We've heard the argument a million times here too: If you don't like the N900, just don't buy it and stop *****ing about it.

Some people disagree with this and I ran into a pretty eloquent comment about it on reddit. Here's the tl;dr:

"If you want a feature X on a platform, *****ing about X en masse is an effective way to hurt the company just enough for it to provide X for you. So, *****ing is a good negative reinforcement."

I didn't write this, so you should be aware that I'm just reiterating and linking to it.

The thread does make one very good example though: When Sony had its rootkit -fiasco, it wasn't enough to just not buy Sony's products - we had to raise hell (and awareness) about it and only then did they agree to pull the functionality alltogether.

Same goes, I think, for the N900 (since it's the product I own): If there's something fundamentally wrong about it, it's by no means useless to ***** about it.

Here's the link:

http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/c...t_dont_buy_it/

Maybe the main problem here is this:

Maemo is organization and it is sponsored by Nokia BUT it's not official support forum. YES there are people (including myself) who find helping people fun thing to do, but then again this is not official Nokia forum. Basically based on freewill and people doing stuff without getting any pay.

So I understand, as my self being one of "whiners" now and then that people like to vent their frustration here (for me it's because I find some people just not getting business behind this, it's not after all only what they want), but on the other hand it's bit twisted because these people here do not have nothing to do with core of maemo. Some of Nokia employees probably read this forum, but what I have noticed after having conversation with some of coders that they pretty much agree with me but everything comes down to business and bosses (who don't always understand what competitors are doing and what customers are expecting. Have limited resources. Have strong opinions about certain functionalities of platform: "Calendar should not be even done because it's not our business", terrible example but you got point of some dinosaur boss who has lost the track of market).

But in away I agree that giving bit punch back to people who think some aspects of this thing are amazing makes good balance. Of course this is AMAAAAZING thing to use if you haven't touched competitors devices. And on the other hand amazing means so different things to different people.

One thing that N900 project managers didn't probably realize is this:
Young people who want to be always connected and enjoy social media are also doing work/business. And this is where N900 doesn't always fit. It's mainly just entertainment developers platform with play, but when you start to compare it to Nokia's E-series it just lacks too much of stuff. SO people who try to use it in business environment are mostly doomed to bang their head against wall if they are not already familiar with getting hands dirty and doing "work" on their freetime.

More

Generally about feedback. I´m rather pessimistic person and find myself too often whining, but then again when I talk about my small little problems i find it really often that people agree but don't find it too big problem. Here lies the really important thing that companies do not always realize (expecially here in Finland land of modest consumers and companies, maybe some war time legacy that makes people think that you should be happy that you even got food). People may seem to be pleased but they are not! When they test competitors device they might find something that functions better or has some functionalities that they didn't even know that they were missing. It's constant race and companies themselves should be ones who constantly raise the level what to demand from themselves. Passive customer feedback is not enough you have to really dig it up and one way to find this feedback that is in deep is to listen bit more customers who demand the most (read whine). Those are the ones who do know where markets are developing and what to do next.

.edit
But after all this is rather wrong forum to whine, but on the other hand Nokia is clearly communicating through bugzilla and brainstorm asking feedback so I´m not surprised that feedback hit's TMO also.

..edit
This is old but good:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk
Yes it's like that today and you have to live with it

exactly. what's the point to whine to thousands of these people and hope the couple nokia employers here will react.

there is a time and place for everything, tmo isn't the place for whining no matter what the time is.

e: I myself use hours per week to packagetesting. I get no credit for it here (except karma) and all I can read from tmo is constant whine, btching, rants, provocative threads.

I paid pretty big premium from my N900 (about 630eur), and I have received no money for any of my work contributed to maemo.org.

then there comes one guy who rants something, says the device is no good (and therefor implies we all use shitty devices), writes at aggressive tone, .... Is that a reward from the work I've done? Then atleast the reward comes at least once a week

I use my n900 on a daily basis and if it was not for people like you volunteering your time then the n900 would be of limited use.

I want to say thank-you ossipena for all your efforts.

If you anyone is unhappy with their n900 then follow ossipena's example and do something positive about it.

thanks for this, now I can read at least a dozen new rant threads without a problem

I agree that the community is doing a fantastic job with keeping the N900 torch burning. Without them, Nokia would have (almost) nothing.

However, the original argument wasn't that Nokia would read the biatching and moaning on here and directly react to that by fixing the N900 - but rather that a sufficient amount of moaning would make potential buyers reconsider their purchase, thus prompting Nokia to do one or many of the following:

* Work harder to get the updates out more quickly
* Inform us in a more efficient way about the status of updates, next and future ones.
* Realize that their otherwise good product is generating a lot of lost sales, since it's lacking in some areas that could be fixed. (Wishful thinking, I know).
* Support the community in new ways (I have to admit their support it very good now, if you look at all the tutorials and api documentation that can be found)
* Fix ovi store and work more closely with companies developing for the N900 (weatherbug, sygic, rovio, makers of the roller coaster game) to speed up application delivery to the store.

You may be right in saying that tmo is the wrong forum for this, but I know of no other forum with active discussion about the N900, so it's just simple logic that all whining will concentrate to this place.

The bottom line is that some people - perhaps rightly - feel that whining is more productive than just silently fading away. At least they feel they've done something. I try not to whine too much, but I certainly speak my mind when something is bothering me.

Having said that, my heartfelt thanks to the community. I don't blame any of you for any of the possible shortcomings the N900 has.

that's where the problem lies: tmo is mainly for people who already own the product. Rants here probably don't end up to possible customers eyes.

so you probably get zero attention from people who are buying the device here. I claim that a single comment at engadget will get you further than creating 10 threads here.

You forgot one:

* Have them to realize that the NIT product line isn't breaking even, and just quit.