Sent from my Blackberry - Please buy me :(

How is this for an advertising slogan for Blackberry: Sent from my Blackberry; DO NOT excuse typos.

We are all used to this ubiquitous line at the end of emails when people respond using their smartphones (Sent from my smartphone, please excuse typos). I thought this was a perfect line for Blackberry when it tried to make a come back recently. As someone said, customers don't buy the product, they buy a story. So, this line might have been a good one!

I started this post as a come back for my blog after almost a year of absence. I had started drafting this before the news of Blackberry being on sale came out. The news says that Blackberry is considering strategic options, including sale. I was already half way through some options that I was writing here. So, let's see if any of these gets materialized in the near future!

What could have Blackberry done? It is now trying to become a completely private company so that it can do some changes, like Dell, away from the public scrutiny. Now, there are a host of things that the company can do. Here are some based on my reading of the mobile market.

Blackberry - The Super Android
It is becoming increasingly clearer that the devices are a gateway to the stores which house applications and content for users to consume. Now, Blackberry has some pretty neat devices, especially with the latest OS and design, but they lack an application store that can match what iPhone, Android and even Windows Phone have. So, one thing they could do, and I believe this was being talked about earlier as well, is to tie up with Android and basically have BB users use applications from Android. But in this case, as I mentioned in an earlier post, why would users buy BB and not some Samsung Android phones? That is where BB would need to create a differentiation with the fact that it has more secure email and then add some other bells and whistles to the product to make it a Super Android. A Super Android that would communicate the same sort of air that a Blackberry used to before the iPhones.

Another option could be to tie up with Windows given that they have the image of a business phone, they could work out a deal with Microsoft to create some applications that help the business user effectively manage the documents, most of which are in MS software. Also, given that a lot of people access their emails between meetings (on the go), and a lot of these people just need to provide comments on the documents, it would make sense to create an application that helps users review the document and embed comments to send the document back - all via the Blackberry. I am not sure if there are existing apps that are good at this but it seems to be something I would like on my phone.

The obvious issue with tying up with Microsoft is that its own app store is not something that is a super hit (yet), so if they tie up with Microsoft, we will all have the same question we had when Nokia went for Windows Phone - "why didn't they go for Android".

Having said that, the apps for documents and stuff that business users have to do on their phones can still be done on Android, so that really seems to be the best bet for Blackberry. I had mentioned in my earlier post that Blackberry could work out a way to provide its secure email technology to other smart phones. A BB email app that connects to its servers and keeps the smart phone users happy that their emails are secure. I am sure a lot of corporates would love to have that. This option, of course, changes the company from an integrated handset maker to probably just an app development company. But I believe they could very well take both options and over time if they do a good job with their Super Androids, people would probably want to buy their handsets rather than use their app on other phones.

A friend of mine asked "Who would buy Blackberry" on his facebook wall; the options above suggest that Motorola (a Google company) may be a good suitor to create the Super Android phones. What say?

Is Apple following in Microsoft's footsteps for once?

Yes, you read the heading right. It's not the other way round. A lot of people would consider this headline as blasphemous! I plead guilty to this sin but allow me to take you through the line of thinking that lead me to this conclusion!

I recently wrote about how Mint, a business newspaper in India, is using its iPhone/iPad app to connote associations with the luxury segment in India. The basic logic is that iPhone and iPad are almost double the price of their Android (or other OS) counterparts in India. Hence iPad is looked at as a luxury purchase. Now, I wonder how this will change after the iPad mini is introduced (expected to be priced around the current Android tabs)! Will Mint lose its premium positioning or will it try to disallow its app from working on iPad's cheaper cousin? Will Apple allow apps to do that? Does it make sense to do that?

Interesting questions! But I don't want to speculate on the answers! Let us wait and watch for there is an even more interesting turn to my line of thought!

Steve Jobs felt the original iPad was always the right size!

Staying with the iPad Mini, if the pricing is not totally out of sync with the market reality, this should really give a big challenge to all Android tablets. While we were earlier talking of whether Surface can be an iPad killer or whether Nexus7 will dominate, Apple's iPad mini is by far the most serious and most convincing attempts of all to kill other tablets. I imagine it would even cannibalize the regular iPad but I am sure that Apple, being the smart marketer that they are, will create enough differentiation between the devices in terms of the hardware specs that book lovers, casual gaming enthusiasts etc go to the iPad mini while the people looking for serious fun with raw processing power (and love for screen real estate) go to the bigger iPad. 

Now, the changes that the bigger iPad may require due to the introduction of the iPad mini is where Apple appears to be following Microsoft's two tablet strategy in some ways! This might appear as a slight exaggeration as Microsoft has two different OS on its devices and screen sizes are same etc. But I can't help but smile at that probability as the bigger iPad's hardware specs will probably tend to overlap with those of the Macbook. I had concluded in an earlier post that the Surface Pro may not work well in the market if the pricing is too close to the ultrabooks. Could this happen to the original iPad as well, post introduction of the iPad Mini? Will two iPads confuse Apple's potential customers who are used to simplicity in all aspects of Apple products including the choices available? Is this why that great visionary, Steve Jobs, never wanted to introduce a smaller iPad?

What do you say? Is Apple really following Microsoft or are my grey cells just working overtime for nothing? :)

PS: You can now comment using your Facebook account. Just click on the comments link below and get started!

An iPad app can communicate more than just your content!

So, from a place where I didn't think tablets could do anything (useful) to a place when the apps on a tablet can convey your positioning in the market! The world has certainly moved on.

ET has an app for each platform, even Nokia's Symbian!

I recently noticed that Mint, one of the leading business news papers in India, has been emphasizing the availability of its iPad and iPhone app quite a lot - so much so they tend to devote a lot of adspace every day for communicating that; even full page spreads on some days! The point to note here is that while these apps have been around for a lot of time, Mint has not come up with an app on any other OS, including Android, the fastest growing mobile OS in India. In contrast, Economic Times, the market leader, has apps on all mobile platforms. 

With this approach, Mint appears to be trying to become the preferred biz news medium of the premium income segment. Apple iPhone and iPad, in India, are priced close to double that of their counterparts in Android or any other OS. So, the iPad and iPhone app positions Mint differently from Economic Times. The only other platform where they seem to have an app is for Kindle which is again a slightly niche product in terms of the Indian context. Whether that differentiation pays up or not, only time will tell but this seems to be a good strategy in line with the content of Mint and its focus on explaining the economics behind the news. The association with Rolex (as seen in the pic above) is also in sync with the image of the premium segment who would appreciate Mint's attempts to understand the underlying reasons for what is happening with the economy worldwide rather than just a focus on the stock prices of various companies.

I am sure this is not the first time such a linkage is being used to connote premium-ness but this is the first time I have noticed this being used in the tech world. Do let me know if you have seen other associations like this.

Should you have apps for all platforms? If not, how to chose the ones to go for?

But the difference in strategies by ET and Mint leads one to the question as to whether it is justified to have an app for all platforms or focus on some (remember, app development means costs)? I guess the answer would to be go for the platforms that seem to define your target segment. ET is an entrenched player with a humongous lead over Mint, not to mention it belongs to one of the biggest media houses in India, so it probably makes sense for it to have apps on all platforms as its users are probably spread across various  income segments. Mint, on the other hand, is a relatively newer player that has done very well to break the clutter in the Indian business newspaper market, so it probably wants to spend that additional dollar on only the most lucrative customers initially who would tend to appreciate its content more.

Oh, the charms of technology today! Never cease to amaze!

Can Microsoft scratch the "Surface"?

I have been reading and hearing extreme reactions to Surface, Microsoft's new tablet(s). At one extreme, people have said that Microsoft is finally ready to kill Apple! At the other extreme, people have said that this is going to die as soon as they launch it because of lack of apps ecosystem. Has Microsoft confused people by announcing two devices in one shot? One is a pure tablet (Surface RT) and another is a tablet that can become an ultrabook (Surface Pro). Most of the reviews on the internet are not talking about these two products in isolation. Most people start talking about the tablet (Surface RT) and then add the features from Surface Pro (full desktop apps, ability to become laptop etc) and it all becomes a little fuzzy and seems to sound as if this tablet from Microsoft is ready to not only "kill" iPad but also laptops! Can it really do that? Let us find out!

There are two Surface products - you should know which one you want & why!

So, for clarity sake, first let us list down features of both products separately and then understand where each of them stand. I have taken these details from CNET.com.

The table here shows the features of the two products. Surface RT is the pure tablet which will compete with the iPad and Android tablets, not to mention other Win8 RT tablets as well! The parts where it really scores are the external ports to allow greater connectivity to other devices and its compatibility with Office – so you can be more productive and actually create some content (using the new keyboard cover!) rather than just consuming it as we mostly do on our touch devices. Flexible storage options also help. But it can only run Metro apps and not your regular desktop apps, so that is a big point to consider. Microsoft has not really been able to get too many apps on its Windows Phone also. However, as I have tried to prove earlier, it does have a lot of the basic apps that people need, so number one priority for Microsoft should be to bust the (half-true) myth that it does not have apps. Yes, it does not have as many apps as Apple and Android but its working towards it and it seems to have enough apps for the average user. So, Microsoft, please please please can you showcase a lot of apps in your advertisements of the Surface because you have done a miserable job with Windows Phone?

Is Surface Pro the "ultimate" device?

Moving to Surface Pro, this is the product that has the full power of a laptop and can serve as a new product that is both a tablet and a laptop. This will run the full Win8 and support both Metro apps and the desktop apps. There are lots of people who have raised doubts about Windows8 as Microsoft seems to always run into troubles with a new product (remember Vista?) – they fix it later and then come up with a better product (Windows7) but that image needs to be worked on. If they don't deliver well on the OS this time around, it is going to be an uphill ride from the word go! But it looks good and MS did a good job with the Windows Phone 7 also, so fingers crossed.

Now, a lot has been said about the Surface Pro being the ultimate device given its ability to work as a tablet and as a laptop. I agree that it does meet my idea of the ultimate device as well. However, I have some doubts in my mind. While these may or may not matter in your situation, my motivation behind listing out these points is to bring this point that mixing all in one may not be the only thing in the world for some people.

Can you use the Surface Pro on your bed or on your lap?

Can you put this on TOP of your LAP?

If I have to use the Surface as a laptop, I need to get the kickstand out and open up the magnetically attached cover/keyboard. While all those gorgeous pics in shining colours do impress, my doubt pertains to the actual target segment of such devices. A lot of these people will be the high flying category who will need to use their devices to work productively while in transit, at the airport, in the car, on the bed in the hotel room etc. However, the Surface seems to be useful as a laptop only when it is placed on a flat surface (forgive the pun). I can't imagine it being useful when I want to use it on "top" of my "lap" because of the wafer thin keyboard which may not be able to respond properly in the absence of a flat surface beneath it. The screen also needs a flat surface to allow the kickstand to do its magic. Having said that, not all buyers would probably face this issue 'cos some may be more than willing to use it as a computer on the table but I wanted to put that point out for consideration. If you look at the Surface from the side, you can see how much flat surface it needs to work as a pure laptop with keyboard.

Laptop and tablet in one is fine but some times two is better than one!

Next doubt is with respect to the fact that the ultimate device is a tablet and a laptop and makes me happy that I own two items when I paid for only one. But someone like my daughter may not be that happy! My daughter likes to play kids games and lots of other stuff on touch devices. So, in today's world, I could give the tablet to her so that she can play on it while I want to do some productive work on the laptop. When she is fed up of the touch games and wants to play some real games with her Barbie, I can use the tablet for my own use. But if the tablet and the computer are one and the same - how do we do that? Point is that most families will need to buy two devices anyway because of such dynamics. It is not a point against the Surface but a point to consider. Now, you could go ahead and buy two Surfaces - RT  as a real tablet and Pro as a "laptop" but then you may really go and buy a laptop as well. Food for thought!

Do you use your tablet sitting on a table or lying on your bed?

The last point is something again related to how people generally use their iPads (and other tablets). It is clearly more of a consuming device rather than a productive device. A lot of people use it for going through Facebook updates of their friends, "liking" pics etc and occasionally commenting on those pics etc or reading books or news or watching videos etc - all while lying in their bed or sofa, basically, in a relaxing position and not sitting in their table and chair!

Is the keyboard radical enough to "kill" iPad?

The points above just want to highlight that just by having a keyboard as a standard accessory, the Surface may not become the ultimate device. In any case, if this experiment with the keyboard does work out well, there is nothing stopping the iPad users from buying one and using the iPad as a laptop too - even though it may never sit on the top of their laps!

Microsoft Surface Pro can run both the Metro apps as well as the regular desktop version. So, it has best of both worlds but the Surface Pro is fighting with the ultrabooks and laptops. Based on my thoughts outlined above, I believe Surface Pro is more than a tablet but lesser than a laptop. So, pricing the Pro somewhere between the tablet and ultrabooks may help otherwise it is going to be a real tough ride for Surface Pro. 

It seems to me that Microsoft has addressed some pain points of iPad users by providing external ports and compatibility with Office in the Surface RT tablet. It will probably not get the Apple lovers to move to Microsoft. But there are so many others who want more from their devices - especially the business people where looks and brand appeal matter but practicality matters too. This is classical marketing - you find the gaps in your rivals' products and serve those. However, when it comes to Surface Pro, if its price is anywhere near the price tag of ultrabooks, it may not really work as most would not want to compromise  about usability at that price.

In my opinion, Microsoft should not confuse itself as the new Apple. Apple's products have been game changers for a variety of reasons. It delivers discontinuous innovations. Microsoft has tried to deliver what could be called continuous innovation - improving upon an existing product. Microsoft should play to its strengths of providing a practical, more productive solution that is compatible with the world's most popular OS. It should work on its weaknesses in marketing so that consumers actually realize the worth of its product. If that happens, Surface will be a winner even though the iPad will not be killed.

You have changed your LinkedIn password but did your phone app also ask for a new password?

After the recent LinkedIn security drama, I got an email about my password being one of "those" leaked ones. So, I promptly changed my password on the website.

I went back to normal life.

Next morning, I was just browsing through LinkedIn app and the top news stories in their app when I suddenly realized that I should have been asked for my new password on the phone app but I wasn't!

Go to "YOU" in the top menu and tap the settings logo 

Tap on "Sign Out" and login again with new password

I have manually signed out of my LinkedIn app this morning and logged in again with the new password but shouldn't that have been an automatic process? I was getting updated content on the app even after I had changed my password on the website. It did not prompt me to enter the new password! Did you face this issue as well? Worst, have you realized that you might not have changed your password for LinkedIn on all the devices that you use to access it?

Or is it just me?

How Blackberry is doing today what Benares did a decade ago!

BENARES: Oh so Beautiful!

I spent four of the best years of my life in the wonderful town of Benares about a decade ago. This was the time when the internet was a very new thing and you could find people who did not have email ids. Tweety meant that yellow bird and nothing else. 20 overs cricket meant that rain had played spoil sport or something like that. You get the idea. This was a time when cyber cafes was a pretty booming business in India. You could see small shops opening up at the nook and corners of small towns and cities across India. One could access internet at one of these shops for about 20 odd bucks an hour. Benares was no exception to this trend. If anything, it had more of these shops because a whole lot of international tourists come there to explore this rich heritage town which is arguably one of the oldest cities in the world. There were a lot of these shops next to the banks of the river Ganges (the famous ghats). One evening, while roaming around on one of the ghats with friends, I saw a cyber cafe which proclaimed, like all other cyber cafes, it had internet along with phone, photostat, STD, ISD etc. What was interesting was that the board in front of the shop also mentioned it had yahoo.com, hotmail.com, rediff.com! My friends and I had a good laugh about it - obviously if you have internet, you have all of it but this guy mentioned those separately as if he had special connections to those websites!

Do I need to buy a Blackberry for IM, email and (Android) apps?

Laughing about a thing like this was fine, especially in a small town like Benares. However, of late, when I see Blackberry advertising its BBM as its USP, I am reminded of that cyber cafe again! BBM and enterprise email were USPs for Blackberry about 5 years ago but today with smart phones proliferating like political scams in the Manmohan Singh government, these USPs seem a bit dated. I don't need BBM today to message my friends without eating up my minutes - I can use anything like gTalk or dozens of other IM clients. They did try to popularise the BBM thing by allowing people to connect to other BBM users using just their QR code. But who really would carry their QR code literally on their sleeve to connect to any one on the street? Having said that, I recently had to eat my words when I read about Sid Mallya tweeting that the girl who claimed that Luke Pomersbach assaulted her was all over Sid in a party for his BBM! 

So, point of points is that Blackberry was (and is) a great product but its differentiation based on the email and messenger has outlived itself. It is time for the apps to rule along with full touch screen models. While it did something to allow Android apps to be available on Blackberry (but still there are problems there), it took quite some time to move away from the physical qwerty phones. They seemed to have taken too much time in understanding the market direction and how it was sweeping the ground from underneath them.

What should Blackberry do?

OK - easy to rip apart a company based on what it did not do. Now, what would you do if you were Blackberry? How would you get back in the game? Its differentiation in the features space is gone. Apps is the new battle ground - BB is lagging behind Android and iPhone by miles. It has got into an arrangement with Android to let Android apps work on BB also but that only underscores the point that there are not enough developers making apps for BB. So, it ends up being there as another Samsung or HTC where it can fight the battle on the basis of its old relationships or some sort of really cool UI on top of the native Android. But as some others have found out, this does not sound much of an exciting story as it would fall into the commodity area. One good exit strategy here would have been to get sold to Google who could then use them for creating a hardware cum software integrated phone manufacturer. But Motorola beat them to this game as well!

How should BB differentiate in today's world?

So, the only way out for BB then seems to be to move up on the differentiation scale. Provide features and services that are really niche. For instance, they could provide extraordinary email features to make the mobile email experience closer to that of the desktop email access. While I kinda kicked BBM and Blackberry email earlier, they do provide encryption which is crucial for security and enterprises must like that. Given the security concerns raised on and off regarding Android and even iOS, security could be the big differentiator. Alternately, BB could  create multiple devices like the Playbook and create an eco system that would help a BB user become more mobile and still more user friendly. What I am referring to is the creation of additional docks which can be used to connect the small phone to a larger screen with keyboard to enhance the overall experience of the consumer. But all these can also be copied by the competition sooner than later but if BB is confident about its technology, it can try this or some other niche features which will help it retain its differentiation.

Should Blackberry reinvent itself as a software security provider to other mobile phone manufacturers?

An offshoot of the first option could be that BB should  totally move out of the hardware business and just provide security layers for other phone manufacturers. Maybe BB could come up as an app on the Android, iOS and Windows Marketplace for users who want to ensure their emails and IMs are secure. A lot of enterprises would probably like to enforce that. I guess this is the most drastic option that completely changes everything but one that Blackberry should consider based on their own analysis of the strengths of the company. 

Blackberry did a Benares in still using BBM as USP; can it again do a Benares in terms of retaining its rich heritage and prestige, and reinvent itself, so many years later as well?

Are Nokia or Windows Phone even serious about smart phones?

Yes, I am asking this question because I really doubt it. At least in India. On one hand, there are reports of people none other than Steve Wozniak (Apple co-founder) praising Windows Phone's features but on the other hand, I still don't see enough Windows Phones on the market or in the hands of my friends. I had to buy one for my wife last month and I got another Samsung Android (in the 15K range) even though a good part of me wanted to go for a Windows Phone. But the lack of applications (along with the lack of the phone itself in one of the leading chains) kept me out of it. I may not even use a lot of the apps but there are a number of apps that I use and if Windows Market Place cannot provide abundant apps, I won't fork out my 15K plus money just like that - right? If I were getting it as a free phone with a 2-year connection like they get in the US, I might have thought about it but even then, I may still have rejected it 'cos of the apps.

So, some of the earliest smart phone experts had predicted that it would be an apps game after all in the smart phone arena. And I guess, with that purchase decision going the Android way for me, even I have finally realized that apps will be the deciding factor. So, let us quickly see where our smart phone players stand in terms of apps. iOS, the pioneer of them all, has more than 500,000 apps; Android has quickly ramped up over the last couple of years on the apps game and now stands around 450,000. Windows Phone is about 10% of these at around 70,000 apps as of 13-May-2012. Now, some of the more detail oriented folks may point out issues like removal of apps and quality of apps etc but even after you do the math to take care of those issues, Windows Phone apps are a small fraction of what is available on the Android Market or Apple's App Store. It is more like 5,000 Windows against 300,000 Android apps (high quality apps). Since I am talking about India, I am not talking about the all mighty iPhone as most people  may not want to dish out more dough for a 3.5 inch phone than you do for a 40 inch (plasma) TV.

Now, let us say, maybe the numbers don't really matter for the average dude - you know, just like people put across that argument about processors - the average dude does not need the high end super computer processing capability. Fine, but there are some things I know I MUST be able to do with a processor, for instance, multiple browser windows, multiple tasks and videos and of course FB and Twitter etc. So, let me see what I normally do on my Android phone and see if I can do the same on a Windows Phone if I were to buy one today. Here is a list of the apps that I use on Android and whether or not they are available on Windows (in cases where I am more concerned with the functionality rather than brand, I have indicated yes as long as there is another app that meets that functionality).

Ok, so it does seem it has more apps than I was expecting. The red ones are the only ones where I seriously think there is a problem but others are not a problem for me. Even though there are no official apps for LinkedIn and Dropbox, I must say that the focus on apps is not as bad as I thought initially.

Update: LinkedIn has launched an official WP app and they say in some cases "Windows Phone app offers even more functionality than its iOS and Android siblings."

So, to be fair, I would say if I had done all this research slightly earlier, I might have gone for WP because it does look like meeting my needs more or less. I am not a fussy guy after all (or so I think!). I am not sure what the other hundred thousand apps are on Android, but I apparently am not using them. So, what I need is pretty much out there in Windows Phone as well. But the big P.O.I .N.T is that no one knows this fact. So, Nokia and Windows should let people know that. Do they expect all their customers to do this research before buying a phone?

So, when I started writing this article (more like a rant), I knew what Nokia and Microsoft have been openly telling me and other consumers and did not know what they have not been telling us. So, I thought Windows Phones are good but I think they lack the apps. If only someone had told me that most of what I use is there in WindowsPhone (courtesy some good application development work driven by someone in one of these companies), I might have been sporting a cool Windows Phone as well!

I mentioned previously that Nokia seem to be goofing up in India by pushing their overseas ads for Lumia in India as they don't seem to connect. I did see some Indian ads finally for Nokia Lumia - a guy saying something about the usefulness of the Nokia Lumia while babysitting kids. Thanks for the Indian ad Nokia but I am sure the youth of India would like to see themselves in much more exciting situations than babysitting! Samsung had used the setting of impressing a girl with the Samsung phone - so cliched, I know, but at least it works!

I was also happy to see Nokia introducing phones at various price points and probably varied features to give some choice to the consumer. The website mentions 3 now, which is some good news! Nokia Lumia 800, 710 and 610 are mentioned on the Nokia India website but the online shopping websites seem to have only the 800 and 710 at approx 24K and 15K respectively.

I had come up with the title for this article before starting to write it. Hence, before I started it, I thought Windows was goofing up big time on apps also, but it seems they are on the right track there; they are not up there yet, but are on the right track. So, after this realization about apps, should I change the title of this article? I decided against changing it because the average customer on the streets is still not gung-ho about this apparently capable phone. Are they letting a capable phone go down because of poor marketing or is it something else?

OR Am I missing something here? If so, please share your thoughts - I will be happy to learn!

Windows Phones are here! (er, but where exactly is here?)

Windows Mobile 7.5, i.e. Windows Mobile Mango was launched officially in India recently but the only Windows phone that I can talk about it probably the Nokia Lumia. That is not really a phone that builds up an aspiration to buy such phones. Even the ads are a bit firang, for desi tastes at least. The amazing everyday campaign does not seem to connect with consumers either.

What Windows phones need is multiple phones at various price points for the consumers to be able  to choose. But before that, what is really needed is an iconic phone that will help drive an aspiration for Windows phones. From what I have seen of the Windows phones and from what I hear from some of my distinguished colleagues (distinguished in the field of technology), this OS is an awesome piece of software. The Metro style text and social life integration into the OS is really good. One of my friends mentioned this is a zero depth OS which means that it doesn't have separate perceived depths between say buttons and other text - this is supposed to do a whole lot of good for the performance of the system, even better than Android.

So, Windows finally seems to have got something right but why is it then that there isn't a lot of marketing muscle that is being flexed either from Microsoft or from Nokia? To their credit, Samsung and HTC did come out with some neat WM phones but again, someone needs to take up the responsibility of driving the marketing buzz. I am not quite sure how things panned out in the case of Android. Back then, (which was not a very long time ago) Samsung, HTC, Motorola and even the Micromax of the world went all out on Android and promoted their own Android devices - probably because green and mean Andro was perhaps the first competitor to the iOS. One could really get that iPhone like effects for far lesser dough - so the manufacturers marketed and the consumers lapped it all up. Now, with that sort of history, it would make sense probably for a Samsung, HTC and of course, good old Nokia, to drive the marketing for WM. But is Samsung worried that too much of Windows marketing could eventually help competitors like Nokia take gains out of their efforts? After all, as I see from my interaction with umpteen number of people, a lot of people still regard Nokia as a better quality phone than the Korean Samsung! Yes, I have to live with this kind of people also, even today! But Nokia does have a way with build quality and of course the famed Nokia reliability of the basic phone that one could throw from the balcony and yet all one had to do to start making calls was to just put the battery in the slot and voila!

We would like to see ads with more consumer engagement

So, maybe Samsung and its kin have reason to limit the advertising for Windows Mobile, especially given the fact that Nokia is now more or less a division of Microsoft (that's a prediction that should come true sooner than you know!). Samsung was the chosen one by Google for the Android and it has emerged as the biggest Android smartphone maker in the world. While Google's support lent a lot of credibility to Samsung, Microsoft being the sole OS on Nokia now means that Nokia should get some special treatment from the OS maker - this should lead to Nokia being the biggest Windows Mobile smartphone maker as well.

It all seems to add up fine on paper. But why is no one at Nokia or Microsoft doing something on the ground? I can't see much action in India at least. Let me know if you see some...

Tablets and Smartphones - the loveliest things life has to offer today!

OK, the title is slightly exaggerated! But I am not far away from the truth either. :-)

Now that the tablet market has grown by leaps and bounds, my previous post on whether tablets will really work or not seems archaic. Yes, I have to admit that. But then, at the time, it did not make sense to me, so I said that. Anyhoo, the market has evolved such that the difference between tablets and smart phones is blurring with every new product. The five inch Dell seemed too big when I first saw it. So did the Samsung Galaxy Note but as long as you can get it in your pocket (gotta have deep pockets, even on those formal trousers!), you can have it. It seems an easier fit for the gals as it fits in just right with their lady purse! Who would have thought, Galaxy Note is just the device you can gift to your girlfriend this V-day! I just hope mine doesnt get any such idea 'cos I am not doing too well with the finances right now.

My not so good finances also mean that I havent bought a tablet for myself either. I did get a Galaxy S phone, yes, just the S, not S II aka S2. That was more cost effective for me, by a whole 10,000 INR - that's a good deal of money. But the good part about not getting S2 is that i would have been so so so jealous of Galaxy Note right now. You can buy one for the same load of money that you dished out for the Samsung Galaxy S II a few months ago! Phew, I really had not thought it over so much - good thing I am writing this thing - almost makes me feel happy!

So, why do I like the Galaxy Note? Real estate baby - that's the name of the game. Yes, wonderful real estate on that touchscreen! The only problem with love for real estate is that it doesn't stop anywhere. So, tomorrow, you get me a bigger screen, I may want to get on to that again. But then, will it fit in my pocket as well? Probably no - so I guess it has to be the NOTE!

One thing that amazes me about the rise of Samsung is that when it rises, all other players seem to be committing what tennis-wallas would call "unforced errors" - errors of judgement, it seems. While it was Nokia earlier which chose to simply look in the opposite direction while Samsung dished out double SIM phones to the masses, followed by the big bang plunge into Android phones, this time around it seems HTC is going down while Samsung continues to be the sole challenger to Apple. While HTC does not seem to be in as bad a situation as Nokia, it does not seem to be in a mood to introduce more models at the entry level. Even at the top end, Samsung is innovating faster to create something new every few months for its customers. Is Samsung the King Bali (Sugreev's elder brother, remember your Ramayana?) of this epic drama of smartphones, i.e. sucking away the powers of its competitors? Only time will tell, as they say.

Enough masala for this post I guess. A number of things that I have spilled out above probably need a post of their own, so I hope I will get to them shortly!

What good is a tablet for?

When the purists write an account of how words in the English language have got completely new implications in the 21st century, the word "tablet" will have its own page (which, who knows, might be read on a tablet!)

Even a year ago, a "tablet" would more or less imply that small little pill that you took with a glass of water to get rid of the headache or whatever illness plagued you. Personally, it was something I really abhorred for a little over 18 years. It was coincidental that I gulped my first tablet (pill) around the time I turned an adult. But for the last one year or so, ever since there was news in the air about Mr Jobs bringing the iPad into this world, the word tablet has made children out of adults; adults who want a tablet as their latest toy. A toy they can show around to their other (adult) friends to convince one and all of their status as the uber cool gift of life on this planet. Or you can showcase it to random (but obviously amazingly hot and beautiful) girls in a mall where they would fight each other to lay their hands on you and your lovely tablet.

However, while a certain part of my brain and heart wants to have a tab, the remaining parts make me wonder of a slightly innocuous question:

What will I do with a tablet?

OK, so I can go to Facebook, watch and share photographs, movies, check and send emails and do some other general stuff. Yes, that's great BUT, I can do all of that on my laptop or the even cheaper and sleeker netbooks na?

Oh, you can do all that on the tablet with touch functionality bro!

But, I can do the same thing on my smartphone also na?

Oh wait, there is the lovely ebook reader application that one can use to read books!

But I can do that on Kindle and that too at a MUCH lesser price. Hmmm... so what do I use the tablet for then?

Well, I have read somewhere that Mercedes was planning to use the iPad as a device that their salesmen would use to showcase the features of the cars to prospective customers. Ok, sounds good - so tablet can be used to showcase luxury products features. Limited use but adds to the overall high value for the product. The folks at Mercedes must be really smart to do this because I know for a fact that at least good old Hyundai could not really understand what to do with it, so they have decided to give away free iPads with one of its high end SUVs; in a way they are according higher respect for their customer that at least the guy who spends so much money to buy our SUV will have brains enough to make some use of this iPad/tab.

Ok, so a couple of automative related uses for iPad. Apple's website shows what all you can do with the iPad. Samsung tab videos also show what you can do with the tab, but, of course, Apple's ads are iconic.

If this was not enough to confuse you, Dell has introduced a 5" Dell Streak. Now 5" may sound so much better than a 3.5" phone screen but I have actually taken one in my hand and if you want to use it as a phone it is a tad too big and if you want to use it as a e-book reader, it is a tad too small. So, in short, it's not a tab but a tad too unfit for what it should do. Some of my friends have pointed to me that the iPhone is also pretty big and that is why Dell Streak5 might just work but I still don't think this is a workable option. What I understand from my marketing and strategy classes is that Dell is trying to be a differentiator by trying to fill a niche area, a sort of a blue ocean - an uncharted territory, for the uninitiated.

But at the moment, for me, it seems this uncharted territory may remain just that. There are reports on the internet that there are 7 and 10 inch Streaks coming in future - those will at least take it from a position of my abnormal confusion to a state where I am normally confused. Even Steve Jobs feels some of the tabs in the market are too small - so I have a feeling I am half right! Meanwhile, here is Dell's TV ad: do check the girl holding it at 13 secs and at 25secs and at 42 and at 48 and you will understand what I mean when I say it's a tad big for carrying around like a phone (interestingly, they don't show people holding it as a phone at all and just when they are about to actually use it as a phone, the lovely ad ends!)

OK, so it seems (at least to me) that there aren't very many real uses for an iPad (that I cant do with my smartphone or laptop) but apparently 7.5 million people who have bought iPads and tablets over the last one year don't think so. If you are one of those who had the money to buy one and brains to actually use it for some good purpose, please let me know why you bought the tab/iPad. Going by the fact that I don't have the money to buy an iPad now kind of tells you I am not the brightest folks anyway :D