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Does Nokia LifeviNe Even Make Sense?

By The Guru on September 19, 2008

One of the smaller announcements made in conjunction with the Nokia N79 and N85 was that of a new application, dubbed ‘Nokia LifeviNe’ (we’re not sure why the N is capitalized). From the information and screenshots we were given at the launch, it looked like just a prettier, finally renamed version of Nokia SportsTracker. While the application is not actually available (why announce it, then? It’s an app, for pete’s sake), Ms. Jen, who we’ve linked to before, but has now apparently joined on to contribute at DarlaMack.com, has been given the unique opportunity to test drive the new application.

Also, apparently due to some licensing issues, it’s been renamed to just NokiaviNe, so, er, yeah. You can check out plenty of screenshots and thoughts from Ms. Jen over at Darla’s site. If you don’t recall, Ms. Jen was one of the Urbanistas, bloggers whom Nokia sent around the world, armed with an N82 (they actually each had 3-4 devices) loaded up with Nokia SportsTracker, to track their travels and snap pictures and whatnot along the way. Brilliant campaign, since the Nokia N82′s tagline was ‘storytelling rediscovered.’

However, the more I’ve been thinking about this LifeviNe NokiaviNe application, the more I don’t see the point at all. To be clear, I understand what it does: you’re supposed to run it on your phone constantly, and it tracks the path you walk/drive/run/fly/etc. and tags any media (photos, audio clips, videos) with the geographic coordinates using GPS. That way, at the end of your trip, you have a visual trail that you can look back through, etc.

While the application use scenario makes sense for workouts, training, and the like, I can’t see the benefit if I’m traveling. If I’m traveling, I’m likely mobile, right? Obviously. Like, COMPLETELY mobile, relying heavily on my phone for pretty much everything. That means that my battery power becomes an incredibly valuable commodity. It’s different than when I’m out to run errands at home, where I know I’m going to be back near a power source, and for extended periods of time. So….in order to use this application, I’m expected to sacrifice my precious battery life to have an application constantly running in the background that’s constantly using my phone’s GPS receiver, which in turn uses data (cause who doesn’t have A-GPS turned on?), as well as taking my usual amount of photos and videos and whatnot. Right…

My next question, then, is what benefit does this give me? I have a trail that I can post somewhere so that others can see exactly where I walked, where I took my photos, where I caught that hilarious video clip, and even what music I was listening to at the time. How is that a benefit to me? As Ms. Jen points out, I’m not even uploading this to my own server or anything – I’m uploading it to Nokia’s server. Given that I can use Location Tagger, or on most newer Nseries, the built-in geotagging function to tag my photos, which I can then upload to Flickr or Share on Ovi, where I have control, I’m not sure I follow the benefits of LifeviNe NokiaviNe.

Am I off my rocker here, or have you been thinking the same thing? Why, when I’m completely mobile and reliant upon my phone, would I voluntarily sacrifice precious battery power for something that’s only going to benefit a few other people, when I can accomplish mostly the same goal with significantly less battery? More importantly, is it accurate to say that having LifeviNe NokiaviNe running in the background uses more power than running Location Tagger or the geotagging feature?

Hopefully that’s one thing that Ms. Jen can take a look at in her testing.

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The Guru

The Guru, aka Ricky Cadden, started Symbian-Guru.com in November 2006, out of his excitement for the S60 3rd Edition version of Symella. The Guru has used Symbian devices since the Nokia 6620, and is known for his perspective as a power user. You can follow The Guru on Twitter at @Rcadden

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  • http://blog.p4n.net/ Peter Rullmann

    I think it is just a fancier version of SportsTracker. The latter was a beta application to explore what is possible and what people do with it and think about it. Nokia viNe is the polished product that they will ship with all the new handsets and that Nokia will push as a killer app.
    So just because Nokia presents it as something new and important that changes your way of living, I wouldn’t think it is supposed to be turned on all day and tracks your whole life.
    The only thing that changed is that the application is fancier and that its name does not suggest that you should use it for sports.

  • http://blog.p4n.net Peter Rullmann

    I think it is just a fancier version of SportsTracker. The latter was a beta application to explore what is possible and what people do with it and think about it. Nokia viNe is the polished product that they will ship with all the new handsets and that Nokia will push as a killer app.
    So just because Nokia presents it as something new and important that changes your way of living, I wouldn’t think it is supposed to be turned on all day and tracks your whole life.
    The only thing that changed is that the application is fancier and that its name does not suggest that you should use it for sports.

  • http://www.blackphoebe.com/msjen Ms. Jen

    There are two benefits to Nokia viNe as opposed to Location Tagger (which I find unusable both from the UI/UE standpoint & battery life) and ShoZu:

    1) Nokia viNe tracks a path rather than just points and it does it consistently. When I use ShoZu it only gives me a point on the map if I look at my map as a whole on Flickr and ShoZu only seems to import the geo-data about half the time, even when I turn on the phone’s GPS separately. [Hello ShoZu, wakey up-ey. Forgo the obnoxious ads and feeds and give me a moblogging app that works, oh like several versions ago...].

    I like seeing the path for each adventure I take with the photos on the path, rather than a collection of dots. The path(s) over time show when and where I have been somewhere. Where as just a map with dots gives no sense separate journeys to a location.

    2) Nokia viNe, while is in its infancy (not sure if we are alpha or alpha/beta testing), it is usable. I like the interface much better than the SportsTracker app. It finds the GPS easily, without having to switch on the phone’s GPS separately. And best of all, it allows me to choose photos.

    The true test of the future of the Nokia viNe for me is will they offer, in a later version, the ability for me to put in the URL to my blog’s atom script with username & password (like Lifeblog does) and let me send my geo-tagged paths (be it in KML form or other format) along with my EXIF geo-tagged photos so that I can use then use a plugin to create a map to that photo essay (Yes, folks are working on this for Movable Type).

    Whether the mobile app is SportsTracker, Nokia viNe, ShoZu, or Share Online 3.0, I want to be able to mobile blog to my own blog, not a co-promoted hosted service.

  • http://www.blackphoebe.com/msjen Ms. Jen

    There are two benefits to Nokia viNe as opposed to Location Tagger (which I find unusable both from the UI/UE standpoint & battery life) and ShoZu:

    1) Nokia viNe tracks a path rather than just points and it does it consistently. When I use ShoZu it only gives me a point on the map if I look at my map as a whole on Flickr and ShoZu only seems to import the geo-data about half the time, even when I turn on the phone’s GPS separately. [Hello ShoZu, wakey up-ey. Forgo the obnoxious ads and feeds and give me a moblogging app that works, oh like several versions ago...].

    I like seeing the path for each adventure I take with the photos on the path, rather than a collection of dots. The path(s) over time show when and where I have been somewhere. Where as just a map with dots gives no sense separate journeys to a location.

    2) Nokia viNe, while is in its infancy (not sure if we are alpha or alpha/beta testing), it is usable. I like the interface much better than the SportsTracker app. It finds the GPS easily, without having to switch on the phone’s GPS separately. And best of all, it allows me to choose photos.

    The true test of the future of the Nokia viNe for me is will they offer, in a later version, the ability for me to put in the URL to my blog’s atom script with username & password (like Lifeblog does) and let me send my geo-tagged paths (be it in KML form or other format) along with my EXIF geo-tagged photos so that I can use then use a plugin to create a map to that photo essay (Yes, folks are working on this for Movable Type).

    Whether the mobile app is SportsTracker, Nokia viNe, ShoZu, or Share Online 3.0, I want to be able to mobile blog to my own blog, not a co-promoted hosted service.

  • http://nseriesus.com/nokia-daily-news-091908 Nokia Daily News – 09/19/08 | Nokia Daily News

    [...] Symbian Guru – Does NokiaviNe even make sense? [...]

  • http://www.mobilephonesite.net/?p=443 Nokia ViNe – Practical or Pointless?

    [...] logging your photos, videos and listened music, for sharing with the world, while Ricky Cadden asks whether the application makes sense, pointing out that it doesn’t give much that’s new and worrying about possible battery drain [...]

  • http://antoinerjwright.com ARJWright

    for someone who is into microblogging as a career it is weird that yot can’t see that this is basically blogging with location as the thread and not content. One, its automatic. Two, its taking services like jaiku and twitter and making them mobile. It would be better if it used nokia’s mobile web server, but then nokia is a services company so the want to own how you share your info.

  • Viipottaja

    I think its pretty cool and will certainly try it – I travel a lot and leave a part from most of my family – something like this could be quite handy.

    1) On battery – well, one basically knows its going to drain the battery, so one shouldn’t use if one knows one won’t be able to charge relatively soon (not that its that big a problem to get a recharge even when travelling, IMHO) 2) I suspect quite a few people will find it cool to be able to easily track your whereabouts and map your pics and not have to everytime worry about downloading your Shozu’s or whatnot to get sorta the same but not quite (for example, AFAIK, simply geotagging your pics and uploading them to Googlemaps or whatnot does not give you easy access to them later tagged to your trip, and in the order they were taken etc.; it could also start a small phenomenon whereby, I don’t know, e.g. architecture or food or wine enthusiasts will form web networks where they report on their trips to each other 3) Its the first iteration, and in beta at that so it could evolve to something a lot more comprehensive.

  • Viipottaja

    I think its pretty cool and will certainly try it – I travel a lot and leave a part from most of my family – something like this could be quite handy.

    1) On battery – well, one basically knows its going to drain the battery, so one shouldn’t use if one knows one won’t be able to charge relatively soon (not that its that big a problem to get a recharge even when travelling, IMHO) 2) I suspect quite a few people will find it cool to be able to easily track your whereabouts and map your pics and not have to everytime worry about downloading your Shozu’s or whatnot to get sorta the same but not quite (for example, AFAIK, simply geotagging your pics and uploading them to Googlemaps or whatnot does not give you easy access to them later tagged to your trip, and in the order they were taken etc.; it could also start a small phenomenon whereby, I don’t know, e.g. architecture or food or wine enthusiasts will form web networks where they report on their trips to each other 3) Its the first iteration, and in beta at that so it could evolve to something a lot more comprehensive.

  • http://conversations.nokia.com/ charlie

    Folks, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. This is a marketing campaign, not a full-fledged service or app (as was Urbanista Diaries).

    Or at least, that’s what I see.

  • http://conversations.nokia.com charlie

    Folks, let’s not get ahead of ourselves. This is a marketing campaign, not a full-fledged service or app (as was Urbanista Diaries).

    Or at least, that’s what I see.

  • http://www.womworld.com/nokia/4267/nokiavine-%e2%80%93-the-guru-doesn%e2%80%99t-see-the-point/ WOM World / Nokia » Blog Archive – NokiaviNe – the Guru doesn’t see the point

    [...] Over on his site, The Guru himself has posted about the new NokiaviNe service, and he’s not really getting it. [...]

  • Dave Mitchell

    In May I used Sporttracker for this exact purpose. I was logging a solo self sustained cycling tour around Italy. And the biggest problem was indeed battery life. I was using an external AA changer to get me through the day, and even then I had to decide if I was going to try to take a picture or try to finish logging my route. Being in Europe, away from home, I was almost never using the phone as a phone. Just maps, journaling, photos and route tracking. No A-GPS, I’d just wait for a lock. Most times I’d go offline just to save battery life. It worked well enough for me because I had a goal but for average joe…. not likely.

    But it does look nice. It looks like route and map data can be on the same screen, handy for the explorer.

  • Dave Mitchell

    In May I used Sporttracker for this exact purpose. I was logging a solo self sustained cycling tour around Italy. And the biggest problem was indeed battery life. I was using an external AA changer to get me through the day, and even then I had to decide if I was going to try to take a picture or try to finish logging my route. Being in Europe, away from home, I was almost never using the phone as a phone. Just maps, journaling, photos and route tracking. No A-GPS, I’d just wait for a lock. Most times I’d go offline just to save battery life. It worked well enough for me because I had a goal but for average joe…. not likely.

    But it does look nice. It looks like route and map data can be on the same screen, handy for the explorer.

  • http://ifeed.ws/2704/mobile/nokia-vine-practical-or-pointless/ Nokia ViNe – Practical or Pointless? | Shopping – ifeed.ws

    [...] logging your photos, videos and listened music, for sharing with the world, while Ricky Cadden asks whether the application makes sense, pointing out that it doesn’t give much that’s new and worrying about possible battery [...]

  • http://www.symbian-guru.com/welcome/2008/10/ms-jen-proves-nokiavine-might-be-ok.html Ms. Jen Proves NokiaviNe Might Be OK | Symbian-Guru.com

    [...] I issued a challenge for anyone able to use Nokia viNe to test the phone in two scenarios – using the built-in Geotagging feature, and using Nokia viNe. Ms. Jen took me up on the challenge over at DarlaMack.com, and I’m honestly quite surprised to see the results. [...]

  • http://s60blog.com/2008/10/can-nokia-push-its-vine-a-little-more/ Can Nokia Push Its viNe a Little More? | The S60 Blog

    [...] through a handful of alpha testers and I guess its altogether in a whole new dilemma after the Guru saw no point of it in the first place. I rather differ here and see a whole lot of potential in it. [...]

  • http://antoinerjwright.com/ ARJWright

    for someone who is into microblogging as a career it is weird that yot can't see that this is basically blogging with location as the thread and not content. One, its automatic. Two, its taking services like jaiku and twitter and making them mobile. It would be better if it used nokia's mobile web server, but then nokia is a services company so the want to own how you share your info.

  • http://antoinerjwright.com/ ARJWright

    for someone who is into microblogging as a career it is weird that yot can't see that this is basically blogging with location as the thread and not content. One, its automatic. Two, its taking services like jaiku and twitter and making them mobile. It would be better if it used nokia's mobile web server, but then nokia is a services company so the want to own how you share your info.

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