Re: Should I wait?
 

ysss I hear where you are coming from, but there is another way to look at this, and that is that the only way to change the "Fanaticism " is from the inside.

The Community is about getting involved, Release Early Release Often is about getting involved from the inside, and as the developers without devices have found, you can only get so far without a device. Its not about overlooking the short comings, but without a device its pretty hard to identify them for real, and then helping out to fix them or change them.

I'm not suggesting that you cant get involved without a device but its probably a fact of life that membership requires ownership if not at least access to a device.

Mike C

Re: Should I wait?
 

Ummm sorry, I don't get what you mean.. which part of my reply to gerbick were you responding to exactly, and why?

EDIT: Ok, re: fanboyism, maybe you should read the post I was replying to to understand the context better.

Re: Should I wait?
 

No worries

Mike C

Re: Should I wait?
 

Just saying that having handled the N900 for a while, it is undoubtedly a fingerprint magnet - something that the iphone handles much better. Don't know about most people buying a screen protector... I've never liked them going back to my Compaq Ipaq days.
It just always felt better without protection......:rolleyes:

Re: Should I wait?
 

Mike C, I think that's totally disengenuous on your part. You were mocking my and other people's posts, with your comments about cake and emotions, and you kept coming back to repeat and redouble your mockery. All the while you had zero substantive to say in response to my posts. That may be funny or provide "lightness" for you or other people, but it's obvious how that is a personal attack. But it's in keeping with your posts above to be disengenuous, because part of what you were doing is pretending that you're above it all, while you are actually the one stirring things up. Most nice people, in your position, realizing they had offended someone else (as if it wasn't obviously part of your point) would appologize. Instead you pretend that it's all just my misperception, so that you can continue to be aloof.

cb474

Re: Should I wait?
 

That's actually not what I said. But then none of your responses have really been to what I actually said, so I don't know what I expect. Also, your argument about the reviews is just an ad hominem argument, attacking the speaker, rather than their claims.

I did not say you have discounted reviews that are positive. The reviews I cited are not necessarily even positive reviews, but you wouldn't know that because you keep commenting on them without reading them. I only cited the reviews that actually comment on the phone application and it was striking that the ones that do bother to comment on it all have positive things to say about that particular part of the N900. That does not mean the reviews as a whole are positive. They actually have many things to say that are critical of the N900, which you would find out if you ever bothered to read the things that you're commenting on.

Also, I am not defending the N900 as somehow perfect and unopen to criticism. That is just another distorition of what I've said, by more than one person posting in this thread (who seem to prefer to be snide, rather than say anything substantive about the phone application--which was supposed to be the subject of the discussion). All I said in fact is, perhaps one person in this forum, Texrat, did not like the phone application, but other people who have used the N900 have thought it is well done. I just tried to provide information about that one part of the N900 that I thought people might be interested in, to point out that there are differing opinions about the phone application.

There are plently of things that I'm uncertain about, with the N900 and I have no idea until I see it if I would want one. I think the camera is probably inferior to the N86, which I've been thinking about getting. I think the N900 is too thick to be readily pocketable. I don't like that it has no call and end buttons. I don't really want a device that requires a stylus to be used. The keyboard sounds mediocre, from what I've read. It lacks MMS support. Despite the Linux on a phone concept, it sound like there's really not that much in terms of applications from the Linux world that have really been ported to Maemo. Obviously the whole lack of potrait support could be really annoying. And that's just things I don't like off the top of my head.

It's like I can't say one positive thing about the N900 without being accused of being a "fanboy" by people who just want to snipe and criticize and have nothing substantive to say. It's easy, of course, to distort what someone else says and then attack that, when you have no good response to what they actually said.

Re: Should I wait?
 

I've never used the term "fanboy" towards you. If so, please quote me and I will apologize for it.

I have been rather verbose in all of my answers so far. And as it stands, you have one opinion; I have one. Last I checked, we're both allowed.

You state your case rather well, imho. So I've taken nothing personal from our exchanges. In fact, it's rather refreshing to talk about our differences, or even likenesses, and not have it dwindle into some shouting match.

I'm addressing the "fanboy" statement merely because you had quoted me earlier. Thus if my assumption is incorrect that you were still addressing me, it would be based on being previously quoted.

I fear that you want me to address your statements directly when honestly I've acknowledged that I'm quite aware of the prior, pre-production positive reviews out there. However, I'm not exactly a fan of pre-production reviews due to the nature of whom has stated what exactly - a Blackberry fan (GigaOm), a Symbian repository (which while detailed, their take will be different than my own) and likewise.

That part was overlooked somehow and my reliance on an "off-the-cuff" comment came simply because it was from the perspective of somebody that shared my same type of usage style, background in experience in Maemo and thus their experience would likely be closer to mine than the aforementioned users. Does it make that an exact science, as exact as a poll? No. But we're talking opinions... which are as scientific as me looking at the sun in the sky and guessing what time it is...

The part I'm starting to finally get slightly annoyed about is how I'm defending my own opinion ad nauseum. There's no need. Let's just kindly state that we will agree to disagree. My patience, my own patience that is... is very low compared to yours. That's your stance.

Mine is different. Portrait support is low on my list of problems. Inability to make video calls with Skype - which starts and stops with that vendor, not Nokia - is just the start of my reason(s) for hesitating. But as far as it goes, my reasons equate to my prerogative.

So in conclusion, I already knew about the reviews you've linked to. I also know of others that were so speculative that I'd rather not consider them for anything other than stuff I should ignore.

I'll form my own opinions based upon my own criteria; and largely that has to do with the type of user I am, the functionality I wish to have in what I consider a phone/pocket computer. And thus far, I am not convinced.

Re: Should I wait?
 

Yes, I agree that we disagree and we have probably gone in circles enough times. I also feel, like you, that I've been defending my same point ad nauseum. I see where you're coming from and why you don't trust the reviews.

The only reason I've been so admant in insisting that the reviews ought to carry some weight is because the original poster asked about the phone application and your very first post in this thread presented the "majority" opinion as being negative about the phone application, which I felt was not a fair representation of the opinions out there. Obviously the original poster and others who read this thread might not share your general distrust of the reviews. If they do fine. But it seemed like worthwhile information to put out there. I don't trust all reviews by any means, but the one's I linked to I think are from people who have something worthwhile to say (whether or not I agree with everything they say). And I felt it was a more fair representation of the general opinion so far from people who've used the N900, to put those reviews out there. I trust readers of the thread can decide for themselves what sources they're willing to trust.

I also appreciate that we discussed our opinions without descending into a shouting match and I thank you for saying as much.

It was really ysss (and Mike C) who chimed in with snide and unsubstantive remarks. And it was ysss who started using language like "fanboy" in apparent reference to my posts. However in the post of yours that I was responding to, you did make a remark that picked up on what ysss was saying and you seemed to agree with it:

Perhaps you didn't realize it, but ysss's remark that you quoted appeared to be a response to me. It was the beginning of his "fanboy" critique. And so it seemed like you were agreeing with his snide remarks about me. If that's not what you meant, let me know. So I was responding to everyone who seemed to be jumping on the "fanboy" wagon in response to me.

Re: Should I wait?
 

Nope. I was honestly referring to the VLC situation I had mentioned a slight bit later. The response about VLC coming to the N900 was surprisingly negative.

My mother knows VLC. So seeing it on a phone is honestly a plus in my eyes. Not so by others, it seems. Just... odd.

And I snipped his statement(s) to further my own prior statements... which he responded about how he and I (accurately too) were in the same boat.

I'm all varied opensource distros on my servers, OS X on my main machines - although I do support Windows still though.

The N810 is a bit of a disappointment in only one way to me... no more development on the things that were grossly underutilized in that platform and seemingly once again on the N900 - the forward facing camera for one instance.

I do use Gizmo, but out of my contacts... I have two others that use it as well. The rest, Skype or Google Talk for the most part. And the lack of a community sourced app that gives me that functionality some 2+ years later is... well somewhat a letdown. But, I still use my N810, so I can't be all that upset.

I'm sure Mer, et al will fix that bit o' disappointment.

Re: Should I wait?
 

Okay, sorry about the misunderstanding.

Yes, I'm also excited about VLC coming to the N900. That's the sort of thing that makes Maemo seem like it has so much potential as a platform. Lots of real, powerful, desktop apps (not just the sort of pseudo-applications that make up the Apple app store). And lots of choices between different powrful apps, e.g. VLC, mplayer, totem, xine. What I'm worried about is how much of the regular Linux apps like that will get ported.

I'm surprised there's a negative response to VLC. If people aren't interested in VLC then just ignore it. It doesn't make sense. What does it hurt if some developers choose to spend their time porting VLC? That's the beauty of open-source at its best. Nobody's forcing anybody to use it. Very perplexing.