The last few posts and comments have sparked a good level of discussion on both sides of the Internet Tablets’ future. I’d like to highlight some very good points made to contradict my first critical post and follow-up. Some of these are responses to the comments and some are from direct conversation with other Tablet users.
In the first post, I mentioned the importance of Hulu, NetFlix, and the BBC iPlayer. While these are fantastic developments in new media, very few users would actually require what is essentially a “mobile internet TV” in the purchase decision. Netflix in particular requires a DRM-heavy platform that is contrary to the ideals of the tablets. While it would be “cool” to have those features, they’re not as important as I initially painted them.
In the second post, I mentioned that the hardware requirements are out of line with “reality” but are required. That may not be entirely true either as evidenced by the next realization:
Recently, Nokia’s growing relationship with Facebook has been discussed (link to wsj.com – subscription required) especially in relation to Nokia’s Ovi. This helped me to realize that the marketing of the N97 put the purpose (specifically – a social networking optimized mobile device) ahead of the features. What does that mean to consumers?
I’ve recently seen ads for the Apple iPhone, the Blackberry Storm, Samsung Omnia. They all have something in common: They claim to be the best choice for music, communication, mobile internet, and more. This is all too confusing for the consumer. If the Nokia N97 is marketed as “the perfect phone for social media” and then they tack on stuff like “Multimedia player, camera, keyboard, and a ton of other features” it will be far easier for consumers to picture themselves using it.
Why limit that approach to just the N97? Maemo tablets have a higher resolution display, better keyboard, and (currently) work independently of phones. With a software layer optimized for social networking, the Maemo tablet can potentially be the single greatest non-phone social networking device. Here are some features that could do it:
- Good camera (already promised at OSiM) for photo-video sharing.
- Lightweight photo editing for cropping and posting photos (software only)
- Improved GPS for geotagging and location-aware applications.
- Better CPU (already promised at OSiM) for a faster overall experience
- Social network applications or application layer to speed up status upates, location sharing, and photo/video sharing (software only)
Look at that. It’s a device that people can actually see themselves using for a very popular task and it’s no further from reality than what has already been promised.
Could the next Maemo tablet be “The Facebook Tablet?” Maybe.
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6 Comments
You mention the GPS. Nokia would have to work really hard to manage to produce a worse GPS than they stuffed into the N810.
Social media is about as overrated as the “mobile TV” thing. The world only needs one Facebook (and even that is somewhat questionable). And the streamed video usually comes in crappy quality and with huge delays (both due to Internet bandwidth and inherent limitations).
@bigFlub:
on the hardware side… I thought the problem with the GPS was a software error whereby when the tablet initialised the A-GPS stuff it used the wrong time and this confused the GPS. the subsequent software fix made it much much better. however, it’s still not as good as the latest gen gps receivers.
on the software/maps side, yes, it does suck – I am surprised particularly when nokia maps on S60 phones is actually OK.
hardware: gps needs to be fixed, camera needs to be incorporated, get rid of webcam unless you have the software to back it up. (Skype, Google Video)
software: Facebook app, Myspace app, whatever – i understand that these are web tablets and they can go to those sites, but it does that very slowly. Native apps makes sense to me. I use my iPod Touch for Facebook / Myspace / Brightkite / Twitter – it’s a lot faster than just going to those websites.
The fundmental user interface paradigm for for social networking platforms is the web-browser…
I have a feeling that all the mobile social networking app nonsense is fundamentally missing the point, if the browser experience we better no-one would care if there was an actual local application or just a view throught the browser with some ajax.
The original premise to maemo and the intrnet tablet fundementally was about doing a better browser than you could plausibly do on the phones… Why not actually do that?
To the question posed at the end of the article, the reason why Maemo in its current iteration isn’t a good pitch for this is totally UI/UX driven. Clean up on that end (first from Nokia, then from Maemo Community) and then you get that social networking device that small numbers of folks crow loudly about.