S60 Open to new features

Wow, Tommi, that's one of the better "it's not a bug, it's a feature" pieces I've seen in a while :)

Nice try...! But actually an interesting point if you divorce it from the battery issue. That said the AOL stuff did sort itself out as I'm sure mobile would too. And networks have a lot more control over cutting people off if they breach AUPs etc.

Interesting perspective. I think you have a point, and most will miss it and go back to the battery issue (which, as Rafe points out, is still a valid one. There's no reason the N95 shouldn't have gotten the battery that my N73 has) but I think there's alot of merit in the idea that it's one thing that can be used to limit network clog.

I also think that as new technologies emerge, they'll be more efficient at handling data.

Posted by: Ricky Cadden | April 10, 2007 07:03 PM

Battery life to limit data traffic? That's a nice try indeed. First, we convince the whole world that 3G is absolutely necessary for the better of this society. And then, when we figure out that we opened the box of Pandorra with the demand for flat rate, we point to an underdeveloped feature of modern phones, good batteries, to put the lid back on the box.

As said, nice try but too simple minded, really.

On a serious note: there is serious work in 'unclogging' the networks despite flat rate. I would prefer these mechanisms getting in place and Nokia (as well as other vendors) doing their homework on batteries so that my 'multimedia computer' actually last some time longer.

I am working in the environmental sector, so just wanted to note that although your analogy to the Tragedy of the Commons helps to illustrate the point, the difference of course is that in the generic Tragedy of the Commons dilemma the use of that resource is indeed free and/or largely unregulated. Global climate change being the most pertinent example of our times.

Anyway, this reminded me also of something Nokia launched maybe a year or two ago: some kind of solution where the networks could push media content to subscibed customers at night time, when network demand is low, thereby allowing them to optimize on the network capacity. Did that product ever take off?

ps. The captcha code required to post a comment (if not typekey member) sucks.. some of them are extremly unclear.

viipottaja: I just heard about a better spam filter plugin:
http://opengardensblog.futuretext.com/archives/2007/04/hurray_comments_are_working_.html

I hope that we can get rid of that horrible captcha code already during this week.

I don't think it's good to tie these issues together. Battey life tech trends suck, but hey, that's why we have chargers.

The lack of flat rate for mobile internet however is the biggest challenge that Nokia faces as we reinvent ourselves as an "internet company" whatever that may ultimately mean.

"There is only one Internet" Kallasvuo says...

And he's right. What is more, shifting data around is not a premium service, no matter how it's currently charged when it becomes "mobile".

The flip side of the battery issue (that surely won't go away anytime soon) would be to off-load processing from the terminal on to network-resident resources. Of course, there are situations/applications where this suits better than in others.

Hello Tommi,

Even with a mobile flatrate I think it is unlikely that we will see wireless network congestions for two reasons: Power users will still tend to DSL or cable as prices are likely to remain lower than 3G/4G wireless flat rates. And should networks come into a state which is perceived as overload, data rates will drop which in turn is again something power users will not like. Thus, they will again drift over to DSL and that way free up resources in the wireless network. So I think there is a good auto control mechanism built into the system. And on top of that I don't really think it is necessary to have uncapped data usage price plans to get users on the network and thus make money. What's required is a large enough bucket of data a month that convinces users that it's good enough for their purpose and a clear notification when they overstep their subscription. Austrian operator ONE has an interesting approach to this: http://mobilesociety.typepad.com/mobile_life/2007/02/there_are_those.html

Cheers,
Martin

In long term - strategic thinking - the ultimate goal of mobility does not permit the path you described. There is a physical limit here, bound by the energy we can store and the energy we need to communicate but I think that the linear improvement you expect for battery life will not hold for the energy needed to communicate. Or better said, I hope it will be exponential improvement in screen technology & back lighting, wireless LAN processors and power requirement, processor power, etc...

for the short term, my expectation is that winners on the market wil be characterized by reasonably long battery life & reasonably good capabilities to communicate... I know... That avoids a clear answer about the future of the N95.

Although there is something you CAN do:
Educate users! What do we expect from a laptop? 2-3-4-5 hours? If we accept that Nokia's pocket computers ARE computers, 18-24 hours under heavy load should suffice...

I look at my E70 as a minilaptop with a battery life for one day of surfing on Wlan-s. Pretty good from that perspective... :-)

by the way in my opinion the E70 is the revolution... Are ther any public sales figures about the E70? I only see that shops are running out of them constantly in Finland...

Nice misdirection. But of course bandwidth isn't actually a finite resource, and certainly it is not one that can be spoiled for the masses by the greed of a few.

Over and over for the last couple of decades available bandwidth has increased to cope with demand,and it will continue to do so because everyone involved is motivated in the direction of more is better.

Thank you for this outstanding article.I thought Centrino was the best technology for laptop battery performance.