Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

I read this article and it talked about nokia bringing smartphones to the mass market.

So what does this mean? I think we can all see smart phones being commonplace and society moving more and more towards a "connected" society.

But when it is a commodity, where does the value come from and how does this change the landscape?

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

I don't know... these days, when I read about "smartphones", I have the same feeling I have when reading the term "web 2.0": I don't think the term describes anything that actually exists.

While "web 2.0" is a emperor's new clothes kind of thing, it's the other way round with smartphones.... The word used to have a meaning once. When I got my first cell phone, a smartphone was something that offered PIM-functionality, maybe even had built-in spreadsheet or rudimentary word processing features.

After a while, when each and every phone had a calendar and a application for taking notes, the meaning of the word changed. Until recently, it was defined as a phone that you can install and run applications on.

This definition became useless when masses of Java applications invaded even the cheapest handsets. Today, different language variants of wikipedia offer contradictory definitions and it's all a big mess.

The only thing I believe makes a smartphone today is its price. Is it more than €400? Then it's a smartphone. (Remember the crippled functionality of the first iPhone? Every S40 could do more. Still, because of its price, it was labeled "smartphone").

So, when Nokia says it will bring smartphones to the masses.... WTF are they talking about? Bringing more functionality to the average phone? People don't even use what's there. So what else could they mean? Right. Making the average phone more expensive. "Smartphones" are about price.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

Smartphone is a marketing term, nothing more.

There were phones, that were simply voice devices. The introduction of SMS/MMS made them data and voice devices. The introduction of WAP/Internet made them better data devices. They still do voice.

If you take the definitions/approach that I took in this article, then the idea of Symbian devices moving down-market makes sense in respect to the kinds of margins that carriers get from devices that have better-than-simple wireless data capabilities. Also, with those more advanced platforms, you get the ability to create and bundle more services which can be sold, further making the platform - a smarpthone plus services - a better source of revenue than something that's just a can-to-can vociebox.

*Its the latter definition of a smartphone that shows the integration of Nokia (logistics, support, marketing) + Ovi (connectivity, services) + Maemo (processes, devices, operating system technologies, users) in the upcoming field of platform-enabled connected device experiences (what the bundle would be called, I'm not sure yet, but "platform enabled connected device experiences" will totally be the definition of it).

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

I think they just mean that every mass-market phone will be able to buy stuff from Ovi. Nothing deeper.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

Or the fact that smartphone level hardware has become cheap enough to be implimented on lower mid-range pricing. For example, all the new 5xxx Symbian phones from Nokia.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

That means, that unlike the N900, the N9x0's target group won't be linux geeks and tech lovers, but rather the current iphone target group (using capacitive screen & everywhere portrait mode).

Nokia hopes that apple relaxes and does not bring another updated iphone. If they won't & nokias plan works out, they will have a Nokia N9x0 with all the features people know from the iphone PLUS the maemo web experience which is unbeatable in the mobile sector atm.

And those 2 factors combined make the mass market buy N9x0 to replace their (at that point) outdated iphones.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

Nothing new, tough. S40-devices for €99 (released in 2008) can buy from the Ovi Store. So... Whatever. It doesn't matter much in the end, it's only marketingbabble.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

Hey guys, here are my thoughts:

I totally agree with this, because these individuals are the driving force behind the market, they are the "focus group." These are the individuals mostly buying the "apps", and they are the ones defining what a "smartphone" should be capable of doing. Unfortunately the tech lovers and geeks (including myself) are a niche group, subsequently making them the minority in the market.

This too, is also true imo. I think this is evidenced by Nokia's commitment to expand S60 down the pipeline to more devices. However, even the average user who once barely used their phone for nothing other than calls, sms, and mms are demanding more functionality out of their devices simply because of advances in tech and a surge in social networking. These individuals now want to also check email, browse the web, log into Facebook, and etc. on the go. Also, I think it is the thought of "having" a device that can perform all these features regardless of how often they use these features drives people to want a "smartphone". I know many people who have these devices and never reach 30% of the devices potential. Ive met Iphone owners who have never even loaded a single mp3 onto the device (let alone even thought of it) and barely use it to browse the web. Its the simple fact they own the device that satisfies them.

Just my thoughts. Thanks.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

The value of any device is almost never in the hardware. Do you care (do you even know, could you even find out) what your carrier's hardware architecture looks like? No. You care about the service it does (or doesn't) deliver.

With "smartphones" the device itself becomes a commodity, as you point out. As the current results of the poll point out, it is the software you can install and run on the phone that provides the added value which causes a person to pick one phone over another.

This has already changed the landscape. When the iPhone was introduced there was no iPhone app store, there was not even a general smartphone app store concept. The iPhone app store, much more than the iPhone hardware, has defined what this generation of smartphones needs to provide. Defining the next paradigm shift, whether it is Google's Android linked to cloud computing or Nokia's Maemo linked to open source, is the challenge.

Re: Dumbing Down Smartphones
 

an example of bringing smartphones to the mass's is todays announcement 160 euro for a sim free s60 device with 5MP camera http://conversations.nokia.com/2009/...lide-unveiled/