I watched the final of this year’s The Apprentice on BBC2 this evening. I’ve been following it now and again on Sky+ whenever I’ve had the time. It’s always exciting watching one of would-be apprentices trying to go up against Sir Alan Sugar.
Anyway, whilst they’re all busy with their various tasks every week, I’ve been noticing the widespread use of Nokia 9300s (or possibly 9500s… but from what I can see, they look like 9300s most of the time). An excellent opportunity for product placement — by ensuring the team regularly used the phones on camera, Nokia (intentionally or unintentionally) has certainly associated their device with it’s business marketplace.
I can’t watch television or films without assessing and critiquing the phones that the protagonists are using.
I have a love/hate relationship with the 9000 series myself.
(I first used one for the Virgin ‘V97’ music festival in 1997. I was ‘broadcasting’ live into one of Virgin Net’s chatrooms via the 9100’s IRC facility at 9,800 baud! It was well received!)
I think they’re super phones, but the email and SMS — in fact the operating system as a whole — winds me up something chronic. I absolutely, positively, cannot stand waiting for menus to pop up and I abhore — ABHORE — waiting for screen refresh. You know when you press ‘send’ .. I want the text message to simply go. I DON’T want to hang around for 3-5 seconds while the handset struggles to verify my request and send the message to the network. While it’s doing this, it completely forgets about the screen update leaving you watching a dead screen for seconds.
Other times I very much admire the device. It’s got a stonkingly good battery. I’d like to see it with the Blackberry connect service to understand how powerful it would be as a ‘Blackberry’ replacement.
However, if you ask any 9000 series fan, there’s one thing they all adore beyond everything else: The fact that if you open up the phone whilst on a call, the speakerphone activates. And it’s a brilliant quality speakerphone.
My dad has the 9500. Almost without fail, he’ll regularly open the device to switch on the speakerphone so that he can do something on the computer and have his hands free. My brother has the 9300. He can’t stop flicking it open and turning on the speakerphone when he’s on a call. There’s something about the device.
It’s this feature that sells the device. Nokia got it 100% perfect in that respect. Yes it does contacts, diary and, at a stretch, email. It’s useful for SMS (if you can stand the stupidly slow screen updates). But the real power is the speakerphone feature.
If you caught me in a Vodafone store unawares whilst signing a new contract, you could easily sell me one. I wouldn’t mind.
Big in your pocket though. A true ‘business’ phone.
(…and congratulations to Michelle who won the series.)