Originally Posted by gerbick

So we know that Peter and Quim might not be the people to ask to get this done, but whom do we ask to get this started? Or at least to get some traction?

Originally Posted by mikecomputing

send a email to stephen.elop@nokia.com and make clear your intrests and atleast hope he gives some damn info!

(yes I am serious and I know its not his board at the end, but would be intresting to see if he willing to answer whom?

Greetings Mr. Elop:

I'm unfortunately sure this e-mail will invariably not be replied to mostly because you are a very busy individual; understandably so for the CEO of Nokia. However if anything, I wanted to not leave any stone unturned in my quest to represent not only my own wishes and whims but also the statements of quite a few individuals at the Talk.Maemo.Org (TMO hereon) community that Nokia has in the past and presently sponsors - home of where the majority of the 300+ Nokia N950 owners have memberships either originally or have connections to in one form or another.

Now, to business... due to the extremely limited production of the Nokia N950, we were forced to wait to for the Nokia N9. A lot of us are located in the US, avid users that currently utilize Qt/QML and while we're learning new tools - I have prior Microsoft .NET development experience and currently own a Dell Venue Pro and awaiting a Nokia Windows Phone 7 (WP7 hereon) device, my attention is currently on the Nokia N9. As it stands, vendors like Amazon and Expansys still have "coming soon" on their pre-order pages, but it is now shipping in many countries, including (soon) Mexico.

I have connections there, can easily fly there. But the question is now around what would happen if I needed warranty work. Where would I send it? Who would perform work on it? How could I reliably even purchase one just in case I didn't or couldn't take a trip to Mexico. And without a Canadian or US date; I am left in the dark yet still part of a big community that has had prior successes with obtaining information and/or devices from Nokia.

Thus I provide my proposal (finally).

Why not have a TMO purchase program? A device purchasing program where we could purchase directly from Nokia the Nokia N9 device finish up our development and/or transition to .NET as well as just for personal usage the Nokia N9. Sell to us directly - a tentative count has netted 30+ people that would buy the device that responded to me directly, there's another 100+ people that would purchase one directly. There's no longer a Nokia USA or Nokia Canada eCommerce store; so we'd gladly pay for shipping from wherever to ensure we get a proper device from Nokia without having to hand over our money in faith to a third party that might cheat us out of our money, sell us a counterfeit device or ultimately, we give all of our money to anybody but the originator of the device; in this case, all the money would go to Nokia.

I also propose that we set up just one individual, international support center. That would negate the need to train people in the US or Canada for support. You'd be selling to a captive audience that wants the device, know their way around the MeeGo/Harmattan environment and we're quite self-sustaining (read: we will answer the questions amongst us, provide the solutions to our peers as we've done with the Nokia N900 and Maemo 5).

Forgive the length of this e-mail, but if anything, I'm offering my proposal not only for myself - if you were to say "Sure, send me the money right now, I'll send you one" I'd do it post haste - but I also speak for an entire community that are in areas where we'd be willing to travel to different countries just to purchase one whereas right now, we cannot. We'd rather give Nokia the money and not pay a premium with Expansys or deal with even more limited quantities via Amazon. We're Nokia fans, some for over a decade.

We'd rather see Nokia prevail. And we're also developers that are transitioning our tools and skills and to do so, we require devices. We're also users that are seeking multiple experiences before we settle down to just one experience. And if anything, we're a group of individuals that are saying "take our money". You have a captive audience at TMO and we are willing to pay for the experience(s) that Nokia will deliver. Harmattan, MeeGo and WP7. But limiting our access should not be part of the process.

Please consider a grass roots, TMO community device purchase program. We understand the risks, we hope that you will be able to source a method that will cost you very little time and manpower, and I hope that you consider this fully. Thank you in advance.

I hope this message finds you well. Take care and good luck with all of your future endeavors.

Originally Posted by Stonik

Is Sebastian Nyström still working as the head of Nokia's MeeGo team (if it still exists)?

As they've sent free dev kits to coders, many of the Harmattan applications are being announced in TMO. So people keep coming to the forum, check out the new software but can't buy the device? If Nokia isn't willing to help, maybe there's a retailer somewhere to give us a hand?

Originally Posted by gerbick

Followed your advice. Sent the following... it's long.



I linked to this thread as well. Will update accordingly.

What kills me... I'd even develop for it. But I got turned down... meh, it happens.

Originally Posted by mikecomputing

OMG! you hint him about TMO and "nokia sponsored project" now you make sure he closes down this site when he see all rumors and whining if he comes here and read those threads of hate.

Originally Posted by abill_uk

This Elop has something to answer too for sure in my opinion.

He is going to lose a hell of a lot of Nokia fans over this.