Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

As you all know apple has rejected google voice from the app store. With all the apple hate going on... i think it is a great time for maemo 5 to come out. Many people are fed up with closed systems and maemo 5 would be a wonderful replacement.

http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/28/g...ose-connectio/

http://gizmodo.com/5324268/apple-rej...ice-iphone-app

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I disagree...the majority of the people that care already have an iphone. just beacuse google voice got rejected (for now) doesnt' mean they'll throw their iphone away or sell it to get another device just because it's open source..especially because Nokia has very little marketing and product branding in the US. People hear "iphone with no google voice (in fact, majority of the people don't know what google voice is and have no use for it)" vs "unknown nokia device that isn't really a phone but has VOIP (that isn't very big in the US) and is open source"...people will still go with the iphone.

who exactly are the "many people" that are fed up with closed systems? the majority of the people don't even know the difference between a closed and open system..and they're the people that give apple and nokia their money. selling to a small community of linux/open source makes a lot less money....so the fact that just because google voice got rejected (for now) from apple would do little to taking money away from apple to nokia

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

By "many people", do you mean all 20 of you? :) Majority of people do not care.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I'm getting fed up waiting for Nokia to even _announce_ something new, never mind release it. my n800 is getting rather long in the tooth, and my fingers are getting twitchy for a new toy, so I'm seriously looking at the HTC Hero. Which T-Mobile (UK) should be releasing this afternoon.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Hmm it reminds me of this prediction about the iPhone...

"“You know the beautiful thing: June 29, 2009, is the two- year anniversary of the first shipment of the iPhone,” Elevation Partners (which owns a huge portion of Palm) co-founder Roger McNamee told Bloomberg in March. “Not one of those people will still be using an iPhone a month later.”"

:D

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

He should be eating his Foleo just about now...

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

But the majority of people do not have an iphone either :)

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

The banning of GV is more to do with AT&T phobia than with Apple I believe in this case. This is because It allows users to send free SMS messages and get cheap long-distance over Google Voice. It also makes it trivial to switch to a new phone service, because everyone calls the Google Voice number anyway and hence you don't have to depend upon number portability and all such.

The same could happen with Nokia phone if release with AT&T. Of course there is the plus side that you could always but the phone unlocked and do anything with it. That's an advantage of Nokia.

But seriously nobody even in my friends circle (tech friends) even know what GV does or are impressed with it. They always say - "but why do I need GV on my phone, I can already make calls from my cell."

And open or closed has never been a factor in who sells a product the most in most consumer markets.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I own an Iphone and a nokia e71 and n810. I find myself always switching back to the e71 and n810 combo every time I decide to use the Iphone. The iphone has some great features and awsome apps but not being capable of multitasking drives me crazy. Also, I really like having a physical qwerty keyboard.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

No worries Android already has it covered. :eek::D Been using GV since it came installed on my Magic.:cool:

Clinton

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

This is rather interesting..

1-2 years ago, this board would be buzzing with screams against Apple from idealistic individuals wanting a successful opensource handheld platform.

Today, Apple has proven a pragmatic platform design with a powerful profit sharing model with the developers can make a thriving ecosystem for their closed system...

Obviously the story doesn't end here. Android and Symbian are gaining steam and they're getting ready to strike back.. but who knows how well they know the current market and what the customer really wants?

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Android maybe..I don't think Symbian is gaining much steam. The OS is getting outdated, and many reviews of the N97 cite this as part of the reason why it's not that great. at least android is a free open source operating system thats going to be on htc, samsung, lg, and other phones..all symbian's got is nokia phones which people are buying less and less of

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

@bigg3rdd0g: I completely agree. Even Android's application stable looks so puny by comparison to Apple's. I'd say iPhone's market dominance would stretch for another 2-3 years before anything else may challenge it..

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

My opinion is you should hold out a little longer. The consensus seems to be that the tech is already outdated. A 2nd generation Android device with a Cortex A8 or better, combined with a supported graphics chip and at least 256 MB is gonna be the sweet spot. The Hero is what, over $700? It's the Android version of the N97.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I agree with you largely though..

1) "but why do I need GV on my phone"

Err.. free unlimited voice and SMS. (well granted it may not be unlimited as I doubt any of us has tested Google's limits but it's sure higher than what unlimited plans a telco will give you probably). If they still aren't convinced, spam them till their SMS message limit is exceeded =P. Granted it's not needed, but it's nice to have a free alternative since I barely use minutes and SMS messages as is (so I don't see a point in paying for alot of minutes or SMS messages). Right now I just use GV for most of my calls, and my cell for when I'm out and about. Since I'm on a family plan it leaves more minutes for my sister and mother.

2) It depends on what you mean by open and closed. Operating system wise (Windows and Linux)? True, it doesn't matter so much. Open and closed e.g. Windows and Apple back in the early days? If we remember from history, Apple insisted on keeping their operating system tied to their hardware, and Windows eventually outgrew and now dominates the operating system market. I can see something similar happening to the smartphone market. Apple may have the temporary advantage now (coming from the iPod to iPod Touch/iPhone transfer) but they're in a new growing market now. It's not just media, it's games, it's tools, it's everything. And eventually as operating system that aren't tied to just one hardware unit (e.g. Android, Windows Mobile, etc..) continue to improve and grow we might see a repeat of the PC revolution. Where Apple had the head start first, but eventually gave way to a more "open" (as in not just one hardware unit provided by one company) alternatives that were cheaper and more plentiful.

I'm personally waiting for Android to mature, it already appeals to me, it's just minor issues like not being able to install applications to SD cards (sounds familar huh?) and how HTC is doing a better job of improving Android than Google is. And of course, price. Right now no matter what you choose, iPhone, Pre, Android the end cost of it is still in the upper $2000 after the two year contract. I rather get a smartphone with a minimal minutes/SMS plan and heavy on data.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Definitely wait for a Cortex A8 class device. The difference is HUGE.
Not to mention, htc overloads the hero with its eye candy-laden (or rather over encumbered) dashboard.. what a poor design decision.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

@Laughing man: The kicker with Apple's iPhone\Touch closed system is that it gives great payout to good developers. This is a substantial difference that I don't think can be replicated by non financial oriented open system.

What good would an open system be, if it's lacking software?

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

lacking software? please tell me exactly what software your missing...

btw, iphone has a media presence bar none. hell, apple in general seems to be everywhere in the tech media these days. only google and microsoft is more talked about, and only google is in similarly positive light (mostly when there is a issue with app store or itms its brushed of as being related to at&t or the labels/studios, not apple).

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

When I wrote my above post there was two methods of open and closed i referenced. The first we think of is like maemo versus iPhone. Windows versus Linux. The second is Windows based computers versus Apple's Macs. Where both are considered closed if you use Linux but you can use Windows on more computers than you can OSX.

What is the benefit of the latter? Simple a bigger audience. You can make X dollars given a deal with Apple with the Y number of iPhone users. Or X dollars given the userbase of Y number of whatever OS which is found on alot more phones.

Right now it's in Apple's court but if it's anything like the PC market an "open" competitor that allows their OS to be used on more types of devices is going have more of a userbase, hence a bigger market to sell too. Right now all of Apple's competitors are still growing (Android being slowly adopted for more and more phones) or like Windows Mobile who have been slacking till Apple came on the scene.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

The first one is opensource vs closed source, which refers to the (source) code licensing schemes. But I don't know about linux anymore these days. They're incorporating more and more non gpl stuffs for practicaility, no? I know the % is still very small, but still.

The second one (ms vs apple) would have to do with the licensing agreement of (both closed sourced commercial) operating systems and business model of Microsoft's Windows vs Apple's OSX... where Microsoft sells the windows OS to be run on any of its (technically) supported hardware, and Apple ties the sales of OSX to an 'apple branded hardware', correct?

For someone making business decisions (heads of software developer companies), the above factors should (generally) have lesser priority than where the optimal potential income lies, no? It is, after all, a business enterprise. I think Apple has hit a home run with its AppStore's software distribution model, giving great benefit to the users, the developers and right in the middle, to themselves.

I believe they will be trying to put all their other platforms through something similar (selling apps for their desktop and notebooks through iTunes?? And defintely their future tablet product) and other competing companies will try to replicate it also.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

On Android? Maybe they're lacking those fart and boob wobbling apps :D

I don't know, I was just making a comment of iTunes' 62,000 apps versus Android's... 5000? 6000 now?

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Something that actually used the N810 camera... and was updated in the last 18+ months.

How about this...

An updated Skype. An updated Evince. An updated Fring. An updated Xournal. An updated Gizmo Project. An updated MPlayer. An updated Modest. An updated browser that's not Tear. An updated Flash Player. Hell, any updated, non-community set of apps that have been updated in the last year. All I've seen updated that I use... Yellow Notes, Mauku and Dial Central. Which... I'm very happy to have updated.

But almost all Diablo apps have largely not been updated since December of 2007 - about a month after the N810 came out, if not by Q3 of 2008 - not even a year after it came out.

It's almost a year later even after that... what updates or high profile software come out lately? In fact, when was the last update for Canola?

There is a lot of missing software in terms of something coming out that's worth it. I'd love to see a list just to compare since I'm in the minority of wanting more apps.

Buy a phone, have it activated at the Apple or AT&T store. Sign up for iTunes Store via the iPhone... and you'll never need to use the iTunes on your computer... other than to backup. I've never purchased through the computer, just use my iTunes to back up the phone.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

i would say everyone is on hold for fremantle and/or mer right now...

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Ok, fair point. We should discount Apple's official number of 65,000 (?), which I should add, is still a fair way to count these as 'individual apps'... to 25,000(?) of apps that are not based on templates?
That is still a significant amount of apps created for a new platform in 1 year (!!)

Anyhoo, my point is that the macro engineering of a platform's ecosystem (financial, social) is much more important than the micro (most often technical) aspect of it.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

It's the second model that matters more than the first matter (most developers and consumers don't care if it's open source or what not). But yes, you got what I said about the second type of openness, licensing of their operating system. As for the rest of your paragraph, that's the thing, right now Apple's business model is working (partially because their competitors are still growing and haven't matured enough yet). But in the future, as say Android is adopted onto more phones (because I doubt Apple will license their portable OSX to whatever phones) the person making business decisions will see..

Hey I can make X amount of dollars selling to Y of Apple's iPhone market.

or

Hey I can make X amount of dollars selling to Y of (say Android or whatever)'s market.

And Android or whatever would have the bigger share of the market. And most companies will choose to target the bigger market. Kinda like how you see Windows versus Apple now. Though a growing number of programs are starting to have both Windows and OSX versions.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Quite funny that Windows with Windows 7 and Apple with 10.6 isn't experiencing the same issues. Only Maemo. Even Android hasn't seen this level of abandonment in what's an established OS to go forward to the upcoming OS.

Sure... the new one has Qt. The new one is a new name. The new one is based on a new CPU.

All f'n flawed. No backwards nothing - sorry, Mer ain't ready for primetime yet. Won't be for a while. I'm impressed with what's been done so far, but it's not for me yet.

Seriously, I'd wish some people would wake up and see how messed up things are. You all can't be all in that much mf'n denial or delusion. Sorry to come off as an asshat; however the lack of support now - I know already, it's DEAD - but maaaan, we're talking about epic fail in past upgrades, software.

Nokia can't even keep Skype onboard. And they paid for that port basically... and Skype needs whatever revenue they can get.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

That's partially why I gave up on the future of the Nokia device (sadly). It has strong community support, but Nokia's support is kinda offputting.. I'm keeping my eye on Mer though =D. My idea is that I'll boot Mer off an SD later, and for the flash memory just run a bare bones Maemo 4.1 OS with minimal installation of programs (just essentials for my usage). My hope is that the tablet will last me long enough till smartphones drop enough in price and Android gets more established. Right now the only thing I'd really want from the tablet is maybe location aware applications. It does everything else I want to a decent enough level (not as fast as modern smartphones but hey, given its age it performs past my expectations). But that requires an active data and GPS connection. While I only turn on the GPS for navigation and I don't have an active data plan =P.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

Do you mean the issue with people waiting to purchase until the next version comes out? If that's what you mean, I think MS is experiencing that issue. MS has seen a big drop in profits, big drop in stock price recently.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

MS saw a drop in profits before leading into Win7 announcements/beta. The perception of the "Works in Vista" was the downfall. In fact, MS just saw its first decline in profits since it's inception some 35 years ago. Nokia can't say that.

What I'm talking about is the huge decline in ANY software announced, updated or coming out for the Nokia Maemo. Yet, there's no lack of software coming out for OS X and Windows... now is there?

That's what I mean. Can't see that anything has been updated or come out for this open source platform that's worth mentioning. Besides Tear 0.3.5 getting updated.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I like this community too. If not for this community, I would have chucked my Nokia N810 and 770 at the closest Nokia fanboy with serious anger management issues.

But as it stands... I don't have any updated software that I tend to use - see my aforementioned list.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

If you are arguing that closed-source is a better model than open source, I think you will have a hard time winning that argument. Sure, you can convince yourself that you are right. But there are a lot of really smart people on both sides of the argument. They have each made some really good points.

I think it comes down to what we value. Personally, I value the openness and freedom and other benefits of open source more than I value the marketing-driven and profit-driven new product announcements of commercial software. Often, new features do not really add value. There is change just for the sake of change. It wastes time.

MS and Apple want you to believe that you can't live without the latest product they are selling. It's a trap. Open source, on the other hand, is not trying to manipulate your sense of self worth.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I'm not arguing about closed source versus open source either. In fact, I'll never be drawn into that fruitless argument since I'm being rather specific in my words.

I thought I was very clear. Windows and OS X have no shortage of coming applications despite their upcoming frequent replacements.

It's not a trap. Even with a lengthy lead-in to development, something new should have been in the pipe. And it's not. Nothing came from this last iteration of software. Nada.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

You won't find the answer in the technical nature of these things. What you're doing is similar to taking a brick off a building, and trying to understand the 'beauty' of the building by looking at that single brick. What you need to do is step back, and look at the big picture.

- Who will be using the system? What's in it for them?
- Who will develop for it? What's in it for them?
- Who will be maintaining the infrastructure? What's in it for them?

@MountainX: Not all hyped products are bad, so long as you can see through the hype and judge the value of the product for yourself. I see many people use this flawed logic, labeling everything that is 'popular' or 'hyped' or 'closed' to be 'bad' without really weighing the true value of the product.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I was speaking from a philosophical perspective regarding the way the whole system of marketing (required by industrial capitalism) works to further entrench humanity in the trap of the false self. (Part of the false self is deriving our self value from products, and that's what marketing/hype is all about.) I'm probably way out of line for even writing this stuff on a tech site, so feel free to ignore me. And I do agree that there are plenty of useful products -- I probably buy way too many of them :)

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

There's been enough time for the bricklayers to build something.

I'm a software developer (of sorts - Adobe Flex/RIA dev) and it just didn't happen with this product in this iteration.

See, you're asking questions about software that came with the device. So Nokia knew what was up from the beginning. Skype... no updates since it's inception. Gizmo, one point upgrade since the beginning. Evince, one update since OS 2007. Xournal, one (if not two) dot upgrades since the beginning. Fring, no updates since its release. Map - one update. Modest, one update, perhaps two - counting Diable. Browser - no real updates, in fact it's in a dead-end fork. Flash player - no update. RTComm - a beta release that's not been updated for a while despite being broken and the community making patches and ways around those limitations.

All of those came with the N810 or were available from day one. What question is there to answer? Who's using the system? The same people that Nokia thought the aforementioned software would apply. Nokia can't be that wrong, can they?

Now, the heroes of updating since? Tear. Each iteration has exploded in usability to the point I fire it up before anything else. The Home apps - they work awesome, updates... great. Mauku - love the updates to the point I started to use it to start off using Twitter using only it in the beginning. Pidgin... I would have continued to use it, but switched to Fring... but they were frequent on the updates until recently.

Yeah, sad... that my list of heroes is that lacking.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

@gerbick: Oh, I completely agree with you about how the nokia tablets seems like a (left for) dead end product ever since its inception. I didn't stay with the platform for long, though I still have an N800 somewhere around my gadgets pile..

My remark was for the open-source defenders out there whom overlook everything else (that matters more than code license).

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

I can't be bothered to argue about the open source community too much simply because without it, my N810 would be dead to me.

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

@gerbick: i understand your sentiment. but I don't think any remarks we make in threads like this will affect their movement much ;)

It's much simpler when things can be quantified and predicted by financial means, don't they :D

Re: Perfect time to release Maemo 5.
 

@gerbick

The N8XX are dead I wouldn't even bring them up in an argument anymore. Mer is the future for updates to the N8XX line. Nokia has it's eyes on the future. Nokia never pushed the tablets as a mainstream device. The only place I ever saw advertising for them in a large public place was the Boston, Logan airport. I think Nokia feels it's better to cut your ties with the past when your user base is relatively small, instead of trying to formally bridge the two devices and half support both.

The tablets are and were a testbed to see where Nokia could go with this technology. Up until the 770 know one would have tried to put a desktop like Linux distro into such a small device. The problem with that is Nokia has had to grow the technology which is why things are fluid on the OS side. Think of where bluez is now versus 2 years ago.

I'm sure Nokia could have embedded Linux (Palm Pre) and wrote an app API on top of that "hides" Linux underneath. So they could play musical chairs with the underlying subsystems. I think in the end Nokia doesn't really want to be in the OS game but they had to mature Linux enough on mobile platforms. And if you look at where this is going, Nokia is moving in that direction. They will have a mobile Linux OS that is mostly open source (kind of like Android but more so).

Nokia only gets one chance to get the next tablet right. Reading the tech blogs you would think Nokia is getting ready to close their doors. The N97 didn't have a great reception so the N9XX needs to be something truly new and imaginative to show where Nokia is heading on the high end.

So given the current market conditions and the products on the market. Releasing today or next month doesn't buy you anything if the software doesn't at least match what's out there now and up the ante?