable, battery-powered device capable of making cellular voice calls"😉 run Symbian or Android or iOS would be far more interesting than how many of some more-or-less randomly defined sub-set of phones run those systems. 😊

It's either the definition of the first commenter above, Kazutoyo, in that a smartphone is one that can run 3rd party apps that directly address the OS,

OR there simply is no such thing as a precise definition for a smartphone any more - that the spectrum of phones is much like the light spectrum with one colour merging gradually into another.

I challenge anyone to come up with a different definition that always applies, and I will find you a case where it does not apply, and thus there is no strict definition.

Hardware features certainly are NO indicator whatsoever. And neither are software features. Or design....

Your challenge awaits... 😊

Hi Steve,
This was a good history lesson, but at the end there really is only a few necessary abstractions about smartphones that sets it apart from the rest of the market:
- It has all the most advanced software features that can be offered at the time
- It has hardware that sets it at the very top of the market at the time
- the package had enough breathing room in terms of HW and storage to expand so far beyond the original form, that at the end it's nearly unrecognizable to it's original form

So for example:
- 2005, 6630 was a real hit because it contained a real mp3 player, a standard flash card slot, pop-port for my xenon flash (the best phone accessory ever made!!), fast CPU, bluetooth 1.0, UMTS, and a great 1.3MP camera
- 2007, n95-3 and n95 8gb was hit because it combined gps, 5MP camera, had loads of storage, upgraded cpu, upgraded screen resolution, a standard card slot, HSDPA, bluetooth 2.0
- 2010, many of the high end android phones, the iphone 4, and the n8 will stand far beyond the n95 because it will contain upgraded CPU, better camera sensors for HD recording, HSUPA, smarter online AND offline software models, upgraded screen resolution, and (hopefully in the N8 case) enough storage to expand well beyond it's original software

Basically I thought some of the items listed was so menial and terse, that even if the phone hits these definitions, it doesn't make it all that smart - e.g. an iPhone now just wouldn't compare to an iphone 4, because it just seems to hit the end of it's useful life for all intent purposes. On the other hand, I still manage to push my N95 to it's limits and not make it fall over, even though it has neither a touch screen nor a QWERTY. Does that make it not smart for the lack of your items on the list, or does it still make it borderline smart, because it's useful life is is well beyond my contract even though there are much stronger selections? And the N97 did hit all of your items, but it can be labeled as not a smartphone, or a failed attempt to be a smartphone because I've basically have already maxed it out with it's pitiful internal storage and cpu, even though it's still under warranty. Thus the existence of the C6 as a mid-range phone now, which looks vaguely familiar 😉

-Gene

I'm thinking of categories , more hardware-linked interpreted , like :

Phone : Voice Calling
Phone plus : SMS added
SmartPhone : Web/Internet (Sound and Vision) added
SmarterPhone : Utilities like Camera , FM radio , Full Qwerty , Touch , Digital Compass , GPS , Accelerometer , USB OTG , or specific software like (Quick) Office , etc. added
SmartestPhone : A SmarterPhone , that runs multiple OS's

( The SmarterPhone category could be subdivided in : CameraPhone , FMPhone , QwertyPhone , NaviPhone , TouchPhone , etc. )

These categories avoid critics like my phone cost more . Otherwise there will be a surely failing division like :
Phone / Phone Plus : up to Euro 50.-
SmartPhone : up to Euro 200.-
SmarterPhone : up to Euro 500.-
SmartestPhone : more than Euro 500.-

😊 Regards jApi NL

ajck wrote:It's either the definition of the first commenter above, Kazutoyo, in that a smartphone is one that can run 3rd party apps that directly address the OS,

OR there simply is no such thing as a precise definition for a smartphone any more - that the spectrum of phones is much like the light spectrum with one colour merging gradually into another.

I challenge anyone to come up with a different definition that always applies, and I will find you a case where it does not apply, and thus there is no strict definition.

Hardware features certainly are NO indicator whatsoever. And neither are software features. Or design....

Your challenge awaits... 😊

It's not rurally much of a challenge. I answered this some time ago on another website:
http://forum.brighthand.com/headline-news/265889-redefining-smartphone.html

But, I will agree that supeerphone is not a class of device, nor is it's definition around hardware features or social networking capabilities sufficient enough to validate it.

I will state that a mobile is only as smart as the person that's using it. And depending on the bias of the person, there might not be too many smart folks or their attending devices out there at all.

Unregistered wrote:Definition 5b: A smartphone is always connected and can browse the full Internet

So only the N900 is now a smartphone?

It depends on the definition of "can browse the full Internet". If, besides the regular HTML/CSS/JavaScript + key image formats, there are also besides "full" Flash also other technologies (video and audio formats, Java applets/J2SE/JRE, etc.) to account for in order to meet the definition.

One could also argue that "full Internet" browsing would also require the ability to download and update images, videos and other content/files. (Most phone browser allow this only in a very limited fashion.)

The minimum requirement is, IMO, the ability to access "full" HTML/CSS/JavaScript web sites without having to limit yourself to separate "mobile" versions.

However, that isn't often enough in practice as people want to download/upload stuff (files), view also Flash content, stream audio/video format that PCs support but not phones in general, etc.

Things would of course be better, if web site designers stuck with standards and didn't use proprietary technologies such as Flash (or ActiveX, or vendor/browser specific extensions), but that's never going to happen. There's always some new thing by some vendor, which someone wants to take advantage of for good or bad reasons.

Price as an indicator...guys check out this link. Its a complete joke...

http://www.integrontech.com/Nokia-N8-16GB-Unlocked-QuadBand-Orange-p/nok-n8-o.htm

1)fast processor (eg:1 Ghz Snapdragon..at least) ;
2)plenty of RAM (let's say 512 Mb after boot😃) ;
2 b)plenty of storage space(64Gb should be enough on the go...for more,look at point 6) 4th idea);
3)high resolution large capacitive touchscreen..at least 4 inches in diagonal..which can work great in direct sunlight and indoors(SuperAMOLED)...great for browsing the internet , playing HD games, editing and reading mobile documents,ebooks,etc ;
4)fast,stable and multiple oriented UI (bussines,multimedia,leisure)...waiting for MeeGo OS :> ;
4 b)bussines , multimedia and leisure apps should already be installed in the device (eg😮ffice,pdf reader,smart music player,HD games,etc) :
5)lots of apps in the application store (eg:Apple store) ;
6)Wi-Fi (g,n) , 4G , internet tethering ,conctivity with other divices(like N8) , Bluetooth 3.0 ;
7)8Mp camera with good lenses(Carl Zeiss) with xenon flash...12Mp is too much for a phone ;
8)thin,shock and scratch resistant aluminium (even magnesium) one piece casing;
8 b)a physical keyboard should be provided if the market requests it;
9)...lets not forget the power plant...a powerful battery which should be provided with an auxiliary solar pannel so you can charge your phone on your way to work for exemple...

What else?...IPhone 4G + Nokia N8 + HTC Desire + Samsung M110 S Galaxy S + future MeeGo device-->SuperSmartphone

What do you think?:-?

Before I would have included n86 as a smart phone but now it doesn't seem right.

To me, you either a large screen or a qwerty to make up for the lack of it.

And smartphone should include more processing hardware which for sure the n86 don't fit.

I would almost lump n86 into those super featured phones.

I would propose a 'hybrid' definition.

Smartphone is a phone that fulfills at least three of the following criteria:
- Can run native applications
- Has large screen (> 3''😉
- Has physical or virtual querty keyboard
- Is sutible for prolongued connection (always connected)

I just picked up my first phone magazine in 3 years (steve contributes).
Apart from a well hidden x6 on the front page it took utill page 40 or so before a symbian/nokia device appeared.
nokia only seem to have 3 or 4 phones that are smartphones and even these are out of date!!!!
It seemed to have to be touchscreen running android/windows/or the "king of phones" i phone.
Surley it is in nokia's remit to define the smartphone.
They need to get agressive with the marketing.

Yes, I do seem to be the only real Symbian user in Smartphone Essentials. I do what i can to keep the platform in the tech media eye. Symbian handsets outnumber everything else in terms of sales, but 90% of buyers don't really understand what they're buying, sadly.

I loved the comment above about smartphones only being as smart as their users. Very true! 8-)

Whatever does that mean?

As far as I can tell, one of the dominant internet protocols is Flash.

Flash runs well enough only on Windows. It's a bit of a nuisance on other desktops, and simply non-existent on phones. As a closed protocol, *all* of the smartphones have to wait for Adobe to take its thumb out of its lower orifice and deliver -- and Adobe hasn't found the wherewithal to create a single instance of Flash v. 10.x for a single one of them, anywhere. (A couple of phones have an unsupported, feature-incomplete "beta."😉 Now that Adobe has upgraded most of its user base to CS5, the meme that Steve Jobs was painting his firm into a corner has subsided and life goes on pretty much as it has since Adobe cut the Flash Lite teams from Macromedia, five years ago.

Likewise, other standards are evolving rapidly enough that sites frequently need to detect the browser and dumb down content for the device. As a consequence, many highly-compliant browsers are unable to view all content or perform all actions.

I think the two issues are related: Flash delivers where IE6, IE7 and IE8 do not.

In any case, it's hard to imagine that we will ever have both stable and also relevant standards. Any living system will have to deal with subsets and supersets.

IMVHO it's completely bollocks to use a term purely generated for marketing reasons to express what phones it's fun to work with... :icon13:

What I can't understand the most is how many comments were hardware-centric - just think what Linux can make of a otherwise useless i80486. 😉

cheers, Swordfish

There was no App Store for the first generation of iPhone in the first year. So, is it a smartphone?

On the other hand, if you take a look on getjar.com, there are more than 1000 java app for feature phone, and it can make it smart. So, is it a smartphone?

Shopping for a new phone and trying to get a full understanding of OSs , apps, JAVA and other features is a nightmare- I'd love it all, but who can find it all in one device? Thought I'd buy an unlocked phone dual sim that I could use for the next 5 years or so.... LOL! Now of course I realize that the technology is moving at the speed of light- WOW! Hopefully I'm one of the SMART smartphone buyers now..... Thanks for the perspective