Let’s run down that list real quick.

HTC Rezound. HTC Vivid. HTC Amaze 4G. HTC EVO 3D. HTC EVO Design 4G. HTC Incredible S. HTC Desire S. HTC Desire HD.

There are quite a few devices missing from that list. Though, none more glaring then the absence of the HTC ThunderBolt, the first 4G LTE smartphone that was released on Verizon’s next-generation back in March.

If you’re an HTC ThunderBolt owner, you probably already know where I’m going with this.

For those that don’t own one, let’s make a long story short.

HTC and Verizon manage to completely screw up the launch of the HTC ThunderBolt back in March of 2011. After finally getting the phone out after the bungled launch, owners are immediately greeted with a ton of issues.

Battery life, freezing, random reboots, a broken mobile hotspot, amongst other issues.

Needless to say, people were frustrated. Especially because the issues took months to iron out. Smartphones aren’t toys. They are expensive pieces of hardware that require contracts and monthly payments. So oddly enough, people wanted what they paid for.

A working smartphone.

It wasn’t until HTC and Verizon rolled out Gingerbread in October that the problems seemed to simmer. Oh yeah. Did I mention HTC ThunderBolt owners had to wait seven months for Android 2.3 to arrive?

What I am getting at is that it took seven months for HTC and Verizon to make owning an HTC ThunderBolt a semi-enjoyable experience. They wasted seven whole months of the two years that many signed up for when they bought the darn thing.

And I think that the companies owe ThunderBolt owners something.

Something beyond a promise not to release bulky devices with terrible battery life in 2012.

How about breaking the silence about the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich update for the HTC ThunderBolt? For better or for worse.

If this were any other device, I wouldn’t be opening my mouth. I know how hard it is to prepare a major Android update for a phone not called Nexus and I know that companies don’t want to throw dates around or say stuff that might end up haunting them.

But trust me on this, HTC and Verizon. HTC ThunderBolt owners have gone through smartphone hell and back and I am pretty sure they can handle anything you throw at them.

So throw something.

“No, the HTC ThunderBolt won’t be getting the update.”

“Yes, it will get it sometime in 2012.”

“Yes, it will get it sometime in 2013.”

But not silence, anything but silence.

If I had my way, HTC ThunderBolt owners would be first in line for the Android 4.0 update after all the garbage they put up with. Instead, they will be one of the last in line, put on the back burner once again.

Been wondering why HTC’s 4G LTE smartphone sales were terrible in the fourth quarter of 2011?

There’s your answer. Loyalty is a two way street.

So, how about it HTC?

Verizon?

How about letting ThunderBolt owners know if they should trade in their ThunderBolt for an Android 4.0 device or if they should endure?

The benefits of Android 4.0 are many and I think those who spent hundreds and hundreds of dollars on a phone that was on par with a paper weight for seven months deserve to know if they are going to see them.

Who else is frustrated?

HTC ThunderBolt Owners Deserve Some Android 4.0 Answers is a post by Adam Mills from Gotta Be Mobile.

The damage is done.

Samsung has already planted the seed, a seed called the Samsung Galaxy S III.

Prior to today’s revelation, there had been a huge back and forth about when Samsung would announce the follow-up to its popular Galaxy S II smartphone. Samsung has sold more than 10 million of them. The Galaxy S II is a phone that many consider to be the pinnacle of Android devices.

The rumor mill churned out a Mobile World Congress announcement and a counter-rumor disputed that.

Then, rather surprisingly, Samsung itself got involved.

At first, it was a marketing executive’s sly mention of a major product launch tied in with this Summer’s Olympic games in London. Then, the company itself decided to spill the beans.

The Samsung Galaxy S III would be announced at a separate event to take place sometime during the first half of 2012.

And that, my friends, is how you effectively take the wind out your competitors sails with minimal effort.

Pretty Apple-esque if you ask me.

Sure, HTC and LG and whoever else will announce smartphones, probably quad-core and likely powered by Android 4.0, and they will be good.

But in the back of consumers minds will be the Samsung Galaxy S III, which is also rumored to be a quad-core device, powered by Android 4.0. And it too will likely be a good phone, likely better than all of the phones announced at Mobile World Congress.

Samsung, in the last year or so, has begun setting the bar for other smartphone makers. Just look at HTC and Motorola. They both announced that they would be releasing fewer phones in 2011 with the focus on quality and not quantity.

HTC has even publicly stated that it was dissatisfied with a lot of its smartphones from 2011.

In other words, they are playing catch up.

Samsung?

It now has bigger fish to fry. (Read: Apple.)

And if Samsung hopes to compete with the 4G LTE iPhone that Apple will release this year while at the same time convince iPhone 4 owners coming off contract to buy into the Galaxy S III, it’s going to have to be an extremely calculated launch.

Hey, the Mobile World Congress is great for phone nerds and businesses and networking but it’s not like it’s a household name.

The Summer Olympics?

The whole world is watching.

And judging by that Super Bowl commercial it released for its Galaxy Note during the Super Bowl, Samsung is ready for the big stage.

So let the HTC’s and LG’s of the world host huge, lavish press conferences at this year’s Mobile World Congress. Samsung doesn’t need one.

Any tablets announced will be an afterthought once Apple announces a date for the iPad 3 announcement event and any smartphones announced will be weighed against the Galaxy S III in the minds of consumers.

Job well done.

Why Samsung Doesn’t Need a Press Conference at MWC is a post by Adam Mills from Gotta Be Mobile.

Who played in the 1984 Super Bowl? Who knows. But I bet most of you know the famous Apple 1984 commercial even if you didn’t see it aired live on January 22nd 1984.

This year Samsung took to the Super Bowl airwaves to poke fun at Apple with the Samsung Galaxy Note launch, Apple was nowhere to be found.

This morning Mashable asked, Why Didn’t Apple Advertise During the Super Bowl? To read this piece, you’d think Apple cancelled the iPhone 5 and shut up shop.

Apple doesn't need a Super Bowl ad.

Lance Ulanoff argues that Apple is in trouble. Without Steve Jobs around to fight, Apple is letting the competition shape the discussion and argument. But even more so, he suggests that Apple is in trouble because they don’t have a new product to announce at an arbitrary sporting event that dominates the news for the rest of the week. And goes even further to suggest that Apple should have teased an Apple TV to the world during the Super Bowl.

Would Steve Jobs have wanted to launch a counter attack? I’m sure the man who vowed to spend his dying breath and Apple’s bank roll to “destroy Android” would have loved to crush Samsung during a major commercial event. But Jobs wasn’t someone who let the competition dictate when Apple jumped. This is evident in Apple’s no-show at CES every year, stepping away from MacWorld and the company’s decision to hold special events for product launches where they dictate the news for weeks.

Ulanoff is right about the lack of a significant new hardware introduction from Apple in the past year, but I don’t share his worries that Apple isn’t ready to talk about the iPad 3, iPhone 5 (or iPhone 4G) and the rumored Apple TV.

Apple has been riding the buzz of new products for the past year, but it has also been riding the buzz of products for all of recent memory. As soon as the iPad 3, iPhone 5 and iTV or Apple TV are announced we’ll be buzzing about the next generation. In fact, we typically begin craving the next-next generation of Apple products before the currently rumored hardware is announced.

Even without a significant hardware upgrade, Apple sold 37 million iPhones and 15 million iPads during the last part of 2012.

Ulanoff argues that staying out of the Super Bowl is letting Samsung frame the discussion, but joining in with a teaser for the new Apple TV, as he suggests, would be the real sign that Apple had caved.

Apple lives on buzz, but Apple never comments on buzz and never lets the rumors of a new product dictate when or what it will announce. I disagree with Ulanoff’s claim that Steve Jobs would have fought Samsung with a teaser ad for the next Apple TV. Steve Jobs was a showman and a fighter, not a teaser.

I’m glad to see that Tim Cook, Apple’s new CEO didn’t choose to tease a yet announced Apple product at the Super Bowl.

–

Watch all the 2012 Super Bowl Tech Ads

Why Apple Didn’t Have a Super Bowl Ad is a post by Josh Smith from Gotta Be Mobile.

No firm answers at the present, though we may get a few later this month when the first beta of Windows 8 is available.

Through all the haze and confusion around this, I worry that the end result will be that Win8 tablets will suffer from a problem that currently plagues Android and iOS tablets: lack of really good productivity apps.

Tablets are great multimedia and entertainment devices, no doubt. But I always warn people away who are looking to do robust productivity tasks. At this point it’s still not possible to, for example, create a semi-complex blog post with images without a lot of frustration, cursing, and disappointment on the iPad. Tablet apps simply do not work as well as desktop apps or web apps designed for desktop.

That’s why there is still a dedicated group of Windows tablet fans that cling to their convertibles and give the iPad and all these Android pretenders a serious side-eye. Windows 8 offered the prospect having your cake and eating it, too, as far as productivity and robust software married with an eminently usable interface.

For some devices this will absolutely be true — the Lenovo Yoga, for instance — but maybe not on pure tablets running on ARM chips.

Windows 8 will effectively have two different interfaces. One will look like a Windows 7 environment with some updates. The other will look similar to Windows Phone 7. Users will be able to switch between them on traditional desktop or laptop computers that use an x86 architecture — the chips you find in computers now, primarily made by Intel and AMD for the U.S. market. Computers and tablets based around ARM chips — those found in today’s smartphones and tablets made by Qualcomm, Samsung, Texas Instruments, and Nvidia, among others — will get the Metro UI and either no desktop interface or one restricted in some way.

Why the restriction? Battery life and resources, mainly. Programs made to run on the desktop tend to take up more resources than those made to run on ARM tablets. It’s not too complicated or time-intensive to make a tablet app ready to run in a desktop environment on an Intel chip; the reverse is not true.

In the end, Windows 8 tablets may end up with only tablet apps, and that could put them at the same disadvantage in the productivity arena as the iPad and Android slates. Not sure that’s Microsoft’s aim.

The software maker is apparently working hard to ensure that Office 15 will run well in either environment on any kind of chip. But will the slimming down make MS Office as pared down as QuickOffice or Documents To Go? If so, I don’t want it.

Microsoft is going to have a time trying to manage people’s expectations across devices. The average consumer probably doesn’t know the difference between a product with an ARM chip and an x86 one. And I can see a lot of anger erupting when people buy Windows 8 tablets expecting them to act like Windows 8 desktops and run the exact same software.

Will this potential issue spur developers to step up and create apps that offer the robust functionality traditional computer users need while also working in the Metro interface? It’s a tall order, I know. But a necessary one.

Will Windows 8 Tablets Be Just As Crappy For Productivity As The iPad? is a post by K. T. Bradford from Gotta Be Mobile.

I am a consumer and I am impressed by more megapixels. I was wowed by HTC offering the 1st 16 megapixel camera when an 8 megapixel camera with better optics provides a better photography experience. I was that guy that bought a new PC every year to have the biggest and baddest processor for many years. I am also impressed when I can run a speed test on my phone and see insane numbers pop up but do I need it? I don’t think so.

The fact that 50% of the 7.7 million smartphones that Verizon sold in the 4th quarter of 2011 were 3G iPhones should indicate that consumers are willing to accept 3G for a couple of years instead of waiting for LTE speeds. Of course, the majority of those 7.7 million users were probably not in an LTE market at this time. Even if they were, do they need LTE?

Who needs more Gs?

Consumers that consume lots of video content. Yes, they can definitely benefit from going from 3Mbps to 12Mbps. But if they aren’t on a grandfathered unlimited data plan on one of the major carriers, they are paying dearly for this video consumption. 4G  =5Gb data allotment reached faster right?

Those using their phone as a WiFi hotspot in a home where they are browsing what Apple calls “the Real Internet” on their desktops or laptops. Those sharing that WiFi with others can benefit as well.

The plain and simple truth is that most of the apps that most consumers use on their phones have little added benefit from faster mobile broadband. Checking email, Facebook, and Twitter might seem quicker with LTE, but 3G is plenty fast to accomplish those tasks without feeling like you are waiting.

Data is expensive!

If you are one of those that need more Gs, what type of data plan do you have? I wonder what percentage of US smartphone users are still locked into some sort of unlimited data plan. If you aren’t on an unlimited plan, how fast are you burning through 2-5GB of data? When I was a heavy Pandora user, I was hitting 4-5GB of data per month on an unlimited plan. I can only imagine what people streaming Netflix and YouTube are doing each month. No wonder most of the US Carriers have done away with true unlimited plans.

LTE will allow users to burn through their data allotments 3-4x faster. I am sure the carriers will love that, but I know my wallet doesn’t.

LTE switched off on my Galaxy Nexus.

Battery Drain?

Is getting your Twitter or Facebook fix a tad bit faster worth the battery drain LTE seems to be causing? Lucky for me, I am not in an LTE area, but if I was I would still switch LTE off unless I thought I needed it for a period of time. You might not believe that, but it’s true. There is very little use for LTE in my day-to-day smartphone use.

When we went from EDGE phones to 3G phones several years ago, the same problem existed. People were turning off 3G to save battery. Same problem, different day. Companies like Samsung are working to find a way to get a complete day in on one battery charge when a few years ago, we were getting 2-3 days easily. You’ve got Motorola cramming a huge battery into the Droid RAZR MAXX that is almost 2x bigger than the it’s predecessor. More technology equals more battery drain. We have to sacrifice somewhere and there’s no better place in my opinion than using 3G over LTE.

What we really need!

In my opinion, what we really need is better reach and more capacity. Along with the LTE roll outs, I know that the major carriers in the US are also working on capacity. There are also plenty of rural areas that still in need 3G love. I understand that carriers need to cater to the larger markets, but small town geeks need 3G too. What about capacity? I’ve seen an increase in variable rate circuits fed by fiber rolling out to cell towers over the last year which tells me that the carriers get it. They can increase capacity by simply re-provisioning a circuit. This is a good things. I’d like to have seen widespread roll outs of enhancements like this than LTE rollouts personally. Maybe because I am one of those small town geeks, but still.

So, do you need LTE or do you just want LTE?

Sure, I can whip it out, bring up a speed test app and show 14-16Mbps speeds to a friend and tell him mine’s faster than yours, but at the end of the day… do I need that speed? Not really, it’s a great party trick, but I’m not using apps and services that require that much bandwidth. Are you? Heck, LTE is faster than my home service and I am doing fine.

Do We Really Need LTE Right Now? Aren’t 3G Speeds Enough? is a post by Chris Leckness from Gotta Be Mobile.

I’m not kidding.

Before I get to what triggered this, let me heap a little praise where praise is due.

Most manufacturers out there love to stay silent when it comes to bootloaders and Android updates. As a person who covers this stuff for a living, not a day goes by when I see people pleading for information, or change, only to have those pleas fall on deaf ears.

Or worse, some vague PR statement that ends up as a blog post which ignites the flames even more.

Asus is the complete opposite of most manufacturers in that it doesn’t mess around with its customers. It tells it like it is. For instance, when it got called out for locking the bootloader on the Eee Pad Transformer Prime, it immediately responded to its customers and promised to unlock it with a tool in the future. And then, on top of that, it announced a specific date for the Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich roll out.

If you have ever owned an Android device, you’d know that most companies don’t announce release dates ahead of time. This isn’t the first time that Asus has been this candid. It seems to always be. It’s like, gasp, it wants to keep its customers in the loop.

Shocking, I know.

That kind of communication was one of the things I want to see from the mobile space in 2012. Companies could learn a lot from taking a look at how Asus treats its customers.

In addition, instead of denying it like some carriers and companies often do, Asus acknowledged that there was a GPS issue with the Eee Pad Transformer. And instead of ignoring it, it decided to fix it.

An update that has greatly improved the GPS on the device rolled out today as a matter of fact.

Again, you just don’t get this kind of support from other companies.

I have almost written this post somewhere around 10 times in the past, including earlier today, but it wasn’t until I saw a post on the XDA-forums from, guess who, Asus, that finally pushed me to do so.

Asus’  Technical Marketing Manager Gary Key went into the XDA-forums, a place renowned for its software development for Android, and laid out a bunch of fixes of common problems that Eee Pad Transformer Prime users have been facing.

Just in case you own one, here they are:

BT/WiFi Fallout Issues

1. WiFi and BT turned on and active.
a. Stream a media source via WiFi for playback to a BT device (headphones, speakers, etc) and the signal degrades to the point where the streaming source stops and requires a reset to the BT device. This is the most common problem reported although using several BT devices (keyboard, mouse, headset) and using the Internet Browser to simply view media content has also been reported as a problem when using BT input devices.

Serial Number Not Found

1. System will not auto or manual update to the latest firmware or image.
a. Go to Settings, Backup and Reset, start a Factory Data Reset. Please do this and after the reset let the unit remain active (settings, display, sleep, always on) for 15 minutes with a WiFi connection active so the system can sync with the ASUS servers. Hopefully the system will see the update, if not please go to settings, About Tablet, and then double tap on System Firmware Update please. If that does not work, please PM the serial number of your unit.

Random Lockups after ICS update

1. System might randomly lockup or generate a blind screen effect after the ICS update. I have received a few reported cases matching this behavior and we will be in contact with most of you in the near future.
a. If we do not contact you directly, it does not mean we are not working on this problem. I have read all the messages and randomly selected a couple of users for further contact. We will have a fix for this problem shortly.

Key obviously did not have to do this, but he did, and Eee Pad Transformer Prime owners and really, all of us, are better for it. It’s not often that companies take the time to do this unless they are absolutely forced to.

Need some evidence?

XDA provides it:

To give you some history, we’ve tried working with HTC, Samsung, and Sony Ericsson in the past, but always ended up at a dead-end. The companies have a strange stance towards XDA: the more technical people at the companies see value in our community and what the developers do, but at the same time, executives are scared to do anything with us because we void warranties and all that stuff.

I’m not sure if I will buy any Asus products in the future but I do know one thing.

I wish more companies treated their customers like Asus.

This Is Why I Love Asus is a post by Adam Mills from Gotta Be Mobile.

This practice isn’t limited to teens and young adults, of course, but it almost always leads to heartache and pain. The fact that we as a culture still feed teens the lie that their high school relationships are deep and meaningful and will last forever (except when they don’t) is partially to blame for this madness. When you’re in the throes of love, young or not, you always think that your partner won’t betray you.

But along comes that day when you have a fight, you break up, or someone cheats and suddenly it’s Armageddon where once private pictures are mailed to family members and embarrassing status updates end up on FailBook.

Image Credit: S. Diddy on Flickr

I know kids don’t want to take advice from adults on stuff like this, but I’m putting it out there, anyway: giving your partner your password is not a good idea.

No matter how much you love someone you are entitled to privacy, and your emails, texts, private messages, and IMs are private. You can be hella intimate with a person and still have your privacy.

Just like you wouldn’t want your boyfriend or girlfriend to be in on every conversation you have with your best friends, you don’t want them in on every aspect of your digital life. No one needs to be inside your head 24/7.

Now, since I know the kids probably won’t listen, I’ll co-sign this from the Times piece:

Winifred Lender, a child psychologist in Santa Barbara, had her three sons sign “digital contracts” that outline terms for how much media they will consume, how they will behave online and that they will not share passwords. Still, Ms. Lender said, her 14-year-old was recently asked by a friend for his password.

“He said: ‘You give me yours and I’ll give you mine.’ ”

Her son was taken aback but then relied on a tried-and-true excuse for saying no. “He blamed it on his parents,” Ms. Lender said of her son. “He said, ‘If I give you my password, my mom will have a cow.’ ”

Don’t have a cow, man.

… I’m officially old.

Teens Sharing Passwords As A Sign Of Love? Can We Go Back To Friendship Rings? is a post by K. T. Bradford from Gotta Be Mobile.

Many are worried that the stated goal of the bills — making it easier to stop piracy by overseas evildoers — won’t be accomplished and that the actual result will be censorship of the Internet.

Ever since these bills gained traction in congress there have been protests, boycotts, and petition efforts from activists and medium-sized Internet companies like Tumblr. But today’s protest is aimed at reached a far wider audience.

Wikipedia and Google are two of the most visited sites in the world. By bringing this issue to the millions of mainstream Americans who may not have heard about SOPA / PIPA and giving them a taste of how it could directly affect them, they’re sending a strong message to congress and the bill’s supporters [that list is a PDF].

The other sites participating may not be as big, but if you’ve visited 4, 5, or 6 pages today only to find them unavailable, you’ll be shaken from your complacency whether you were aware of this bill before or this is your first time hearing about it.

If you want to learn more about SOPA / PIPA and why so many Internet companies have a problem with the bills as currently written, there’s a long but informative post on the Reddit blog with a great explanation. Or you can click on the links provided by any of the dark / on strike sites you come across.

Personally, I have several problems with the bills and the process by which they ended up in congress. First, I’m more than wary of anything the MPAA and RIAA involve themselves in. Especially the MPAA since it has no transparency yet has established itself as the guardian of morals and culture in our country, at least as far as films are concerned. I don’t like that.

I also don’t like that these organizations are able to buy the votes of our congresspeople to the tune of $190 million dollars. If you’ve followed any of the discussion around piracy and digital media you know that both the MPAA and RIAA have been on the wrong side of that fight since the beginning, coming at the problem in a heavy-handed, un-nuanced way that doesn’t serve the needs of the people who make them money: the audience. Their statement about today’s protest is further proof.

Beyond that, I’m concerned that the people debating and voting on this bill are highly ignorant of how the Internet works. That is unacceptable for a bill of this nature. A law that has such sweeping and wide consequences and could, in the wrong hands, fundamentally alter the Internet should not be voted on by someone who is happy to be ignorant of how all this technical stuff works, har har.

It should be a big red flag that you’ll find few Internet companies on that list of supporters but many, many media companies that are hostile to the advances in media the Internet has made possible in the last couple of decades.

It’s also a red flag that the bills are so badly written and vague. That leaves a lot of room for abuse and confusion should they become law.

Those are my personal reasons for being against SOPA / PIPA. I encourage you to read more about the issue and make up your own mind. If you feel so inclined, sign a petition or contact your congressperson. Here’s a handy list of those opposed to and supporting the bills. I’ll be tweeting links to SOPA-related stuff all day if you want to follow along.

What Is SOPA and Why Are All My Websites On Strike? is a post by K. T. Bradford from Gotta Be Mobile.

Let me get my position on Nokia and Windows Phone in the open right away, including my own personal biases. I’m a former Pocket PC/Windows Mobile fanboy who is now platform agnostic.

Don Reisinger from eWeek has quite the interesting article up regarding Nokia and Windows Phone that I couldn’t help replying to. When I first read his article that was written on January 11, 2012, it did just what I think it was written for, I grabbed my keyboard ready to comment. While I was rereading and preparing to write this rebuttal, I was informed that he wrote a contradictory article two months ago. The article two months ago was titled, “Nokia’s Windows Phones Threaten Android, iOS: 10 Reasons Why“. The article written on the 11th was titled, “Nokia’s Windows Phone Strategy Will Fail: 10 Reasons Why“. Was the most recent story written as link bait? Why the sudden change of opinion?

Let me comment on each of the 10 reasons why Don thinks Nokia’s Windows Phone Strategy will fail.

1. The product designs are subpar

Really? His article from 2 months ago says quite the opposite.

One thing about Nokia is that it knows how to create nice-looking smartphones that people actually want. The Lumia 800 is especially appealing. 

When you look at the Lumia line of Windows Phone 7-based devices, it’s hard to find too many redeeming qualities in their designs.

Two comments, same author, two months apart. What?

The Nokia Lumia line has plenty of design appeal. From the fresh colors to the one-piece polycarbonate body, the Lumia lineup delivers. As someone who has handled all three of the Lumia models now, I am sold. They all are very solid, have beautifully bright screens, and feel so balanced in my hands.

2. Nokia’s brand loyalty is waning

Meanwhile, Nokia has done little (if anything) to repair its ailing brand. At what point will the company wake up and realize it needs to regain lost customers?

I can’t really speak to this without seeing numbers. What I do see is that many Nokia faithful that supported and loved Nokia throughout the Symbian days are warming up and even liking Windows Phone. These observations are mostly from bloggers and writers I know and/or follow on Twitter. The author mentions that countless customers are leaving Nokia for other products with better features, performance and applications. I agree, when the main phones from Nokia in the US market are feature phones, that’s understandable. Nokia really hasn’t had a smart phone presence in the US until now and as customers migrate from feature phones to smart phones, they have to go towards iPhones or Android powered phones. Now that Nokia is entering the US Smart Phone world now, I believe brand recognition and loyalty might favor Nokia. It wasn’t too long ago that regular, no geek, cell customers considered Nokia’s feature phones one of the better manufacturers.

3. Microsoft has lost mobile customer trust

 But now, with better options available elsewhere, it has fallen far behind. And like Nokia, it has done little to fix it. 

This is true, but you have to keep in mind that Microsoft’s new customer focus are not the same customer type overall that they’ve lost trust with. The crowd that Microsoft lost are the geeks like me. The folks that like an open OS that they can tweak. Those customers are mainly Android fans for the most part now. Microsoft won’t get many of those customers back. The customers that Microsoft appears to target now are those that have iPhones or have never had a Smart Phone before. This is a general observation and I have no facts to base this on, but it’s quite obvious. I am close to becoming a Windows Phone user again myself, but I can say that I have many friends and colleagues that aren’t as eager to get back to Windows Phone.

4. Windows Phone 7 can’t attract enterprise customers

I have no real complaints with this statement. Microsoft does seem to have abandoned enterprise by choosing to follow a bunch of Apple’s plans. Although Microsoft Office, Outlook, and Exchange are just part of it all, there are other aspects important to enterprise customers that Microsoft has left out.

5. Consumers would rather go with Android

The numbers support this argument, but it’s presented with a very broad brush. Yes, Android is doing quite well, but it’s not as user-friendly as Windows Phone. Motorola and Verizon did some great marketing to make Android a cool alternative to AT&T’s iPhone a few years back. Nokia and Microsoft are doing the same now with its marketing efforts. Will it be as successful as Verizon’s “Droid” marketing? Only time will tell. Right now, an average consumer (not a geek or power user) might prefer Android or “Droids” because that’s what they know, but Microsoft and Nokia just got started here. Give it time before we say that consumers would rather go to Android over Windows Phone.

6. The price is cheap (but that’s not a good thing)

At first glance, that might seem like an offer too good to refuse. But further inspection reveals that the phones don’t have the features and performance to seriously challenge models priced around the $200 mark, like Apple’s iPhone.

When is cheap not a good thing? When you are talking about build quality. That’s not the case with the Lumia line. If you’ve ever picked up a Nokia Smart Phone from the Lumia line or from later offerings before the Windows Phone move, you’d know that the build quality is consistent and solid. Even the light weight Nokia N95 was solid even though it was made with a lot of plastics. Cheap price for Nokia quality will never be a bad thing. The $50 Lumia 710 is much more solid in terms of build quality than most $50 Android devices I’ve encountered.

7. The marketing is off

When viewing television, listening to the radio, or reading online or print publications, try to find a single, high-quality ad from Nokia or Microsoft promoting the Lumia line of devices. 

Huh? The marketing just started. Do I need to remind everyone that the Nokia Lumia 710 just became available in the US on T-Mobile this week? Do I need to remind everyone that the Nokia Lumia 900 was just announced this week at CES? Microsoft has been marketing Windows Phone Mango with a  huge budget this past fall with a ton of parties and events.

Just this week, I commented on how much marketing Nokia is throwing out there for the Lumia lineup at CES. They have ads everywhere, they are giving coffee and donuts to CES attendees at Monorail stops, they have dancers at Monrails, and they gave free shuttle rides from McCarran International Airport to hotels this week at CES. I think that’s great marketing for Nokia and Windows Phone. Kudos Nokia!

8. The first device should have been the winner

The issue with that is the device is one of the lower-end handsets the company sells. Nokia plans to offer the high-end Lumia 800 and Lumia 900 eventually, but by then, consumers might be left with a bad taste in their mouths.

A high quality, well-built Smart Phone that could easily sell for $100-$150 with contract priced at $50 sounds like a better entry into the US Smart Phone market that a $200-$299 entry in my opinion. I am not much of an economist, but selling something of great quality for a low price seems like a win/win to me.

9. There’s no fanfare

Unfortunately for Nokia, it has no hype to rely on, which can only mean one thing: failure.

In all fairness, this article was written a couple of days before Nokia pulled in all the “Best of CES” awards.

Perhaps he didn’t see the line to get into Nokia’s Press Conference on Tuesday at CES. Maybe he didn’t see how many journalists didn’t even get inside to see the Lumia 900 announcement with Stephen Elop, Steve Ballmer, and Ralph de la Vega or maybe he was one left in that long hallway. There was plenty of fanfare at that CES.

10. There’s a general lack of market understanding

Wouldn’t it make sense to wait a week, so it can get more headlines? Nokia’s management seems to misunderstand the technology industry. By doing so, it’s hurting its chances of succeeding.

When all eyes are on CES, why would you wait a week later when all those eyes are sleeping off their CES trips? Why put off announcing such an awesome device? The fact that Nokia received so much attention and stole the show at CES shows they did a great job and understand marketing quite well.

Summary

The Microsoft and Nokia partnership seemed as weird as Microsoft and Palm with the Treo a few years ago, but it worked out for Palm and I feel as if  it will work out for Nokia. When I first learned of this marriage, I was very skeptical, but I am sold now. With Nokia’s solid rep and Microsoft’s promising mobile OS, there should be success moving forward. Right now, Nokia has very little smart phone presence in the US and Windows Phone is well behind Android and iOS, meaning that any progress is good. Give this a year and let’s talk then.

If this article is exactly what the author wanted to get as a result, good job Don! It worked.

Nokia’s Windows Phone Strategy Will Win: 10 Reasons Why is a post by Chris Leckness from Gotta Be Mobile.

The story everyone interested in seeing sales of new devices and gadgets wants to push is the Utlrabook story. And when you see headlines like this: 2011 Was the Second Worst Year for US PC Sales in History Except At Apple, you can get the sense of which way the wind is blowing.

Let’s face it, Tablets, following hot on the heels of Netbooks, caused some severe disruption in the computer industry. And where it hurt folks who make and market these things for a living was price. Netbooks closed some doors for the big dollar devices as it opened the eyes of consumers on the value proposition. Tablets followed suit. The magical $1000 and up price tag that makes margins a little more comfortable disappeared in many quarters, because there were cheaper (and smaller) alternatives that fit more into how consumers really spend their time computing.

But Apple held its own (and grew) with its high margin proposition. And, just like everyone played follow the leader with Tablets, it appears that the Ultrabook push is an attempt to not only follow the success of Apple’s Macbook Air, but also Apple’s business model.

The question is not will it work, the question is how well it will work and in the end that story will be told in two chapters. Price point will be chapter one. Given that every Ultrabook will be thin, bordering on light, and essentially offer many of the same features, it will all come down to price. Thin and pretty may be in, but consumers are going to focus on the price point. And from what I’m seeing OEMs think that the territory between $1000 and $1500 is the sweet spot. I’m not sure if that is a safe bet or not, but I tend to lean towards the not. The second chapter will be all about Windows 8. Let’s face it, Microsoft and an entire industry are planning, hoping, and working to make Windows 8 not just another big roll out, but a game changing roll out. Game changing in the hopes that influencers will talk about nothing else this summer and fall heading into the next holiday selling season.

Don’t get me wrong here. We’ve seen some interesting differentiation among some of the early Ultrabook candidates. And, I’m sure quite a few Ultrabooks will be sold with Windows 8 on them and I’m betting that this time next year we’ll be seeing a significant resurgence on everything associated with Windows 8 equipped hardware. But the real question will be how consumers conditioned to hardware prices below $700, will feel about prices that bring back flashbacks to the days before Netbooks and Tablets. After all, the Ultrabook phenomenon (if it becomes one) is really a marketing move more than it is anything else.

What’s So Ultra about Ultrabooks? is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

It all takes place in Las Vegas, the magical kingdom, where night is turned into day and hopes and dreams abound. The smoke and mirrors that make up CES 2012 require eagle eyes to sort through all the hype (and incredible email filters to sort through all of the press releases.) A good amount of what we’ll see will never make it into the hands of consumers, but this is the land of hopes and dreams. It is also the time where Apple dominates everyone else by not showing up.

As has been my custom the last several years I’ll be watching from afar this year and commenting on the themes and trends we see emerging. Intriguingly it makes it easier to spot trends, both negative and positive, when you’re not caught up in the grind that can be the show. That’s not to criticize anyone attending the show on the ground.  It’s a blast. I’m sure Xavier, Josh, and the rest will have a blast and there’s a big piece of me that wishes I was there with them.

But in the meantime, here’s a list of things to consider as you digest the news.

These first three fall into a broad category for just about any gadget you hear about.

• If a device can’t be touched at the show by bloggers or reporters you won’t see it until late fall of 2012 at the earliest. If ever.
• If there is no release date or the release date is “later in 2012″ then you know there are still quite a few things to workout.
• If there is no price point announced then you know that all the parts and suppliers haven’t been nailed down yet.

These next items relate more to Tablets and Slates specifically.

• If new device is being pitched by using the iPad as a comparison tool instead of the devices own features and benefits then you probably don’t want to take it too seriously.
• Listen for what version of Android the device will be running. Anything being talked about at CES 2012 that isn’t going to run Ice Cream Sandwich out of the box shouldn’t merit your full consideration. You’ll hear lots of promises that it will get Ice Cream Sandwich soon. Vague answers about upgrade paths should raise questions not excitement.
• This year we’ll hear about how a new device will also compete with the Amazon Kindle. Again, if it doesn’t have it’s own juice, we don’t care.
• If there isn’t a price point attached, we don’t care.

And some other things to look out for this year.

• About those Ultrabooks. Thin is in. Great. Everyone will have a thin Ultrabook. What else is cooking under that thin hood?
• TV, TV, TV. Or should I say, Apple TV. Everyone is talking some sort of way to grab your remote. And as always Apple dominates the conversation without even making an announcement. Keep in mind that all the tech innovation promised will depend on the media conglomerates cooperating.
• Ice Cream Sandwich. This will be the show about Ice Cream Sandwich. We’ll see lots of promises. Many won’t be fulfilled. The question those covering the show should ask any rep is “when is the release date?”
• Smartphones. There will be more than we can keep up with. Everything will be focused on Ice Cream Sandwich and rightly so. Look for dates of releases. You won’t find any.
• This is Microsoft’s last year at CES. This is a big year for Microsoft and it will be fascinating to watch what Microsoft lays on the line in Vegas. But then again, other shows are becoming the real proving ground for new moves later in the year.

How to Watch the Great CES 2012 Circus is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

For example, Apple gained ground in the Top Mobile OEM category, a measurement of which companies sell the most actual phones. From August to November Apple went from 9.8% to 11.2% marketshare, no doubt owing to the introduction of the iPhone 4S and the price drop on the iPhone 4 and 3GS.

Apple is in 4th place on the OEM list, but iOS is the second most popular mobile operating system for smartphones at 28.7% marketshare. Android is on top at 46.9%, having gained 3.1% share since August. Perhaps coincidentally, RIM’s marketshare is down by exactly that amount in the same timeframe.

Android has almost half of the mobile marketshare thanks to the glut of Android handsets available. Three of the five top OEMs make Android phones, and you can find them on pretty much any U.S. carrier, even pre-paid ones, and at good prices.

These numbers don’t reflect the 3.7 million Android devices activated over Christmas weekend. With Android so dominant I wonder why it is that its users still get little love from developers.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about how Apple’s App Store generates twice as much revenue as Android for devs, but Android has more free apps. However, apps that go with the freemium model on Android make more money than those on iOS.

It’s understandable that developers would want to put their effort into what will make them the most money, but given that Android marketshare is growing and that it is possible to make money yet satisfy Android users’ love of free things, why not tap into that 46.9% of the market?

And the revenue generating excuse falls apart for apps whose revenue comes not from the app itself, but from the service behind it. A commenter on the above linked post points out that: “ESPN’s app was total garbage on Android and took forever to get updates,” and “Android versions seem to have less features for no good reason and less polish for no good reason.”

I’ve noticed this, too. HootSuite’s Android app is atrocious when compared to the iOS version, for instance, and as a paying customer of that service I get annoyed every time I have to deal with it via my phone. I’m sure any number of you could call out specific apps and companies for shoddy development, slow updates, and fewer features. (In fact, I encourage you to in the comments.)

Small companies or independent developers facing this problem is understandable. Big companies have no excuse.

Given that it is possible to make money off of Android apps  — go freemium, insert ads, offer a free and pro/paid version — and that Android owners outnumber iPhone ones (and have for some time), it’s time for devs to step up and start paying more attention to Android.

Android Smartphone Marketshare Rises; So Why Don’t Devs Love Us? is a post by K. T. Bradford from Gotta Be Mobile.

A group of Boston theatres are considering setting aside ‘tweet seats’ for customers to purchase from which they can share their experiences while a play is going on. This is something that other theatres have been experimenting with for at least a couple of years now. Theatre folk around the web are looking at this a bit askance. From what I’m seeing many think this is a bad idea. But I think most feel that this is only the beginning.

I run a small professional theatre and I’ll tell you straight up I wouldn’t set aside “tweet seats” for our customers. There are several reasons for this.

Our theatre is small. We do a live “curtain” or welcome speech before each performance. At the conclusion of it we remind patrons to turn off their phones and put their cameras away. We usually do this with some sort of joke, and in fact some repeat customers eagerly await how we frame the now-ubiquitous announcement. There’s quite a light show that happens when we get to this part of the speech as customers reach into their pockets or dive into their purses to turn off their phones. Smartphone screens are so bright that in a darkened theatre it looks like some sort of chain reaction beginning to erupt. It would have to be disrupting to see those bright screens shinning for both the performer and fellow audience members during the progress of a show. Granted the folks in Boston are thinking of setting aside a section of seats, and I’m guessing this is to minimize that distraction.

But I prefer to think of this in the way that a local movie house, Alamo Drafthouse Cinema handles it. Prior to a movie audiences get the no-talking reel everyone is familiar with. Alamo does this with a bit of a threat. Simply put they state that if you’re disruptive then they will remove you with no refund in sight. They also say that texting, tweeting and the like are considered talking. It seems to work and creates a more civil viewing experience. I’ve yet to see one Smartphone screen light up during a movie there.

But there’s another reason as well. There are different kinds of live performances: music, theatre, sporting events, (note that some sport venues clamp down on customers bringing Tablets into stadiums), community events, school events, etc… In some of these instances I can see how the informality of the event can create a situation where tapping a few characters into a smartphone could be deemed acceptable.

However in others, like attending a play or a ballet or a symphonic concert in my way of thinking doing so just seems rude to both your fellow attendees and the performers. Something tells me in the years to come, sadly, I’ll be in the minority with that opinion.

The tension or friction that this causes (or will cause) is going to be something to watch. I have to say that nothing makes me happier than to watch a crowd at our theatre during the intermission or during the pre-show, sending messages to their Facebook pages (or to ours) or letting folks know where they are and what they are doing. That kind of word-of-mouth works well for us at our venue and we’re seeing that increase.

But I have to hope that for at least the 2 hours or so that a play or other event is unfolding that folks would refrain from this activity. Our mobile lives and our other lives keep blending together in more and more ways these days. Call me old fashioned, but I think there need to be some instances of our lives where we can shut down and turn off.

But then maybe I’m wrong here. Bertolt Brecht is known for wishing that there could be “smokers theatre” where men could puff away on cigars during a play. He felt this would create a relaxing environment for the men (who were usually brought to these events by their wives) so that they could more easily participate and view the play in a relaxed manner. I’m not sure if this is completely analogous or not, but it seems to me that it brings up some of the same social barriers that we associate with being in a communal audience to share a moment in time from a performance.

‘Tweet Seats’ for Theatre Events: I Say Let’s Not Go There is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

Here are links to last year’s wish list as well as 2009, 2008, 2007 and 2006.

• Now that we’ve gotten past the “everybody needs to market a Tablet right now” phase and are moving into phase that determines who is really going to compete in this sector, I’d like to see the manufacturers acknowledge that there really isn’t that much difference between their hardware and ecosystems, so we can all move on from the ridiculous lawsuits.
• I’d like to see Amazon continue to move the Kindle Fire platform forward and become a real player in the mobile and Tablet sector. They have the resources to compete on the one feature that will drive things the most: price.
• I’d like to see Google really focus on the Tablet space with Android. Honeycomb was a farce visited on us by folks who know better. Let’s hope Ice Cream Sandwich yields a better effort when those “high class” Tablets debut in June.
• I’d like to see the pace of releases slow down enough so that early consumers aren’t forced to deal with v1.0 issues or greeted with an immediate update.
• 4G is coming. It’s here in some places. When it works. Great. Now, let’s get some mobile gadgets that can actually use it without depleting the battery so quickly. I’m tired of the one step forward, two step backwards game.
• Truth in advertising. Is that concept dead, or should we resurrect it?
• I’d like to see Siri and whatever Google’s answer to that (Majel?) will be really get some laser focus for future development.
• Apple’s iCloud is full of promise. So are politicians. Until Apple makes iCloud work seamlessly with its desktops and laptops, it’s not even a Beta. The fact that this is a cloud service with out some sort of easily accessible photo storage is laughable.
• GMail needs to live up to Google’s promises about speed and reliability. I know the push is on social at Google. But I’d rather have reliable and dependable access to email than social features.
• Let’s have some honest discussion about media streaming, online backup, always-on connectivity, and bandwidth caps.
• I’d like to see Microsoft really succeed with Windows 8 and what that means for Tablets. I fear it will only partially do so, and that won’t be enough. But I’m hoping I’m wrong.
• I’d like to see Microsoft’s Windows 8 Tablets bring about a resurgence of Ink Enabled Apps.
• I’d like to see some acknowledgment from Microsoft that OneNote is indeed a Killer App.
• I’d like to see the mobile tech and gadget industry move away from the horrible trap it has built for itself with a focus on early sales numbers. First weekend numbers are great to announce, but I’m not sure it is accurate barometer of anything other than first weekend numbers.
• In fact, I’d like to see the “horse race” for numbers about Apps and activations and whatever become less important.
• I’m hoping that Rumor Blogging dies a quick and sudden death. At least for rumors that mean absolutely nothing. Yes, company X will be releasing a new version of product Y. Only morons don’t know this to be the case and continuing to ginny up hype about this kind of common sense rumor only shows how little you think of your audience.
• It really is time for a single sign on that cuts across platforms, business models, and cuts through the nonsense.
• It is time to admit that there privacy on the web is just an illusion.
• I’d like to see RIM’s two CEOs step down. RIM needs to be shaken up badly and not just for having drunken employees misbehaving on planes.
• Thunderbolt. Whoopee! Call me when there are consumer level devices that work with it.
• As we move deeper into the battle for the living room I hope that at some point we see some forward thinking by the content controllers that acknowledges that they are probably losing money in the long run while they fight to retain control.
• I hope HP’s move to open source webOS actually becomes something. I have my doubts.
• I repeat this every year and will until we see some change. CEOs of gadget companies should be forced to unpack or unbox their products on video or when they announce the product.
• Now that the FCC and US Justice Department have actually shown that they can deal with a carrier and a US corporation (AT&T) in a responsible fashion, I’d like to see Congress at least pretend that it knows what it is doing when it tries to write laws about a technology that it doesn’t understand and doesn’t seem to care about its ignorance.
• I’d like to see Facebook go through a year without changing anything.
• I’d like to see an end to Early Termination Fees. Or at least I’d like to see consumers be able to demand rebates when a product that is overhyped doesn’t work as advertised.
• If your product isn’t ready for reviewers to touch it and use it when it is announced, then don’t announce it.
• And as always, whirled peas.

A Christmas Wish List for Mobile Geeks and Tableteers is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

I’m talking about the Great Tablet Massacre of 2011. It was supposed to be the Year of the Tablet 2.0. Indeed if you are Apple or Amazon you could probably make that claim. If you’re Barnes and Noble you are holding on and glad you’re still in the fight. If you’re Asus you’re ready to enter the game anew. But if you’re HP, RIM, Motorola, Samsung, Google, or any of the others who focused your efforts on Tablets this year, you’re retrenching and licking your wounds at best, or possibly thinking about a complete retreat. If you’re Microsoft you’re glad you decided to retreat a year ago after boastfully waving your sword in the early going (as if there was really a choice), hoping that there will be a new opportunities after the chaotic battles of 2011 sorted out the winners and the losers.

The Long Run Up To War

Before I get to the battles themselves let’s go back to the early rumblings that began the Tablet wars. In many ways it began with Microsoft’s vision of Tablet computing. The main battle to be fought back then matched the technology of those days against the vision of what a Tablet could be. But Microsoft’s found ways to create its own internal warfare by not being clear on how to market the original vision. Microsoft fought itself into corner of its own battlefield that it could neither advance or retreat from. Meanwhile its opponents were lurking, paying attention, and beginning to arm themselves.

Then came Netbooks. Asus changed the course of things with a new weapon on the battlefield: the original Eee PC. First, it walked away from Microsoft using a Linux based OS. This was a loud shot that echoed with many reverberations. Microsoft hadn’t been challenged like this before and the Notebook revolution shook Microsoft to its core. Microsoft would later reclaim this turf once consumers started to want more and Microsoft was content to extend the life of XP to keep them happy. But even as consumers did want more Asus had sneakily changed the price and value proposition, proving to consumers that they didn’t need full featured PCs to do the fundamental tasks that many ended up doing on PCs anyway. It also left an indelible impression with consumers that, for many, computers didn’t have to cost over $1000.  A low cost, low performing machine was just fine for email and most web browsing. Throw in media viewing and you had a potent weapon.

As all the players ran headlong into the Netbook wars technology was slowly improving to the point where improved battery life on low powered processors began to become the driving factor. Intel and others kept trying to make inroads with new processors, but on another front-mobile phones that were slowly gaining consumer acceptance, were doing so on the strength of processor architecture that offered a different alternative. It wasn’t perfect yet, but these processors were gaining ground.

And then mobile phones became SmartPhones. Apple changed the game with the original iPhone on all fronts. The original iPhone chased the opponents off of the field and they began to retrench, rearm and retool. Touch became viable. Computing in your hand became doable for the masses.  (We’d later learn that Apple temporarily halted its iPad plans to move the iPhone forward.) In the mad scramble to gain some advantage, Google emerged with its Android plans adding a new Superpower to the fray as Microsoft’s dominance began to fade. Nokia and RIM couldn’t (or wouldn’t) move its troops (or generals) quickly enough and the stage was set for the Tablet Wars to come.

Battle Joined

2010 dawned as The Year of the Tablet v 1.0. CES 2010 was full of boasting from the new Tablet warriors as they girded for battle. Apple wasn’t even present but dominated the thinking and the news with its soon to be announced iPad. Once it was announced, the battlefield changed. But no one could discern how. Opponents jockeyed for position waiting to see how and if Apple would define the need for this new Tablet weapon. Plans and schedules changed. And then to everyone’s surprise, (including Apple’s) the original iPad swept the field in such a dominating fashion that many of it opponents simply retreated with plans to come back and fight another day. Or another year, in the case of Microsoft.

The War Continues

2011 began with new hopes among the Tablet warriors. Google’s Honeycomb would soon take the field to save the day, with Motorola being the first Google ally to carry the Android banner onto the battlefield. HP was promising a webOS Tablet that looked ilke a serious opponent. RIM was reading from a new playbook with the Playbook. Samsung was going to also ride Android onto the field, using different flavors for different devices, and it looked like by year’s end there would be a real Tablet War going on with multiple opponents slugging it out in the marketplace. Meanwhile Apple was not resting on its laurels and Amazon was lurking.

As 2011 progressed it became clear, as in all wars, that factors such as wealth, the weather, and leadership would play an important role. Opponents with wealth focused on building their supply lines (Apple, Google, Amazon and everyone else calls them ecosystems). All eyes turned to the skies as the Cloud became an increasing component of every arsenal. Dropbox, Netflix, and Angry Birds played Switzerland becoming important neutral allies for all comers. Google and Amazon cut their deals with the content companies and the rest promised ecosystems would arrive once they took the field. That proved to be a strategic mistake. Weather events in Japan and Thailand affected supply chains and only the nimble and the prosperous were able to shift their plans accordingly.

But eventually, one by one the opponents mounted their steeds and appeared on the battlefield. First Motorola with its Honeycomb banner unfurling in the breeze rushed into the fray. Both its hardware and surprisingly the software was found lacking and Motorola took a beating. Motorola would later in the year sell its Mobile division to Google in a promise of battles yet to come. Then Samsung began to unfold its campaign with an array of weapons that sometimes confused the marketplace and itself. Mimicking Motorola, a part of Samsung’s strategy was to use Honeycomb, but unfortunately, Motorola had already proven that Google’s Tablet OS had flaws. As Samsung looked like it might see some early success, Apple opened another front in the war by unleashing its lawyers on Samsung (and HTC). This sewed uncertainty and disrupted everyone’s focus, forcing a shift in resources in a patent acquisition war that threatened to overcome the war for the marketplace. The great promise of Honeycomb faltered, and Google and its allies cast their glances towards a better future with Ice Cream Sandwich as they licked their wounds by fighting off the lawyers.

RIM launched its assault with the Playbook, and demonstrated that leadership and vision were not just important but vital components of any successful strategy. It QNX OS was generally liked, its hardware was so-so, but for a company that made its once fearsome reputation on email and messaging, it sadly left those arrows in its quiver without firing its most potent weapon. Undaunted, RIM continued to fight, gradually giving ground with price cuts, but the leadership challenges unveiled in the Tablet Wars have probably crippled the company forever. RIM guessed so badly here that it couldn’t even rationalize adopting the motto of many a defeated Tablet warrior, saying that its effort was intended for the Enterprise.

And then there is HP. After investing heavily with the acquisition of Palm, HP went its own way promising a webOS Tablet that looked to all watching like it would be a real competitor. HP had the infrastructure, webOS was generally thought to be a good OS, and the prospects on the day of battle  were good. It launched its assault and then mysteriously clammed that it hadn’t launched yet, even with troops on the field. That move heralded bad things to come. Either the generals didn’t know what their troops were doing, or were not interested in the fight to begin with. Sadly, after committing strongly, HP left the field severely wounded, forcing a change of leadership, and relegating webOS to a possible insurgent campaign under the banner of Open Source.

As autumn dawned, Apple still held all the strategic advantages. Google and its allies were badly wounded with Motorola and Samsung hoping for new life in the next year. RIM and HP had removed themselves from the field of battle with crippling losses. And Amazon was ready to make its move.

With a strong supply line and resources to match, Amazon went its own way and ignored the me-too Tablet frenzy that drove others to try and meet Apple head on. The Kindle Fire Tablet launched as what many consider a decent, but flawed weapon. But it outflanked all the competition with a march on a key objective: price point. Amazon faced competition with the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet, but the long view seems to pit Amazon more against Apple based on resources and the supply lines available. Amazon certainly looks armed to wage war in a long campaign and many feel that Amazon has only begun to fight as 2011 draws to a close.

The War Going Forward

Surveying the battlefield as we head into 2012, we see three major opponents still standing: Apple, Google and its allies, and Amazon. Microsoft is preparing to launch its campaign in 2012 and carries as much baggage as it does promise on its approach to the battlefield it helped create. Asus is poised to carry the Android banner into battle yet again with the Transformer Prime. Apple is poised to retain its dominance and lose some of its luster if it can’t get its iCloud Air Force to fulfill its promise. Amazon won’t be resting on its laurels and will certainly surprise. Google is pointing towards the middle of the year as when it will have its newly armed forces ready to go. Google should be concerned that its eager allies, and the many insurgents it allows to use its software don’t spoil its fighting trim by releasing their own ICS Tablets too soon, or too crippled to put up a good fight.

The Tablet Wars continue.

The Great Tablet Massacre of 2011 is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

2011 proved to be make or break year for some in the mobile tech world as we saw huge successes  (Apple and Google, and potentially Amazon) and huge failures (RIM, HP). We also saw significant personnel change at some major companies. We’ll likely see more in 2012. (Check out how I graded on my 2011 predictions here.)

The turbulence and disruption brought about by the rush to market a Tablet seems to be settling down a bit as most of the players have recognized that the rat race of the last two years proved that creating a Tablet requires a substantially different effort than it did to compete in the age before the iPad. Tablets will still be a big force, but I think strategies are moving on to other targets effectively yielding the playing field to Apple for the time being. Google is still trying to compete, but by saying it won’t have a “high class” Tablet ready to go until June, Google runs the risk of being in a three-way race as Microsoft finally makes its late play. And let’s not forget that Amazon may be a very successful dark horse when all is said and done.

And in reality Microsoft will be the big news in 2012. The expectations are high for Windows 8, Microsoft’s Tablets, and well, just about everything else it does, with the exception of its Xbox and Kinect business. As I say below, Microsoft needs to hit a home run in 2012. And even if it does it may not be enough to win the game. But as next predictions for 2013 begin to roll around, you can bet that Microsoft will be a big topic of focus at year end.

The Big News

• Apple and Google will continue to dominate the mobile news for the early part of the year until-
• Microsoft will be making big news with Windows 8, Tablets, and everything we’ve been waiting to really see for 2 years now. It will be a make or break year for Microsoft in terms of the public’s perception.
• Apple’s aggressive patent wars will continue casting a pall on the entire industry.
• Amazon will continue to gain influence as a mobile force by going its own way.
• June will be a big month for Google as Eric Schmidt says that’s when we’ll see Google TV everywhere and “high end” Android Tablets.
• The legislative battles in Congress over SOPA and PIPA will continue with most folks not really paying attention, including those who are charged with voting on the legislation.
• Ultrabooks will be labeled the next big thing. They won’t be.
• The push to control the living room will continue. No one will gain control over the living room and the battles will rage.
• A new update to Android, iOS, Windows Phone, or some other system will be released and within 24 hours there will be a major bug or flaw in each one.
• The carriers will continue their wicked ways but more customers will start to push back.
• Nokia will look to bounce back and extend its US presence on the back of Microsoft. It will make inroads but not at the level it is hoping.
• RIM will come closer to burying itself after having no more feet left to shoot.
• There will be a change at the top at RIM.
• Voice Control: Siri, how many competitors will you have in 2012?
• The 4G wars will continue unbated but will be slowed down a bit by issues with battery life and uptime issues.

Google

• Google will continue to tighten its focus and improve its design ethic.
• Google will face more trouble with governments and regulators.
• Google will once again try to clamp down on standards for Android but will not succeed.
• Ice Cream Sandwich will continue to be the story (until the next version gets hinted) but Google will have to contend with the morass it has created when carriers and OEMs delay updating existing devices.
• There will be ICS updates promised for devices shown at CES 2012 that will not see an update before the end of 2012.
• Google TV will still be looked at as a failure.
• Google + integration in Google’s products will continue to proliferate.

Apple

• Apple will take some needed lumps for a less than spectacular and less than speedy follow through on the iCloud release.
• Apple will release a new iPhone and a new iPad. The cycle will continue.
• The question “where are the Thunderbolt accessories?” will begin to haunt Apple.
• We’ll start to see stories that blame Tim Cook for Apple’s problems.
• Apple will not release a 7 inch iPad.
• Apple will make moves towards taking over the TV market but will have early stumbles.

Microsoft

• Windows 8 will be heralded as a big success. Microsoft has to hit a home run with Windows 8 on many levels. They will hit a triple.
• Steve Ballmer will step down.
• Steve Sinofsky will step down after Windows 8 is released.
• The Metro UI on Windows 8 will be equally praised and condemned.
• Stories that say most enterprise customers see no reason to upgrade to Windows 8 will be a dime a dozen.

The Cloud

• Now that the majority of the big players have their own cloud for syncing and streaming (some) media, we’ll start to see promotions and tie-ins that seek to differentiate.
• The real tension with Cloud Computing has always been how the carriers treat data plans. This tension will increase as the year goes on and folks start to discover the limits that they have chosen.

Amazon

• Amazon has extended its beachhead into mobile computing with the Kindle Fire and will continue to  enlarge its impact. Amazon has the room to maneuver on price point that no one else does and will use that to its advantage.
• Amazon’s Kindle family will expand in 2012.

Best of the Rest

• Also ran and follow the leader Tablet makers will start to abandon the form factor for greener pastures.
• Facebook will continue to iterate and irritate its user base but will continue to grow, alarmingly so.
• Social networks and applications will reach a saturation point. We’ll see trends begin to point downward.
• The Rumor Rampage in tech blogging will start to see a backlash from readers.
• The US Presidential election will see plenty of action on the web and in social media and will generate even more stories in the mass media about how we need to keep the web and social media under control.
• Bluetooth 4.0 will become a big story. The question will be will there be devices that support it.
• Intel will hope to make a big push that actually works into mobile, but it may be too little too late.
• We’ll start to see more governments trying to clamp down on cameras and video during public protests.

2012 Predictions: Warner’s Take-All Eyes on Microsoft is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

For me, the battery life, by far, is the worst part about this phone. It has honestly got to the point where I am no longer having an enjoyable experience with the Galaxy Nexus.

For the past couple of days, I have been using my Galaxy Nexus as my main phone, doing all of the things I used to do on my iPhone 3GS.

Making a phone call here and there.

Sending a few text messages a day.

Checking sports scores and fantasy teams.

Using Facebook and Twitter.

And playing the occasional game.

If you thought I was a power user, you were wrong. I am simply the average smartphone user putting a phone through, in my opinion, average use. Don’t get me wrong, I knew 4G LTE battery life was bad, but to be perfectly honest, I was not expecting the experience to be this bad.

For four days, I kept a close eye on my Galaxy Nexus’ battery life. Friday and Sunday, I used it without the extended battery and on Saturday and Monday I used it with the extended battery on board.

Without the extended battery on, I was able to pull down somewhere around 10-11 hours of battery life. With the Galaxy Nexus extended battery on, somewhere around 13 hours.

To me, this is unacceptable.

This is a phone I paid over $400 for. That price included the cost of the phone itself, the extended battery and a bunch of tax.

At this point, I should not be paying that kind of money to be a test subject in Verizon’s little 4G LTE rat race. I touched on not wanting to be a lab rat over the summer and I thought that Verizon and the manufacturers would have solved this problem by the end of the year. 

Guess not.

I thought that they would have been solved in the two month gap between announcement and release.

Guess not.

The Galaxy Nexus is not the first 4G LTE device to hit shelves. Nope, that accolade belongs to the atrocious HTC ThunderBolt that needs an extended battery the size of a brick just to hold an average charge.

That’s unacceptable too.

Both instances are making Apple look extremely smart for not pushing out an LTE iPhone in 2011.

So, like any normal person, I’ve gone in search of a way to improve battery life, beyond my own knowledge. One trick I saw was to switch the phone to 3G and use it on Verizon’s 3G CDMA network.

Look, if I wanted a 3G phone, I would have bought the Droid 3 or the Droid X2. I forked over and will continue to fork over a ton of cash to Verizon for 4G LTE. I want to use those speeds without them destroying my experience with the phone.

And again, I am an average user.

Now, it’s possible that this is going to be fixed with an update somewhere down the road. There are whispers of a kernel issue that keeps the phone awake, even when the screen is off.

Maybe that’s the case.

But at this point, while the Galaxy Nexus is a home run in the world of Android, it’s more like a double or a triple in the world of smartphones.

I would understand if I were a power user seeing this kind of battery life, you know, using Netflix or playing a game every second of the day, but at the end of the day I’m not.

I’m just someone that would absolutely love to get a full day, maybe even 20 hours, out of his smartphone and at this point the Galaxy Nexus doesn’t give me that.

And to me, that’s unacceptable, especially when this is a device that has a $300 price tag and the Nexus name attached to it.

So I’ve got two words for Google, Samsung and Verizon, two words that have probably crossed the minds of those who just bought the Galaxy Nexus:

Fix it.

–

How has your battery life been, folks?

Verizon Galaxy Nexus Poor Battery Life Is Unacceptable is a post by Adam Mills from Gotta Be Mobile.

The one thing that is predictable as the sun rising in the morning is that things will constantly change. 2011 was certainly a year for that, although many of the main players remained exactly where they were heading into the year. Tablets and mobile tech continues to dominate the news and the markets, as well as continue to cause great disruption. So much so, that we saw two major players (RIM and HP) take some serious lumps that threatened those companies to their core.

Like it or not, Apple and Google continue to dominate mobile tech and Microsoft is still waiting for next year. It also looks like the economy, mother nature, and market turmoil are having as much impact on things going forward as key individuals are.

So, below is how I grade myself on what predictions I made last year. I think I did reasonably well.

Stay tuned for predictions for the New Year coming soon.

The Big Stories

• Smartphones and Tablets will dominate the gadget sector of the industry. (Accurate)
• Apple will continue to dominate the news and the industry because it has successfully changed the calendar to fit its aims. Apple owns the calendar and influences everybody else’s decisions, coverage and success. (Accurate)
• The media will be happy to say that Apple still rules or that Apple is being beaten. Either way it will be a good story. (Accurate)
• Google will also dominate and Android will continue to be one of the largest stories of the year, if not the largest story. (Accurate)
• Tablet fatigue will begin to set in by the end of the year. While we will see lots of new Tablets, the introduction of a Tablet enhanced Android OS, the hardware won’t offer anything really newer than what we already have, and after the buzz over iPad 2 and Honeycomb Tablets subsides there will be a lot of stories asking “what’s next?” (Somewhat accurate: Tablet fatigue hasn’t really set in, but we are looking ahead to what’s next because of the failure for Tablets beyond the iPad to really take hold. But then again, there’s Amazon. The hardware still doesn’t offer much new.)
• Governments and Old School Media Corporations will fight tooth and nail to hang on to control. They will have some success because they own the content but the Internet will start to push back in ways that will create tension. (Accurate and increasingly becoming a major issue. )
• The carriers will be hyping 4G and and hoping that no one notices how consumer unfriendly their data plans really are or the fact that the speeds aren’t really 4G. (Accurate)

Other Fronts
Apple

• Again, Cupertino will dominate the news and the product cycle. iPad 2 will be big news and continue to be what everyone compares everything else to. (Accurate on many levels from products to the death of Steve Jobs.)
• Apple will continue to innovate in its laptop business and push that segment of the industry further into chaos. (Accurate. See Ultrabooks.)
• Apple will continue to struggle with Big Media and Publishing Companies and not get the deals it wants for content. No one is going to make the iTunes mistake again. Or at least they hope not. (Not Accurate. Apple got what it wanted with iTunes Match.)
• Apple will not release a 7 inch iPad. (Accurate)
• The next iPhone will be announced as another game changer. It won’t be. (Somewhat Accurate. The hardware certainly wasn’t. Siri is a potential game changer. But only as potential.)
• We will start to hear increasing talk about Steve Jobs leaving Apple. (Accurate. And he did leave and later die.)

Google

• Google holds many of the trump cards and has eager eyes watching it with intense scrutiny. Android will be the big story but Chrome OS will get some play but not until later in the year. (Somewhat accurate. Android was and continues to be a big story. Chrome OS surfaced with Chromebooks and seems to be a lackluster success so far. )
• Android fragmentation will become a bigger buzzword than it already is. The question will be if it is really a problem or not. (Somewhat accurate. It’s still and issue. The question still remains how relevant it is.)
• Honeycomb Tablets will be “the next big thing.” There will be a lot of these “next big things.” Too many in fact, making it tough for consumers to gauge what’s what. (Somewhat accurate. Honeycomb Tablets were the next big thing. Then we discovered Honeycomb wasn’t any good and we didn’t see too many Honeycomb Tablets, but enough to get the patent lawyers involved. Now it’s on to Ice Cream Sandwich.)
• Eric Schmidt will continue to make stupid statements. (Accurate)

Microsoft

• Windows Phone 7 is Microsoft’s big hope (outside of Kinect). It will continue to lag behind in 2011 due not to product problems but PR and marketing problems. (Accurate, even with what is hailed as a great update with Mango.)
• Microsoft will release a CE based Tablet of some kind. It will not be a success immediately. (Not Accurate)
• Windows 8 will become a big story. (Accurate)
• There will be more calls for Steve Ballmer to step down. (Accurate)

Other Mobile Players

• HTC and Samsung will continue to dominate in the handheld sector. LG will make some inroads in the US, but not enough. (Accurate)
• RIM will finally let someone hold its Playbook. It might actually make it to market. It will fail. (Accurate)
• HP will release its WebOS Tablets. These devices will become a significant competitor. (Largely inaccurate. The webOS Tablets were released. HP killed it, then resurrected it for a short time, then open sourced it.)
• Motorola will continue its resurrection thanks largely to Google and Android Tablets and Android smartphones. (Somewhat accurate. Motorola Mobility was bought by Google and looks to have a leg up in the future.)
• Talk of NVidia’s Tegra 2 will quickly fade as NVidia starts hyping Tegra 3 about the time that Tegra 2 devices start getting shipped. (Accurate)
• Dell will continue its decline. (Accurate)

The Best of the Rest

• Cloud Computing will gain even more focus but the concept will take some hits because of privacy and bandwidth issues. (Accurate)
• Verizon and Apple will launch a Verizon iPhone (Accurate)
• Net Neutrality will become a bigger issue once people realize that the FCC’s new rules essentially say there are two Internets: One for mobile and one for more traditional broadband connections in the home or office. (Somewhat accurate)
• Amazon will continue to dominate in the eBook Wars. Google Books will have little impact. Barnes & Noble will stay a respectable competitor. (Accurate)
• Facebook will continue its march to Internet dominance but will begin to lose its luster by year end. (Somewhat accurate. Facebook shows no sign of losing its luster.)
• Notebook and Laptop makers will focus on slim and thin trying to duplicate Apple’s success with the MacBook Air. (Accurate)
• We’ll see Tablets in all sorts of shapes and sizes. Debates about which size is best will continue forgetting that a Tablet experience is a very personal thing and that choice is a good thing. (Somewhat Accurate. We did see different sizes, but not that many different shapes. Apple and its lawyers seized on this against Samsung. We still forget how personal a device Tablets become when we compare the differences.)

Grading My 2011 Predictions is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

The what seemed like age old passionate battle between Windows and Apple fans has found new fertile soil in a rapidly increasingly man the barricades struggle to end all struggles between Apple and Google’s Android fans. Those that engage the most are both accurately and derisively referred to as fan boys/girls. Too often the passion devolves from passionate fanaticism to a childish condemnation of the opposing view.

For the most part, as entertaining a commentary as this may be on the human condition, its generally harmless.  On other levels though it has become sadly vicious and at times painfully pathetic. I often wonder how some one new to these debates feels while attempting to sort through the detritus left dangling in comment threads on blog posts these days.

In the last several days two of tech writers I admire have been engaging in a public spat over the iOS and Android thing. The Verge’s Joshua Topolsky kicked this off with a forum post calling out MG Siegler on his review of the Galaxy Nexus and Android 4.0. The title of the post references the leavings that equine animals visit on any surface that happens to be around when it is time for the digestive system to make its purge. Topolsky is extremely passionate in his points and whether intentionally or not, sort of hangs the Android/iOS fan boy canvas into a class warfare frame.

Of course, this being the Internet, Siegler fires back in a post similarly full of passion and similarly titled. He tries to move the argument onto a plane about tech and gadget writing in general. I imagine this will go on a bit longer, but then again, the burning passion behind both of the posts might have already cast enough heat to consume the argument.

I won’t bother to defend or rebut either of these two bloggers. They both make good points. Some I agree with. Some I disagree with. But then, that’s the point. Far too often I believe the reactions that we have to strong opinions in reviews have an incorrect starting point. Simply put, in my view, far too often some assume that reviewers or critics are trying to tell them what to think, instead of just simply using the opinions as a springboard to simply thinking.  If reviews or critiques are read within that simple context then the discourse surrounding the opinions becomes, well, more grown up.

The two posts are also quite entertaining and there is certainly value in that from both a reader’s point of view and a business point of view. Reviewers, op-ed writers, critics, don’t develop a following if they aren’t capable of being at least somewhat entertaining when stating their opinions. Readers return to read opinions they enjoy and trust. Note that I don’t intend trust to mean agree with.

I would venture that if we only read writers that give us opinions we agree with than we are only looking for confirmation of something we hope is right as opposed to something we know is right. It’s like burying your head in the sand hoping you won’t see a different outcome that may challenge your thinking. Or perhaps it’s like a dung beetle rolling up a ball of manure. You can admire the single minded attention to the task, but unless you have the perspective of the dung beetle, you’re still in the shit.

To put it another way: these are just phones and opinions about phones, people.

Why Is Our Passion for Mobile Gadgets Turning Us All Into Dung Beetles? is a post by Warner Crocker from Gotta Be Mobile.

The hard part for me is that I want a new phone, but don’t necessarily need one.

As many of you know, I have an iPhone 3GS and am currently off contract. Problem is, for the most part, Apple’s iOS 5 update has worked like a dream on my aging phone. In fact, it has worked so well, that it stopped me from running out and getting the iPhone 4S when many of those around me fell victim.

Yes, I passed on the iPhone 4S.

Then, October and November rolled around and I started thinking about either the HTC Rezound or the Motorola Droid RAZR.

But, for many reasons, I passed on the Droid RAZR and HTC Rezound as well.

There were other phones I passed on as well.

The webOS smartphone I can’t buy. The BlackBerry 7 devices that you couldn’t pay me to own. The Windows Phones with intriguing software but obsolete hardware.

Time and time again, I looked at these phones and debated my decision with my co-workers. With my friends. Even with my technologically inept parents. And time and time again, I kept coming back to two phones that weren’t any of those.

The Samsung Galaxy Nexus for Verizon. The device with 5,000 release dates.

And the iPhone 5. A device that may or may not be 5,000 different things.

One of them, the Galaxy Nexus, comes out tomorrow on Verizon for $300 with a new two-year contract. The other is assumed to be coming out wither in the summer of 2012 or in the fall.

Nobody seems to know.

The Galaxy Nexus has 4G LTE.

The iPhone 5 might have 4G LTE.

The Galaxy Nexus has Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, an operating system that appears to be the best mobile software that Google has ever released.

The iPhone 5 will probably run iOS 6, an operating system that will probably be the best mobile software that Apple has ever released

It’s a tough choice to say the least.

But after a lot of thought, a lot of debate, a lot of lifting logs and punching animal carcasses – oh wait, that was Rocky, I have finally reached my decision.

I am buying the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

Tomorrow, I plan to waltz into a Verizon store and plop down a wad of cash for a Galaxy Nexus from Verizon.

I’ve already explained to you why the Galaxy Nexus is the phone that I, and hopefully you, have been waiting for. But let’s recap, very quickly.

• Android 4.0 – Right Out of the Box: I don’t want to wait for Android 4.0 to arrive on my phone. I want it now. The only phone that affords me this is the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.
• Fast Updates: The Galaxy Nexus is a Nexus device. That means that it will likely be the first to see major Android updates from Google. Like I said, this might not sound like much, but go talk to an HTC ThunderBolt owner about the wait for Android 2.3 Gingerbread and you’ll see where I am coming from.
• Limitless Customization: Again, this is a Nexus device and that means that it’s also a developer-friendly device. I’ll be able to root and unlock the bootloader without any sort of hassle and that means I’ll be able to customize the device to my liking. Not every Android phone is afforded this. Talk to Droid RAZR owners who have a locked bootloader.
• Great Hardware: I need hardware that is going to last me. The Galaxy Nexus has a 4.65-inch Super AMOLED Plus HD (720p) Display with Curved Glass. It has a TI OMAP 4460 dual-core Cortex A9 processor clocked at 1.2GHz. It has 5MP rear camera w/ 1080p video capture. It has 32GB of storage space. It has NFC. Translation: this is a phone that is going to last me for the next two years no problem.
• 4G LTE: And finally, the Galaxy Nexus has 4G LTE data speeds, speeds that are 10 times faster than those of 3G. 4G LTE is the future and I think it’s almost a requirement for things like Netflix and Hulu. I can’t stand using either of those on my iPhone.

All of that, in my opinion, separates it from the other Android phones, Windows Phones, BlackBerry phones, and the iPhone 4S.

But, what about the iPhone 5?

Like many of you, I am tired of the waiting game.

If only this had LTE.

Had Apple released an LTE iPhone in September, you better believe I would have scooped that bad boy up, no questions asked.

But it didn’t and to be honest, I just can’t see myself using the iPhone 3GS for another 7 or 8 months, even with iOS 5 running as smooth as it is.

So, yes, I will be picking up a Galaxy Nexus on Verizon tomorrow but I think I will probably get it without a contract.

Hey, I have to keep my options open, right?

Why I Am Buying the Verizon Galaxy Nexus is a post by Adam Mills from Gotta Be Mobile.