5 Things Apple Needs To Learn From Nokia
The second part to my previous post telling what the Finnish giant needs to pick up from Cupertino turns the tables, and offers Apple a few things that I think they should learn from Nokia in regards to mobile phone. When comparing two different OS’s, I think it’s important to point out the strengths and weaknesses of each one, rather than simply declaring a winner based on my own personal preferences. I know several people who flat out prefer the iPhone, whereas I also know several people who think that alot of it is rubbish and prefer the S60 way of life. There’s nothing wrong with that, they’re just analyzing their personal preferences and uses and going off that.
Hopefully fanboys on both sides of the fence recognize that I’m not saying one is better than the other, so let’s not have a flamewar bust out in the comments, please. Without further ado, here’s the list of things that this Guru thinks Apple needs to pick up from Nokia in the future.
1. Unlocked - I have an AT&T SIM card, and yet it *still* took a few days of downloading older firmware, secret button presses, and a host of other nonsense just to be able to use my existing AT&T SIM card in this thing (I wasn’t going to sign a new contract just to test the thing). The notion of having to ‘activate’ a GSM phone is absurd, and really puts a damper on the iPhone. I realize there are business and money motivators behind it, but it simply has to go. You’re not making any friends with it.
2. Bluetooth - I know you’re not a fan of Bluetooth, really. You’ve never put it in the iPods, and you *barely* stuck it in the iPhone (headset profiles only don’t count). Let’s see some FTP, DUN, and A2DP, please. It won’t kill you, I promise. You can also sync via Bluetooth, in case you weren’t fully aware of that. That way, I can simply walk into range of my computer and it starts syncing, rather than having to sacrifice another USB port for the dock. (But DON’T do away with the dock. Keep the option)
3. Development Community - Nokia has Forum Nokia, which is designed to help developers get everything they need to develop applications. There’s an active forum there, with conversations between real developers, making sure that it’s relatively easy to get involved, and plenty of tools to help you out. I realize the SDK is coming out, and that’s a step, but thus far, it’s only been released to a few select companies. It needs to be readily available to any and all.
4. Standard ports - It’s ok to use the Dock Connector, but only because it charges/data at the same time (and really you should look into moving to microUSB, but I can look past this). The 3.5mm might as well be a proprietary port, as ’standard’ as it is. Sure, it’s the right size, and theoretically, you can use any 3.5mm jack in it, but since you recessed it, we now have either 1. use YOUR earphones in it or 2. BUY a separate adapter. Both characteristics of a proprietary port. Had you included the adapter in the box, you could have gotten away with this.
5. Presentation - Why on earth would you make such a nice, attractive packaging, with a black and silver phone, and then toss those tired old white accessories in there? It totally throws the whole thing off. If you’re going for presentation, you’ve GOT to match things correctly, Apple. The iPhone in a matte black dock would look SO much better on the desk than oddly placed in the bright white thing.
So the new guy can still pick up a few tricks from the old dog, if they want to play ball. I do realize that the iPhone is Apple’s first phone to market, but they’ve still got alot to learn.
Points 1 and 3 are the things that I’d like to see fixed first… Point 3, as you mentioned, will probably fix itself in a couple of months, and Point 2 may never happen, as syncing via WiFi will probably come first.
Thanks for such a nice comparison information.
Point two will happen in a fashion - the next version of Bluetooth is WiFi…
Jan 14th, 2008 at 6:00 am
[...] Making the list of five things Apple should learn from Nokia are: providing unlocked handsets, opening bluetooth connectivity options, fostering a development community, moving to standard ports and, surprisingly, making more of the presentation of the iPhone package. It is interesting to look at both lists from Ricky to see his take on the ups and downs of both devices and what room they still have to grow. [...]