BOSTON, USA

Back in June I stepped down as Editor-in-Chief and handed over the leadership of this site to Phil, in preparation of my eventual departure from the company.

Since then, I have been just another writer on this team, focusing more on my usual “round ups” of links, generating discussions based on articles from elsewhere in the Nokia neighborhood. I’ve also been transferring as much of Nokia Conversations’ culture as I could to Phil, who has been mixing it with his special sauce to take this site and ancillary channels to a new level.

In this final post as a Nokia employee, I’d like to leave some parting words, pointing to things that I think will be major parts of the conversation over the next year, if not longer. These are more my observations, and, at some points, may deviate greatly from the established corporate line. But these comments are more to generate a discussion that I hope lasts a long time.

Care to join me? Then read on.

May the real competitor rise?
There is a great story from Sarah Hrdy, from her studies of langur monkeys in India. Males had harems of females and spent all their time fighting off other males while the “subjugated” females spent their time surreptitiously mating with other males. The upshot was, the male was utterly distracted by fending off too many competitors. [I was a biologist, originally, so excuse the bio-example.]

Likewise in business. There are only so many fronts Nokia can expand into and compete. Therefore, even if it hits many markets, it focuses on a small amount of competitors (friendly or not), such as Google, Apple, RIM, and Facebook.

Of course, it’s not that clear if the real competitors are any of these giants, as readers of the Innovator’s Dilemma know. While Facebook and Google simmered for a while before shooting up, and RIM and Apple have been around for a long time and suffered a few near-deaths before hitting their current success streak, companies like Twitter and YouTube (and products like netbooks) sprang up out of almost nothing.

Is there a little David out there that will seriously challenge Nokia-Goliath in a way the above-named have not?

Brand momentum
And with Nokia’s shift in competitors, what happens to the brand, ranked fifth largest by Interbrand? Long-term and steady, Nokia has been building its brand around Connecting People for a very long time. Will the brand hold up to the new world order that Nokia is entering?

Also, how might the strength and assurance of the brand hinder growth in areas where Nokia is actually a challenger? Can Nokia remain big and humble, complex and friendly?

Environment and people
Last year I asked readers to re-evaluate what business Nokia was in, looking at major expertise areas that the company built in pursuit of becoming the largest mobile device manufacturer.

One area that makes me proud and continues to amaze me is led by the environmental and social responsibility teams at Nokia. On the one hand, it’s just being ethically good, but on the other hand, Nokia is proving you can make positive changes that are actually good for the company, too.

I wonder if Nokia will ever spin off an Environmental consulting group for other industries. That’d be one more business area Nokia leads in.

Portfolio integration
One area that captures a large part of my thinking process is trying to understand Nokia’s strategy for accumulating talent and technologies from small companies. Nokia has been purchasing companies with a regularity not seen since the heady 90s. It will be important that these new companies rapidly become integrated into the solution-making processes at Nokia. But that they also need to rapidly transform Nokia’s culture into what made these companies so innovative in the first place that Nokia bought them.

Designing a way out of a paper bag
With Nokia’s new Solutions division coming to life tomorrow, Nokia needs to do more than change the name plates on the org chart, but change the nature of the leaders inside the company as well. It is great to know that Nokia indeed brings folks from outside the company at high levels. OK, so they are usually Finns, or ex-Nokians, or both, but even a prodigal son, tempered in the real world, can bring transformative magick to a core division at Nokia.

Design will have to be stronger in making sure what ends up in users’ hands. I do not think new ways of designing are needed, as the design teams are overflowing with amazing people. But the company really needs to make sure that what the design wizards dream up, Nokia can, once again, deliver.

I have seen changes in the past two years that point in that direction. I hope the new folks coming in over the next few weeks bring another round of fresh energy and determination to Nokia.

Product obsessions
Based on the readership of this publication, hardware products still dominate everyone’s mind-set. There have been some few who keep warning that the days of hardware are over and that software is where it is at (and, looking at Nokia’s activity of the past 3 years, Nokia knows that too). But, the trend-setters and industry observers alike are looking for technical leadership from Nokia.

Yet there are those who are dissatisfied with the Nokia Booklet 3G, the Nokia N900, and the Nokia N97. I think these people are passionate about the possibilities of tech and passionate about Nokia and, like over-achiving parents, scold Nokia when it didn’t deliver the stars.

That’s fine. It’s a game one can never win or end. And it’s a game that Nokia is willing to keep on playing, finding its way to a place that excites it and its customers.

Waving good-bye
Nokia Conversations is now part of that journey and I am happy to be given the opportunity to help build it. I remain passionate about Nokia and experience the same love-hate elation-frustration that all you passionate readers have.

I, once again, want to thank you for a fun ride. Some of you have even been with me for even longer than this publication.

I hope that we may meet again.

Image from Phil of Ottowa

I’ve mentioned a few times the disconnect between what a designer hopes and what a user gets. I’ve collected a few recent links that ask questions around design issues, such as adding apps to smartphones that are close to app-complete, juxtaposition of conflicting expectations, good enough being the enemy of perfect, and a design scorecard proposal.

Read on to stimulate those brain cells. These are some really good articles I’ve collected for you today.

Clashing expectations
The folks at Near Future Laboratory have a great article on urinals. I know it might seem far-fetched, but a public style urinal in a private bathroom set the author off on an exploration of our expectations of public and private spaces and how meanings of things get munged in different contexts.

A designer must not just think of the technical and physical bits of their product, but also take into consideration how people might want to take it into use. Or, you get, as the author says “communications devices that end up being more like something an astronaut would use than what a normal, everyday person would introduce into their everyday practices of connecting to other people.”

All that mental stimulation from a urinal.

Adding when nothing more needs to be added
And speaking of astronaut phones, Steve Litchfield has a quite interesting article on how, despite all the hooplah around app stores, folks, for the most part, could get by with a few (he said at least 3) apps beyond the full set that come with most smartphones.

Steve did a quick Twitter survey and then charted out the responses. Two interesting observations: 1) there are indeed a set of three key apps that many folks used; 2) that there were 40 other apps that only one person suggested as an important app.

I suppose that on the one hand most could get by with a smaller number of apps. But, on the other hand, to really serve that long tail, exemplified by those 40 single apps, app stores better focus their efforts on app discovery. Otherwise, there is no long tail and folks will just gravitate to a few apps, and who would need an app store for that?

What do you think?

Stopping when there’s nothing left to take away
On the flip side of giving users everything they may potentially need, there is the goal of simplifying (or not being any more complex than you need to be).

Wired has a great (albeit long) article with examples from different fields of how folks are satisfied with simple and accessible products, as opposed to hi-fi, whiz bang, poly-featured products [link via russb].

I would claim that the bulk of the 4+ billion mobile phone users who are using basic voice and text phones are quite content with the features of their phones and are not affected by any running obsolescence. Their devices offer them just what they need, and the benefits they could get from added features is not enough for them to change.

Indeed, SMS, and now Twitter, are great examples of popular services that were built around, not only simplicity, but very tight constraints. And both are popular because they are accessible and sufficient enough for their users.

Why is simplicity so hard? Where does our desire to be so complete come from?

Can we be satisfied with a service that lets you build your own mobile web page with only five links?

Keeping tabs on costs
Russell Beattie, who works for Nokia in the US, has been an active thinker and maker of mobile devices, software, and services (check out his latest on redesigning the mobile browser). Over 6 years of listening to what he is up to has taught me to not be quick to judge what he says, but to mull it over carefully.

He’s floated an idea that there should be a scorecard in design that is based on what he calls “action cost,” what I might even call “cognitive costs.” It’s simple: when designing actions, tally up what it costs a user to think and make decisions to follow the pathway to complete the action.

What Russ is trying to do is codify the complexity of the software. I’ve seen diagrams from Francesco Cara, of Nokia, at LIFT 08, showing a map of the menus in different phones, revealing that over half of the choices in an N95 were under settings, a stark deviation from previous devices.

How does one codify complexity? I’ve thought of this in other domains, but, myself, failed to come up with any ideas related to software.

Russ does give an example using an N97. It might be interesting to build comparison charts to understand complexity across devices and products. The magnitude of the number is not significant, but the comparisons would be. This would help make decisions on whether a change in software increases or decreases the complexity of the actions users must take.

Do any of you have ways to measure and manage complexity in software design?

Image from Dave Duarte

BOSTON, USA

But since I’ve moved to the USA, the whole thing has broken down, mostly due to lack of uniform network coverage. Read on to hear my trials and tribulations and weigh in with some of your own stories.

I have the whole world in my hand
The cost of getting mobile maps seems to have gone down,* because everyone seems to have a navigator in their car and electronics shops have tens of models on display. I already see behavior modification where people no longer give directions, but just an address, expecting the receiver to either look it up through a PC browser or use their own navigator.

And there is no doubting the geeky thrill of being able to see street maps peppered with points of interest or satellite images of your surroundings, all from the palm of your hand and from anywhere you happen to be. It’s also thrilling to just start driving or walking, knowing that, when the time comes, you just open up your device and get the directions you need.

Except when it breaks down.

Lost. No, really lost.
We were off to visit my relatives in rural Pennsylvania, but at the end, switched destinations to meet them at a party. No worries. I had the address and waypoint programmed into my Ovi Maps on my phone.

When we approached the general area where the party was, we then pulled out my phone to get the last turns needed. Alas, there was no network coverage and I had not loaded the area maps into my phone.

We first tried all sorts of electronic rain dances – rebooting, changing SIMs, changing phones, even resorting to GMaps (D’oh – no coverage = absolutely useless). We then moved to Plan B and tried calling my relatives, but being at a party, they did not hear their phones. Then Plan C was asking the gas station, but they didn’t have any maps that seemed to help (huh, isn’t that an indicator), nor did they know the road. We just started driving in an arbitrary direction until the coverage kicked in and we were able to get back on track.

After getting yelled at by the whole family the rest of the way (it was hot, we were all hungry and tired from the long drive, you know the scene), we finally made it to the party.

Lessons
Our behavior has changed, making us depend on our wee electronic devices to supplement our brains. But we need to make sure that all that supplemental information is actually in our devices – I need to figure out how to load all the regional maps into my device, that was the mistake that set up this failure. Also, this story illustrates a deep dependence we have on network connections. While in Europe, I never ran into problems; in the US, it is more likely for me to be in rural areas where coverage is not as robust.

Ironically, this has only happened once to us, since we spend most of our time in a more urban area with better network coverage. But the one experience – hopelessly lost in an unfamiliar area – has made us smarter in how we use our mobile maps. Now we have printed maps for our region and make a point of printing out directions before we head off somewhere. Just to be sure. Until we regain confidence in using maps in rural areas here in the US.

Do you have similar stories? How did you overcome being lost? Are you as dependent as I am on Ovi Maps?

Image from .Larry Page

*After all these frustrations, I considered getting a small navigator with the maps built in, but it would have ended up being less convenient and even more expensive. Go figure. Now I’m off to load all those maps!

BOSTON, USA

What can we do about this? And what are the implications of this relentless march of technology? Read on for a few more points around this topic and then feel free to let loose with how this “progress” really makes you feel.

Obsolescence
All tech, from canoes to carriages, to castles to computers, evolves. Ever the manic tool-maker, humans tinker and play with things, trying to understand how to make a tool better, more efficient, and cheaper to make.

Right now, mobile devices are going through a rapidly changing phase, where multiple times a year, projects are started that incorporate the latest and greatest. Part of this is the passion of the device creators, stretching the possible to provide the ultimate tool. The other part is the craving multitudes, who want those ultimate tools.

But, when you’re producing a ton of devices at a rapid clip for a wide range of people, you get a constant overlap of products, where as soon as one is on the market there is one with a slightly more desirable feature set. That then sets of a perpetual cycle of desiring an immanently available device and, when the time comes to acquire it, an ambivalence selecting it over the next immanently available device.

Wake up
My advice has been the same for many years: just get the best device today. Forget about the next announced device. You know that adage “a bird in hand is worth two in the bush?” Well, that’s quite relevant here. You will get more use out of a device today than waiting for that ultimate device tomorrow.

And, yes, be ready to see a more desirable device be announced as soon as you buy one today. Just look at the newly announced device, laugh, and know that you will not get it. Because when you are ready to get your next device, there will already be an even more desirable one for you.

It’s inevitable.

The dark underbelly
We really cannot talk about obsolescence without mentioning what happens to all the devices that are discarded. We’ve written previously about recycling, take-back schemes, and the like. So, remember to recycle your old mobile device (which of course you coveted, only to discard for another more covet-able device).

What do you think?
Of course, I’ve seen comments all over related to this march of tech. So, feel free to use the space below to kvetch, laud, or comment on what this all means to you.

For a long time now, our mobile devices have been watching us and, in some ways, leaving a contrail of our paths behind us. This contrail could be broadcast by the various radios the devices carry, or by some app communicating continuously (or even intermittently) to some box out in the Cloud.

A recent article (see below) got us wondering how far we want to take this permission we give devices to leave these trails.

Big Brother in your pocket
When Nokia released Nokia Lifeblog back in 2004, we used to say that the phone was watching everything we did, so why not make a piece of software that allowed us to easily lay out those activities in a visually appealing multimedia diary? While the focus was on a PC app, we all were busting our brains to think of this online. Indeed, the blogging component was a manual version of that.

But what would the world be like if we could just stream our life to the Cloud?

There’s no end to what the sensor-in-a-pocket model could bring, as exemplified by Jamais Cascio’s list [via experientia].

Sensors for everyone
And we’ve been seeing an expectation that a ubiquity of sensors will somehow make life simpler. Except, a comment by Adam Greenfield (who has written oodles on this) made us think twice. The issue is that, even in the aggregate, patterns can emerge that can help folks reveal specific patterns and relationships once thought of as anonymous.

And a recent article in the Boston Globe on guessing who is gay on Facebook, serves as proof-point for Adam’s comment.

Yes, we might not even see or understand the contrails we put out. In the let-it-hang-out world of the Web, we are indeed leaving patterns of contrails that those who know what they are looking for can read, understand, and then make apparent for whatever purpose they might have.

What do you think of this?

Image from kevindooley

GLOBAL

Image from Foxtongue

Of course, the operators are going to be there. And, if we were there, too, we would, like usual, beg that we not gripe about operators and focus on what we CAN do.

Today, we’d like to point to a few interesting things that could easily be part of discussions at Mobile 2.0 – operator customization, apps in under served segments, and just plain cool geekery.

Yeah, read on. You want to see the cool video at the end.

Accustomed to customization
Recently, we commented on how one can really never know what folks might do with a device. A designer has his customer in mind and then someone builds something on top of it that was not part of the plan.

While some days it does feel like operators do that, they are part of the package too, for Nokia, so customization is part and parcel of building and selling mobile devices. There was a bruhaha over customization options for the Nokia N900, to which Nokia set the record straight.

Nonetheless, Bill Ray, from the Register, captures the general feeling that (non-manufacturers and non-operators) have with respect to device customization. Our question is, does it have to be so contentious between user interface, software selection, price, and distribution?

Sigh.

Touching back
For us, one cool thing about the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic touch screen is that it touches back through vibrations, enough to make things feel real on the screen. Taking this farther, a joint project with Nokia, Tampere University, and the Finnish Federation of the Visually Impaired, has created a simple app that turns text messages into Braille. On the phone.

By using the vibra in a Braille like pattern, each letter can be felt back on the screen. The video below explains it better.

We’ve highlighted other similar solutions from Nokia, such as the Nokia BT Loopset (Mikko Haho explains it in a video). Bringing solutions to all potential users includes those who one would not expect to use a mobile device due to hearing or visual impairment.

Cool, huh?

Almost touching….
Two really clever and creative guys, Jack Shulze and Timo Arnall, created a Rube Goldberg-like contraption that inspires one in how RFID can be used beyond the boring and mundane Oyster card use. Check it out below.

Nearness from timo on Vimeo. [via AllAboutSymbian]

Does that get you thinking?

Image from A6U571N

We asked Kirk a bit about his company, developing with Flash for mobiles, and how they got involved with Nokia and Adobe. He also told me a bit about his two Open Screen Fund apps, one a CNN news reader, the other a Twitter app for mobiles.

Read on for the whole story.

Flash in a hand
Kirk has been building Flash apps for about 10 years. His experience in mobile goes back to some work he did with the US carrier, Verizon, embedding Flash in their devices. Recently, his company has been working on a Flash-based Twitter client called Twittle. They wanted to close a gap they saw in mobile Twitter clients (and to trump the UI of, ahem, some of the ones with more pull).

At CTIA this spring, he showed Twittle to a Nokia exec which ended up opening up a bunch of doors for Kirk and his company, eventually leading to a new Open Screen Project for CNN.

You can have the sizzle and the Flash
The CNN news reader is a Flash-based video widget for the Nokia N97 and the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic. Kirk’s intention was to make an app that was more than just a news digest. His goal with the CNN widget was to bring a new way to view news videos, and to provide an enhanced touch experience.

Indeed, full-screen video is the highlight of the app. It uses something called “progressive download,” that was optimized by Nokia to support responsive video-rich mobile apps.

The app will be available in most countries via the Ovi Store, and translated into various languages. And, like most mobile developers, Kirk hopes to be pre-installed some day on some devices.

Is there any substance to the Flash?
I briefly asked Kirk what’s it like do develop with Flash for various different sorts of phones. He said that there were some areas of overlap between phones. For example, there is little reworking of the app needed for touch apps across, say, Windows Mobile and Symbian. And it’s not a huge rework to make sure the graphics and navigation work with a keypad and smaller screen size of a non-touch phone. Basically, the major differences between phones is when accessing lower-level data in a phone.

That’s not unexpected. But he did say that developing on Flash is close to half the time he would work with a similar app in Java.

Interesting.

Do you create or use Flash apps on your phone?

Here are some screen shots of the app

BOSTON, USA

Of course, we don’t substantiate rumors or talk about those known unknowns (that’s usually called a leak). And it’s a hard balance to say enough to show where we are going, without giving the game away. In some cases this can put us in an unfavorable light. For example, it’s sometimes foolish to suggest we released a solution in response to a competitor device or service, when in actuality, solution timelines were long set before the competitor revealed its solution. Or, all of us have to wear a Finnish poker-face, because we can’t really to talk about a leaked product everyone is excited about.

Today, there are some links we’d like to share. In the past week, we’ve had more than enough concrete stuff to be excited about. But here are three articles that are examples of the hopeful speculation we usually like to read. There is also one, to remind us that even when we do reveal something, it might not be so exciting in the end.

Hoping for a Booklet bonanza
Here’s an example of a launched product leading to speculation of future products of the same category.

There is no doubt that folks are excited about the Nokia Booklet 3G. But there have really been no indication how far Nokia will go, or if it’ll make another one. The folks at NokNok have been passing our comments through a sieve and got all excited by a Nokia Booklet Team comment soliciting feedback on things to improve.

I have no idea if there are more booklets coming (not that I could tell you, anyway). But, one way we could tell Nokia to make more is to leave suggestions for future booklets, if Nokia were to make another one. What do you think?

And I’d say the Nokia N900 is also one of those that begs the question: Will more of the same come? At Nokia World 09 Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President of Markets at Nokia, called the Nokia N900 the fourth in a five-step evolution. This was an open statement that highlights a continuing effort in bettering a particular breed of product.

Wrapping one’s head around it all
Here’s an example of a writer trying to make sense of all the solutions Nokia creates.

The writer, from the Bangkok Post, enumerates all the major solutions Nokia has, then reads closely what executives have said and tries to make sense of it all. The conclusion is that the Ovi Store is key in a major makeover for Nokia.

Hm, indeed, the company is going through a major makeover, shifting from being a device manufacturer to a solutions provider. And indeed, the Ovi Store is a major part in that. But, why headline with that? Maybe that was what most grabbed this one writer’s attention and expectations. What grabs yours? What do you think is the most important part in Nokia moving forward – the devices, Maps, or something known to be unknown?

As an aside, the writer drops a jaw-dropping stat. We know that about 1.1 billion people use Nokia phones. But, compare that to about 1.6 billion bank accounts and 1 billion credit cards. What if the, Nokia Life Tools and Nokia Money were the real keystones for Nokia’s drive into the future?

Reality upon reality
Here’s an example of trying to see where Nokia is going when Nokia itself says what it sees the future is like.

ReadWriteWeb points to an interesting video that Nokia released on Augmented Reality (see below). The video focuses mostly on devices to aid in the interaction with data while on the go, showing examples of listening to music, reading incoming messages, browsing widgets. But it was clear that the video was light on the concept of augmented reality of data enhancing interaction with the physical world through such devices.

For curiosity’s sake, what do you think could have been added to this video?

No need to speculate on this
Sure, there are a ton of things folks are speculating about Nokia, its solutions, and what next bomb-shell it’ll drop. But, sometimes, when we do get around to making an unknown known, it might not get any big reception.

Om Malik clearly is expecting more out of Nokia, and that’s a good thing. In a recent post, he says that a recent acquisition elicits no more than a yawn. He also mentions that folks at his Mobililze 09 confab were comparing Nokia to re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

Ouch.

Om is someone who knows a lot more unknowns than most folks and can see where many of the trends in the industry are leading. Such feedback suggests Nokia could do a better job in not only communicating what it is doing, but also showing, through actions, that it means what it says.

What do you think?

Image from J Winia

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Nonetheless, analysts far and wide weighed in on the announcements. Below, we’ve mentioned a few choice articles, representative of the general discussion out there. So read on for a full flavour round-up.

The Nokia Booklet 3G
The guys at Engadget were excited with the new Booklet 3G, but were cautious about some things related to it. They were curious to see if the half-day battery life would hold up to real-life testing. Also, they were a bit surprised with the €575 price tag despite comments from Nokia executives that the Booklet would be heavily subsidized by operators.

A search on YouTube also revealed a ton of videos, with hands-on reviews, promo videos, and interviews.

The Nokia N900
The first Linux-based Maemo phone has everyone talking, as well. Here’s a video of a demo given to Mark Guim. We don’t know how he managed to sit still the whole time, so close to this device.

The Nokia X6
Taking a page out of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic’s book, the Nokia X6 is sleeker and packing a bit more than its predecessor. While we are not always super enthusiastic about small technical features in a product, it seems like many folks were relieved to hear that the X6 had a fancy capacitive touch screen. I suppose that’s a signal folks were looking for that Nokia indeed was going to come out with capacitive touch devices.

The Nokia N97 mini
Folks were happy to hear about the N97 mini. And the folks at Avec Mobile pointed out that while most of the differences are seemingly slight, one difference between the bantam and the bigger sibling is significant: price.

Lifecasting
One little item that did indeed get some mentions was the Lifecasting app for the N97, which makes it easy for folks to update their Facebook profile from a mobile. When the N97 launched it was called the Facebook phone. Now, it’s even more so.

Lionel Laurent from Forbes reports on Facebook’s forays into mobile and its growing relationship with Nokia.

You can get the Lifecasting app at Nokia Beta Labs. Here’s a video (kinda) demoing it. Though you don’t need a funky emo-doo to use it.

Parting shots
We also want to point out two articles that represent a feeling that’s out there. Basically, there is an underlying interest in the new products released, that Nokia is continuing to make moves to change user’s expectations of mobile devices of all types. But there is also a feeling that there was a lot that was not done or said at Nokia World, either for US customers or in response to competitors.

What do you think? What do the products announced at Nokia World 2009 tell you about where Nokia is going and what it can achieve? Likewise, if you’ve seen more reactions out there on the web or offline related to NW09 that you’d like to share here (good,  bad or indifferent) please share them below.

Image from MonsieurLui