Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Meego != Nokia

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

I really hope I'm wrong too!

I was a SE fan for many years - the phone and software did exactly what I wanted.

My partner bought the Nokia Xpress 5800 and when I saw it I thought it was pretty good. Then my daughter got a Nokia 5300(?) because her LG phone kept destroying the contents of her SD card.

I nearly bought an Android phone last year and even considered the iPhone (what the f*** was I thinking?!).

Then I heard about the n900 and eventually got one and enjoy every minute of it.

It really showed what a company and open source software could do and I assumed this was a hint of Nokia's future and became a fan.

As I've said in previous posts this year I was hoping a european company like Nokia would be serious competition to the likes of Microsoft and Apple and I would have been kind of proud about that.

I think Meego's hope is to be something different from the current trend of dumbing down the smartphone experience.

This is probably Nokia's best strategy - offer something different from everyone else and become a differentier in the market rather than a "me too" manufacturer.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Effectively it is for the moment.

Nokia and volunteers are working together to port Meego to the n900 as a "reference" design and ARM-based devices.

Nokia's n900 "successor" will be running Meego in some form.

Apart from Intel only Nokia are working on a handset version of Meego. Nokia have actual handsets in the market Intel do not.

Meego on touch devices are based on Intel x86 version of Meego.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Their sole reason for existing is to research these risks. So a big fail to them all.

Some possible reasons:

• Nokia didn't pay them this year's subscription fee for the "A-" rating.
• Some people in Fitch have huge short positions on Nokia
• MS "commissioned" Fitch to update Nokia's rating

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Fitch ain't a nobody, and people in the know should be worried.

The banking world is all about speculation, belief in and the image of something. If belief fails then people go elsewhere and if the image Nokia is putting out is one of a failing company, then people look elsewhere. We are not talking customers, we are talking the banking world, investors and share holders. That means problems and a black cloud forms. Companies can't continue on in that state and this should start people on the Nokia board to worry. If the other biggies take note and adjust, then you have serious issues.

Though reading this board you can see people immediatly thinking of conspiracy theories, rather than the 'fat, bloated, badly run, crap phone producer struggling after 3 years of bad phones on a global market it can't seem to understand, finally reaching the stuggling point. No it must be bribery by the competition, that is the real reason.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Not good news, but has very little practical value as long as Nokia has billions in cash and continues to make profit (I.e no serious loan needs).

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Lol okay if that's what you want to believe.

Out of curiousity what would it take for you to be concerned about Nokia's position though?

By the way I don't think anyone (apart from a couple of pastors maybe) predicted the economic crash so rather than saying all governments and companies that failed to do so are failures maybe, just maybe, it was difficult to predict. May be that the financial institutions were doing a very good job of hiding their true position but unlike enron they did not do so in an illegal way.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Did we see developers flocking to Maemo (even before January)? No. IMHO, the Qt strategy is a better one than "Avkon on S60, GTK+ on Maemo".

With very few apps. Or, they could release a phone with similar hardware, but with an existing app eco-system, that paves the way to Qt (and Maemo/Meego apps).

Sales of Symbian^3 phones are *great* for users who are looking forward to Meego, it increases the target market for the platform (Qt). Application purchases/downloads on Ovi are even better.

See e.g. the wordpress app ...

You seem to have missed all the complaints about features not in PR1.2, PR1.3 etc. Or, is Maemo good enough as it is?

Developers would have been stuck porting apps from other platforms, including Nokia platforms, and most likely have become frustrated with effectively having to maintain two versions.

Developers, or users? Developers don't need to wait, they can port their Avkon apps to Qt on Symbian, and get Maemo for very little extra work, and be ready for Meego at launch.

No, those are the Android vendors, they have very little they can differentiate on, except low-margin hardware differences.

Most users aren't *that* interested in wring their own apps, so you need developers. Qt (and Nokia Qt SDK, Qt Quick etc.) lowers the barrier to entry further than GTK+/hildon would have been able to, provides a migration path from Symbian, gives developers confidence that their investment in the platform is worthwhile etc.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

Unfortunately. Even after the recent catastrophic failure governments have still yielded to lobbyists NOT to reintroduce the complete separation of retail and "investment" (ie speculative) banking.

It should only be of concern if real investors are worried. Unfortunately in the current broken financial system most price changes are driven by speculators.

Shouldn't worry a company if they have cash and no need to borrow. Unfortunately executives may be worried about their share options and may be driven to do things to "please" the markets (financial not consumer) instead of doing things for the longterm good of the company.


Since I have no stake in Nokia I have no need for concern with regards to them. However if they don't change their obsession with product segmentation (ie the deliberate selective crippling of dozens of similar mediocre models to fit in with their idea of different user profiles) then their future will not be bright.

They were supposed to be the best of the best, that's why they command huge salaries and even huger bonuses. If they weren't able to predict the crisis then they should've repaid back their salaries and bonuses along with interest. And after the financial meltdown when they were under intense pressure to have their salaries reduced and bonuses dropped they sickeningly whined "but we are the best people for the job and if we don't get paid enough we'll go somewhere else" WTF!!??!! They're lucky to be getting a salary and not a jail sentence.

Re: Nokia debt rating downgraded, future not looking so hot
 

"would continue only using software called Qt (pronounced "cute") to create apps for its phones."

I thought it was pronounced "cutie",like Q-t