no, really

I think I keep coming back to this post, and I’m not sure why. As anyone who knows me already knows, I’m reasonably satisfied with my phone. It works splendidly, and still gets the “wow that’s thin” comments I enjoy so much. I do wish I had a more functional device, but one that’s *actually* functional, none of this flash-bang stuff that’s all fluff and no substance.

Naturally, the closest thing to what I’m looking for is packaged in schmancy Apple design, but it’s only a reasonably close approximation. The two reasons I stayed away from the iPhone were 1) potential reliability issues in v1.0, and 2) price. I personally know a few people who got the phone the instant it came out, and still maintain the facade of elation.

But, just as I suspected, the honeymoon is over.

After the wow of the slick and prettiness has worn off, and the pixie dust has settled, you gotta ask yourself “does it really do what I want?” Fred says “nope.” I figured as much. When I’ve got a big purchase, I usually delay as long as I can to be absolutely sure it’s what I want and/or need. I was tempted by the iPhone, but the price tag turned me off from day 1. That and hassling with at&t for their contract bs.

Fred has some odd requests, like that it shouldn’t have a phone. He’s clearly approaching this mobile device thing from the other direction. While I’m a huge fan of using things *other* than the telephone to communicate over the course of my day (particularly loving using my bluetooth headset with iChat), when it comes down to it, I believe the phone has its place. Sure, Skype offers phone-like features, but after last week’s mysterious Skype outage, who do you trust more?  Besides, I think Fred’s opinions are colored by the build-your-own-mobile-device thing he’s invested in.
As everyone is, I’m curious to see if and what Google is producing.  I’m guessing it’ll be very g-app centric (which is fine), and there must be some ability for Google to stick their ubiquitous advertising in front of the user (otherwise, why would they waste their time?).  If we haven’t heard anything about it, I wonder - is it carrier neutral?  Is it only wi-fi?

I’m sure it’s going to be at least a year or so before a device really entices me to plop down a few hundred.

but someone heard my cry for a beta phone.  I can’t share any details (of course), but I guess I can share that it’s Windows Mobile based (which still sucks), and it’s got a very new “feature” that I haven’t been able to test yet.  I’m looking forward to seeing what it can do.  The device itself is pretty nifty, though - it feels right, and it’s a candybar - light and rugged.

Between being forced to use my old Nokia while in Indiana, and starting with this once I got back, I find that I’m kind of missing my Samsung.  It’s sitting here in pieces looking like it needs some triage.  Sigh.  Maybe I’ll learn to like the new beta device in time…

For the last month, I’ve been patiently awaiting the latest gmail feature: POP Mail Fetcher . Now I’m getting impatient.

Where’s my pony??!

Until Nokia calls me back I had to find something that would keep me happy in the meantime. I’ve been really amazed by Samsung’s products lately, and impressed by their corporate stance on the brand: they want to be like BMW. And I like BMWs. Therefore, via the transitive property…

So I poked around to find the “best” and the “coolest” that Samsung had to offer. Applying my need for a decent camera, a candybar style and such, I hunted down the one I wanted, and acquired it: SGH-X820

I did this because I figure… if I don’t change my plan, I don’t really need a PDA thingy. I can still do most of what I need with this phone, and still - going over data and sms limits of my plan, it’ll be cheaper than switching.

Having spent the weekend in Boston with my new phone, I’m VERY pleased. It works just the way I want it to all the time, and it’s sexy as hell. I mean… thinner than a SLVR, and *not* a Motorola? Nokia: watch out!

I’m not one to grovel and beg, so I won’t do it now. But here’s what I’ve got to say, Nokia: get over yourself. Once upon a time, you were the belle of the ball. You had pretty gowns and a rockin… set of features. You did it snappily and cutely without looking like an anime-loving Japanese schoolgirl with her STD clinic on speed dial. You had grace and efficiency that is trademark of your get-the-job-done-with-few-words Scandinavian heritage.

But then you got a little narcissistic. You were lauded for wonderful ideas and innovative interface designs, and while you were bowing, the world kept going. RIM is eating your lunch with one of those giant silver serving sporks and a pair of wooden salad tongs. Motorola has the worst interface on the planet, but they slap a shiny skinny cover around it and blammo, you’ve got a household name. So, Nokia, where’d you go?

I know you’ve still got your foot in the game, but you’ve gotta keep going. The E61 was a great start… it’s just too bad that Cingular forces you to your knees until you come out with the E-series’ idiot cousin the E62. Yes, yes, I hear you… if you want to play ball in the US, you’ve gotta play by their rules. Isn’t it about time that changed?

Terminate your contracts with the providers and open a store next to every Starbucks in North America. See how they like it when people sign a contract to get the “free phone” and pop their SIM into one of your hot new toys.

Better yet, get people who actually use your phones to beta test them in the US. There is so much diversity of users in terms of habits and signal strength and travel, etc. in the US, that it’s a great edge-case market for testing. Anyone can prove that their phone works perfectly at 72F at sea level at 10:30am standing 100 feet from a tower that’s serving up all the network you could want. But what about those people in mountainous regions? And those of us whose municipalities would rather we stick to smoke signals than put up obscene towers just so we can find out what color socks Tawni is wearing to her soccer game while we drive down the road in our Escalade doing 90 mph.

Better yet, ask me! I’m a great tester. I use my phone daily for all sorts of tasks, and I never bang it on the desk to make it go faster. I travel from the suburbs to Manhattan routinely, by car or by train. I work with computers and the Internet ALL DAY, and have friends with all sorts of other devices and networks that I exchange txts, emails, mms, etc with. Besides, I’m sick of shelling out hundreds of bucks and signing contracts that describe the term in Epochs just to play with a piece of plastic that just makes a phone call.

You’ve (hopefully) already read my wishlist of features in a phone. How about you get to drawing, and give me a call when you come up with something. I’ll let you know if it’ll win hearts like Jennifer Garner, or just please loyal fans like Anne Hathaway. They both look good in a dress, but which do you want on your arm?

so we’re most of the way through a slew of work on the house. A wall came down, and there is all new paint, and new moldings n stuff, and it looks fantastic. We also got a bunch of new high hats in, which brings me to the point.

I love my dimmers. Like, really love my dimmers. They’re not super geeked-out like x10 or anything, but they have two things that are kind of exciting to me: little green lights that move, and cool extra little fade in/out features. I look forward to going in and out of the rooms that have said dimmers just so I can play with them. I even got another one for the bedroom lights that has a remote control!

That makes me a geek. A very very happy geek.

I’ve had the same phone now since July of 2003. ‘How’ you ask? How can I - someone who is pretty demanding of their devices - possibly have had the same phone for two and a half years??

Well, first of all, it was *exactly* the device I wanted. Something that I didn’t have to sign a contract for (thank you, eBay), something that had Bluetooth (which was rare back then), a camera (and it took video: ooooo), mp3 player, email stuff… scads of features. The best part? It’s a candybar.

I like candybars. The chocolate kind with peanuts and caramel, and the digital kind that you put up to your ear and say “hello.”

It does all kinds of stuff, and it fits in my pocket.

Fastforward to the present. All kinds of high-speed data networks are growing like mold on rocks, new devices come out every couple weeks that routinely beat the competition. Heck, it’s probably possible to sit with your kr-ak-jakz-eo thingamabob on the top of a mountain in the andes and send your cousin in Sheboygan an e-mail about seeing him your sister’s bar mitzvah the next day.

With all this wonderment, why can’t I find one that I like? Reason: they all suck. It’s a multiple choice quiz:

Which one of these faults would you like in device ‘x’?
a) suck-ass battery life
b) little-to-no camera
c) qwerty keypad requires surgeon and micron etched needle
d) requires restart at random and totally inconvenient intervals
e) 2-year commitment to service of unknown quality

Here’s what I would like:
* Pocketable form factor
* usefuly sized keypad, preferably querty
* display of reasonable size
* camera that takes recognizable pictures
* reliable high-speed network
* crashes less than once a week
* bluetooth with a2dp
* at least somewhat attractive. gets a date to the prom, but doesn’t need to be crowned queen.

Here’s what I can live without:
* wifi (if I’m in range of a wifi network, chances are I’m near a computer that would be waaay better at doing anything requiring a wifi connection)
* streaming music videos with ultra bing-blingy polymorphic ring-picture-vid messages
* anything remotely related to windows

So, please, Mr. R&D, make me that damned phone. Or at least ask me for some opinion on what to make. Trust me, if you follow my suggestions, you will have that better mouse trap that most of the population is yearning for.

For the time being, I’m torn between the Treo 680 with Cingular and the BB 8703e over at Verizon. I’m sure everyone has an opinion on both, which doesn’t help me much. Maybe I’ll just flip a coin…