Symbian counting down towards something, any guesses?

Stefan Constantinescu

Stefan Constantinescu (@WhatTheBit on Twitter) has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices. As a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet, he knows he is not alone with this radical fascination of all things wireless. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you! Stefan began blogging as a hobby in the fall of 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007. Later he got a job at Nokia in March 2008, but as of June 2009 he has rejoined the IntoMobile team. He is currently based out of Helsinki, Finland.

• Ewan MacLeod

  A new Symbian handset?

• Alexandr3

  Well, maybe it’s just the number of countdowns they have done… 108th countdown for something overly hyped but that didn’t make you go “wow”…
  As you said, there has been quite a lot of countdowns these days…

• Friend

  Best guess so far? Someone hit the friggin’ self-destruct button at Symbian HQ.

• Brendan

  Oh yeah, you’re a great ‘analyst’. Nokia are ‘only’ giving away navigation.

• joseph

  What Brendan said.
  Feel like having a collection to buy you a clue.

• Stefan Constantinescu

  If Ovi Maps was anywhere close to being as good as Google Maps, then I’d care.

  Right now it’s horrible and no matter how many free features you add, such as navigation, it still doesn’t make the application any better.

• Brendan

  Ovi maps is vastly superior to Google maps, unless you’re a Nokia hater in which case you’ll never be convinced, even if they give you a free car with every phone.

  Okay, Google Maps has higher res satellite imagery and slightly superior directory search (on account of that being, you know, their *thing*). Then what? Bloody bitmap based maps that’s what.

• Stefan Constantinescu

  Ovi Maps, the search feature, is terrible. Google excels at search and that’s why it rocks on their product. Plus the syncing of favorites requires far fewer clicks.

  This isn’t a question of hating Nokia or not, I love the company and you’ll have to pry my E71 out of my cold dead hands if you want to use it, but it’s a question of who makes better software.

  Oh and one more thing, are you going to bother disclosing that you “work for the not-for-profit Symbian Foundation in the Delivery Management Test team” according to your blog?

• Stefan Constantinescu

  Most of the people reading this blog are already paying for unlimited data anyway, the data argument is useful if you’re traveling abroad, and in that specific use case then yes, Ovi Maps is better.

  But that’s probably the only use case.

• kilari

  What i’d like in 108 minutes would be for Nok to announce a world slaying handset, 4 “, snapdragon, capacitive, 32gb, running on Sprint. Or even better yet, have all carriers bands all rolled into a single handset, or just varying versions of the handset that makes the model compatible with all carriers.

  I’ve never used OVI Navigation, but I have a G1 with Google Nav, and I also have my Palm Pixi with Sprint Nav. Sadly, I don’t find Google Nav that special, and what I prefer is just to run Sprint Nav on my Pixis smaller screen. Sure I wish I had a bigger screen but I’d take Sprint Nav over Google Nav anyday.

• Brendan

  As I did mention in the all about symbian article comments, Google search is much better than Ovi Maps for finding a specific place (that is you know the business you’re looking for). For any other kind of search it is crap. If I search for pub in London it may want me to walk almost a kilometre, where there is actually one across the street. With Ovi maps I can browse in categories. Much better for exploring.

• antonio

  Nokia fanbois would say a turd is awesome, if Nokia started offering it with their phones

• Stefan Constantinescu

  If there is a pub across the street then why do you need to take your phone out of your pocket to find it? Can’t you just use your eyes?

  What we’re arguing about, back and forth, is that application A is better in use case Y and application B is better in use case Z.

  Anyway, have you tried the latest Google Maps which does have an explore feature?

• Brendan

  Agreed (except for the 4″ part, are you crazy)? Why is everybody obsessed with massive touchscreens these days?

• Al Pavangkanan

  Ovi Maps has a dayman mode.
  Ovi Maps has a nightman mode.
  Google maps knows karate.
  Friendship for everyone.

• Ahmed Eltawil

  Nokia Ovi Maps is available offline without the need of a data connection. As for Google Maps, you need a constant data connection. To me, that’s the biggest advantage.

• hary

  Stefan may be, your most of the blog readers may be having data, unlike me, who does not have a data plan. But i am thinking in broader terms in terms of broader range and most importantly in terms of common man who cannot afford data plan like me. (I didn’t know that the views in the articles are based only considering the reader base, i though they would be based on broader terms).

  For me and several million users, Ovi Maps is and will be the best solution than any other maps solution in the market. Even if someone has a limited data plan, then Ovi maps will do better due to vector method they described in terms of consuming less data compared to others.

• Jormage

  Apple fanbois would say a turd is awesome, if Apple started offering it with their iphones

• KT

  Ovi Maps for mobile >>Google maps mainly because of the offline feature for me, i dont have a data plan yet. Tho i use mgmaps for google maps, but still can only search using ovi maps. Search works good enough for me in singapore.

  also.. for syncing L2swim, automate ur syncml syncing and stop grumbling abt more clicks to sync

• KT

  imo they wouldnt even need the iphone along with it..