IT’S REALLY very plain and simple.† Ease of Texting.
With the Philippines sending out 600 million text messages a day, SMS or Texting remains to be the KILLER mobile application in the country. †It should be obvious that cellphone design, at least for the Philippine market, should take this into consideration and make Ease of Texting the number one design criterion.
A month ago I got myself a second mobile phone ñ a company-issued post-paid line and cellphone unit from Sun Cellular.† Since my company actually got several lines with free units and I was in a position to decide on the assignment of the units I chose for myself a SAMSUNG SGH-D900i. †It’s a sleek, lightweight, slide-type unit with all the bells and whistles of a high-end model.
But it has a major flaw, at least as far as I am concerned.† It is soooooooooo NOT user-friendly.
Noticed how many “o’s” there are in the word “so” above? There are 10, and that is no accident. It represents the approximate number of key presses or clicks it takes to send a single text message (excluding the typing of the message itself). And I am not exaggerating. It may actually be 11 or even 12. I stopped counting.
That’s the problem with non-Nokia phones, and it’s not just Samsung.† Their designers don’t get it. They make phones and load them with so many cool and high tech features assuming that’s how customers like it.† Some of them succeed in luring customers with the bells and whistles.† However, as soon as a customer tries to use her fully-loaded cellphone for texting she curses it.† It’s just so difficult to use.† It’s counter-intuitive.
Going back to my Samsung phone… after a couple of weeks of hardly using it (and hardships when using it), I started contemplating my options.† It is simply not working for me.† It didn’t take me long to make a decision.
Serendipitously I recalled that my assistant has a lowly Nokia 2600 Classic†assigned to her.† So I offered to swap the fully-loaded Samsung with her bare-essential Nokia.† Lured by the “high end” features and sleek design of the Samsung D900i she blindly took the bait with hook line and sinker.
Now I am wondering if she’s cursing her new cool cellphone whenever she uses it to send text messages.† Or maybe she’s cursing herself for gullibly accepting the swap.† Or she’s probably cursing me for getting her to do it.
As for me, I am quite content with my lowly Nokia 2600 Classic.† At least it no longer takes me more than three clicks to send or reply to a text message. #
there’s nothing wrong with samsung phones. they are sophisticated, that’s all, and that’s why some ppl don’t dig it. you have to have sophisticated taste and mindset to truly enjoy sophisticated gadgets.
The PalmOne Treo is an exception. In my opinion it is the most texting-friendly mobile phone. Even better than Nokia. Of course it has QWERTY keyboard so it may have undue advantage over regular cellphones. Still I’ve tried other QWERTY-units and they are not as intuitive and easy-to-use as the Treo.
you are absolutely right! sony-ericcson, motorola, samsung, LG, philips, and so on… they just don’t get it, do they?