Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago • Hacker News Board

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#111

Post by ajklsdhfniuwehf » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 4:55 PM UTC

i have a web scrapper going to gsmarena.com every day and checking if there's a new android phone with keyboard :)

years ago it allowed me to buy the blackberry priv and key2. two awesome devices with real keyboards (which also act as touchpads)

But their marketing sucked and both tanked. I think the company that licensed the blackberry brand (why?) flopped and there will be no more models.

priv was the best one, but is stuck on android 5 or 6 now.

Key2 is still being sold and receiving security updates for android 8.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#112

Post by erhk » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 4:57 PM UTC

Calling the nokia 9000 the first smartphone is disingenuous. It fits perfectly the modern connotation of a "dumb" phone.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#113

Post by donio » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 5:23 PM UTC

unnah wrote: post #76

raesene9 wrote: post #27

This article kind of misses out the later Nokia N900, which had great hardware, but suffered from Nokia's lack of support (IIRC they stopped supporting it about 6 months after launch). If you like that kind of form factor/functionality, there's current devices too like the cosmo communicator https://store.planetcom.co.uk/products/cosmo-communicator

Another option is https://fxtec.com/ although it doesn't seem to have a second screen on the back.

It's a slider so it doesn't need the back screen.

For those looking for modern PKB phones the Unihertz Titan and the upcoming Titan Pocket are some other good options.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#114

Post by macintux » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 5:27 PM UTC

> The article was updated on August 16,2021. The orginal text said the Communicator line was discontinued after thge 9210 model, which was wrong.

It’s depressingly impressive that the correction at the end of the article has three typos.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#115

Post by senko » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 5:29 PM UTC

wbertberw wrote: post #107

senko wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maemo wasn't the problem, and in fact N900 had a dedicated cult following for years after. Nokia spectaculary blew its own foot with deprecating Maemo after only a few months - either the stupidest move in history or result of internal power struggles - and force-marrying it with Intel's Moblin (itself a decent mobile OS) to create unholy mess that was Meego. The book (btw awesome find, gonna read it at the first cha…

> not only meant Nokia had to rewrite its proprietary UI and repackage everything this is half-correct. Maemo->Meego did shift from GTK to QT, but they kept the Debian packaging on the N9 (the only device to ship with Meego)

You're right, tho I believe that was only intended as a halfway step (so even more breakage, yay!).

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#116

Post by soylentcola » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 5:59 PM UTC

bserge wrote: post #90

mnmmn123456 wrote: post #13

It didn't change the world. The iPhone did 10 years later. I guess the article is of interest because it has this wrong claim weaved in and even at it's time the "Nokia Communicator" wasn't a big success. Maybe we didn't know what FAANG-like success looks like at that time and everyone thought "Nokia is such a respectable, successful company in Scandinavia". Probably the article is of interest now because, we didn't…

Well, not the iPhone, but Apple's marketing. We had everything the iPhone did with Windows Mobile. Hell, even Symbian did fine. They were just aimed at "professionals" and completely ignored consumers.

Yeah...I remember the iPhone release. I was so jealous of the capacitive screen and solidly implemented graphics acceleration. But compared to the HTC WinMo phone I had at the time, it was missing such futuristic capabilities as 3G data, GPS for turn-by-turn nav, 3rd party apps, copy/paste, MMS, background apps, front camera (although it was less important because video calls on 2G was a non-starter), and the ability to even change your background or ringer to something that didn't ship with the thing.

Definitely glad that others were soon to follow with the more modern displays, because the first iPhones themselves were like a step back in many other ways compared to the Palms, Blackberrys, and PocketPCs of the day.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#117

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 6:30 PM UTC

asymptosis wrote: post #44

unixhero wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the time Nokia was not derelict. It is stated in the heading, it is now 25 years ago when Nokia started its path to become a global juggernaut.

When did I say Nokia was derelict? Please pay attention to what I really wrote.

[deleted]

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#118

Post by neurostimulant » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 6:35 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #97

hargv wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say if you were going to elevate anything after the 9000 it should be the Symbian devices- i had a 6600 and a friend had a 6630 and those will to me always be the first "Smartphones" We played downloaded multiplayer games over Bluetooth in school, and though mine didn't have official mp3 functionality I downloaded the app used on later devices and used mine as an mp3 player. Even downloaded a bunch of roms fo…

I kept using Symbian until the end, Symbian Belle was quite nice, and with PIPS and Qt, Symbian C++ wasn't that bad. Also jumped into Windows Phones, as its development experience was miles ahead (still is) from whatever comes out of Google. With exception of Android, I never needed a "gaming rig/server configuration" for mobile development. Anyway it is what it is.

I remember picking up a secondhand hp ipaq pocket pc and got my mind blown when I realized how easy it is to make an app for it. It's basically just plain old winform apps.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#119

Post by kiksy » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 6:43 PM UTC

zokier wrote: post #42

I think Nokias 7650 deserves also mention. Launched in 2001/2002 it arguably laid the foundation for mainstream smartphones, while Communicators were inevitably doomed to be niche devices. 7650 had also many of the hallmarks of modern smartphone, at least compared to Communicators which were more of evolutionary dead end.

Worked with someone who had a 7650. Watching what that could do blew me away at the time. First phone I saw that genuinely acted like a PC in your pocket. Bought a 6600 as soon as it was released and loved it.

You could probably make an interesting article on how much a modern smartphone in 2021 differs from the 7650. Fundamentally I don't think it's as much as many would think.

Re: Nokia 9000 Communicator was launched 25 years ago

#120

Post by netfortius » Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 6:49 PM UTC

rcarmo wrote: post #75

I used to work as product manager in a major telco and had one of every single model of those, and they were some of the best hardware I ever used. The peak was, I think, when I accessed Excel over Citrix while sitting in the airport waiting for a flight. In comparison, the N900 I have sitting in the bottom of a storage box someplace was a major disappointment--Maemo never came close to delivering half the functional…

I appreciated the N900 (still have one), but Nokia caught my eye and then interest in the smartphone area before that, as I bought an E61 in an airport in Germany, while on my way back to the US. Once back to work I configured it as skinny (SCCP, actually) client to my Cisco CUCM, and amazed all my peers about being able to pick up my phone extension, over WiFi, on my cell phone. And then all the other things you could do with it ...