Re: Winners and losers
 

Nokia has been committed to Symbian like no other manufacturer has been committed to any other OS. They have been so committed it nearly killed them. Maemo and later MeeGo has been a distraction that went bad, very bad.

As for Android, you know I am right. Android doesn't sell by itself because people don't buy OS'es they buy phones. That is where Microsoft did wrong with WP7, they thought WP7 would sell and tried to uniform everyone with the same look like they have done in the PC world, no matter which phone you got, the UI should be Microsoft. This doesn't work in the mobile world, it never has, and never will.

HTC has had the same look and feel on both Android and WM. Samsung has the same look and feel on Bada and Android. S60 and S40 has the same look and feel. It really is simple, when you buy a Samsung, you should feel at home no matter if it runs Android or Bada or is a dumbphone.

Microsoft has now eventually turned 180 degrees, everyone will be allowed to make their own look and feel. WP will forever after be associated with Nokia, and everyone else will shy it like the plage unless they make it exclusively theirs. Nokia has been smart enough to quitely and gently say that the default MS UI is "ours".

The mobile world is driven by ecosystems, if we like it or not, that is what it is all about, and always have been on different levels. The ecosystems are the lowest common denominator, not the OS and not even the phone brand, and certainly not the operators even though they like to believe so themselves in the US. At some point in time, yes, but not anymore. We will see the PC world shift to the ecosystem paradigm as well, and it starts with tablets. So far no one has really understood this to the full extent, but Apple is closest. Nokia and MS looks to be getting it now, but thay may fail miserably if they get too preoccupied in supplying and protecting their bits and pieces instead of looking at the big picture, MS clearly has a long way to go.

The problem is that people care much less about ecosystems than they care for OS'es, and that is almost nothing to start with. What matters is that it is a Nokia and all the cool thing that Nokia can do.

Re: Winners and losers
 

I think it's safe to say that Nokia has shown very little commitment to Maemo. It's been treated like a garage project this entire time.

Symbian though, has been their bread winner. So of course, they've shown commitment to it in the past.

Re: Winners and losers
 

Needless to say, that encapsulates the failure of Nokia's management and board of directors. Six years ago they came up with the tablet revolution and since then they've merely treaded water while investing in protecting their past.

They wasted basically all the initial huge developer interest through their strategy/technology resets, poor support for the released devices and the lack of any new devices (let alone ones with decent specs).

So where would the developers they once had in their palm go if not to competiting platforms, thus multiplying the marketshare and mindshare damage.

They did put some effort into developing Qt but encumbered it with their managerial inertia and kept it nevertheless partially behind closed doors. They showed no commitment to releasing devices using the technology though. One aging, already average at birth N900 with delayed Qt update while the larger market was getting flooded with a *variety* of more modern phones and tablets which caught the attention of developers, media and the public too.

Meanwhile Nokia's future Mae^^MeeGo and Qt were indeed being treated as fringey garage projects.

And now Nokia's management and board are blaming the failure on the technology while enslaving the company to the whims of an unproven OS (out next year, possibly) controlled by the industry's most notorious partner-eating black widow.

All the long-timers here are painfully aware of Nokia's incompetence in software development by now (likely due management "processes" and hierarchy rather than individual developers!), but that combined with the lack of new or even slightly refreshed devices... mind boggles that this represented Nokia's future!

Re: Winners and losers
 

None of the longtimers here really know what has been going on at Nokia. Regarding competence, 10 years ago Symbian had close to desktop performance and dektop functionality on very low spec HW. Symbian was the only capable OS. It is only since 2008 that iOS and Android came with "cooler" UI the longtimers here are referring to. But still today, none of these two can show the same wide functionality as Symbian had 7-8 years ago.

Times have changed, deep understanding of HW and complex and unfriendly APIs is not needed. More modern OSes on much higher spec HW have friendly APIs and what is needed is competence in software architecture regarding UI. This transition proved to be too difficult for Nokia. They just didn't manage to modernize Symbian from the ground up, making it a modern OS.

Lets not forget that S40 is the most used OS of them all. Nothing else comes close, not when comparing it with anything. S40 is the absolute King of OSes of any kind.

Maemo/MeeGo and open systems was a dead end road. With NFC coming and more demand for secure systems throughout, there really is no thinkable way to handle this without tighting the rope regarding what can be installed on the device. Not only tightening of the rope, but also more security between apps. WP has all this built in from the ground, it is a feature of the basic architecture.

Re: Winners and losers
 

Wow, that's some pretty severe nonsense there.

Bull. Proper encryption would allow a completely open device to safely use NFC. If NFC is that fundamentally insecure then not only does it deserve to be cracked wide open, but the companies pushing it deserve to lose money.

Which is for security, yes, but not for you but against you, and it isn't to keep your NFC data safe. It's to keep you stuck in the Microsoft-controlled ecosystem provided via their Marketplace.

Re: Winners and losers
 

@Ericsson

You say neither iOS nor Android "can show the same wide functionality as Symbian had 7-8 years ago."

I've never used a Symbian phone (or were my very-low-end Nokia phones running on Symbian?). So I'm honestly curious: would you (or anyone else) please provide a detailed explanation of this functionality. What's so great about the Symbian OS? What are all these great things it can do?

Re: Winners and losers
 

Many times (for example, right now to WP7). It's not usually a lasting commitment though, so if you don't like the current direction just wait a while.

Re: Winners and losers
 

I have doubts that Nokia will go back to strongly supporting OSS in the short term. If this WP7 adoption works, it may provide a powerful precedent to keep things closed. If it doesn't, they're screwed and are likely to be acquired by someone that desires the brand/assets.

Re: Winners and losers
 

The communicator series from Nokia and UIQ series from Sony Ericsson and Motorola were many years ahead of their time. Us google and you will find some stuff. The idea was to have desktop functionality in palm sized hardware, not unlike the N900 actually, but with a different edge. The N900 is a palm sized Linux box, the communicators were palm sized desktops aimed for geeky executives. You can say that both concepts are ultimately flawed, at least they are not mass market devices, but they both have a large fan base. The E7 is the last communicator, although it is watered out compared with the earlier ones, like the E90 for instance.

Why not? Communicators and UIQ devices were THE thing, just look at the market share of smartphones some years back. It is truly amazing you know nothing about it.

Re: Winners and losers
 

Yes, I'm quite amazing.