Form Function Faceoff

Only after the dust settles, and the euphoria of holding a very beautiful looking mobile phone is replaced with the realism about “what am I getting for what I am paying”, will the real winner emerge.
Today, as I sit writing this, many would be queuing up outside the Sahara Mall. Today is the iPhone day!
Now Indians will get a phone on which they can pinch pictures with two fingers and make them big or small, will no longer need a stylus and yet need not press any buttons to do what they want to do, would see outstanding details on the screen, would experience desktop-like internet, would experience and unlimited new applications that can be downloaded from the App Store. And most importantly from today they will make heads turn. Well, at least a little.
So, iPhone has it all. Or does it? To me it has great form – shape, look, display, BRAND, status, some novel features to make girls in your office say “Wow!” and rub their shoulder (unknowingly) against yours, a little longer as you show them what the phone can do in contrast to the usual “New phone, nice!” and walk away kind of situation.

Attention for female colleagues apart, but iPhone has its own share of limitations, which I am sure the readers here would have already experienced of read about viz. the hugely infamous ‘no copy pasting and forwarding of messages’ (due to this Vodafone & Airtel make less money from SMSes that are forwarded, no wonder they have not shown any mercy in pricing the device!), Bluetooth only for hands free, no transferring of contacts between the SIM and the phone (strange), no recording of video (that is even more strange) and to top it all no option for external memory. So an 8 GB or a 16 GB iPhone will live as an 8 or 16 GB and die like that! Pity, in our times of expandability and modularity – we can’t do much about that on the iPhone.
This said iPhone is the greatest mobile ‘form’ that money can buy. I would have said this about functions too but because there is no 3G service in India yet, iPhone will remain a hugely underutilized device.
How? Well, for example with 3G you could have watched the much awaited Vijender Kumar fight at 9:30 pm tonight, on-the-go (and needless to say could have made more heads turn!)

While you cannot yet watch the Boxing match tonight, on your iPhone, Nokia pulled of a punch on the day of India’s second medal at the Olympics. They have tried to preempt the iPhone launch with their N96. So what makes this worth looking at as compared to the hugely attractive and so much more talked about iPhone? To me, a lot is going for it. Just sample some of the things that it offers. N96 is a dream come true for memory hungry Indians at 16 GB expandable to 24! With that kind of ‘memory’ I really do not think if N96 will ‘forget’ much. For instance it will remember 18000 songs, keep as much as 20,000 pictures at 5 Megapixel, and store as much as 60 hrs of video that can be viewed on its 2.8” screen.

It also has a novel feature called Wave Secure that will help you back up your phone on the net and even help you track it if you misplaced it. While these are more of the device virtues, which Nokia has traditionally been strong in, what are more impressive are the new applications. Maps functions helps you create your own ‘soft maps’ (I like soft maps), so you can location tag your pictures and create your own world, your own topography for you to share with those who are close. N96 also helps us access OVi, which will now finally go head to head with Apple Apps and we’ll come to know who stands taller.

So how is the stage set? Who will win? Why? What to expect?
The way I look at these two launches is Apple is finally stepping on Nokia soil. I suppose India and China are both big Nokia markets without any iPhone yet. So it would be interesting to watch how things unfold.

Some initial thoughts:

1. I look at this as a battle between form (3G iPhone, in 2G environment will continue to be more of a looker than a doer!) and function (the ‘very loaded’ N96)

2. I see this as a battle for the top slot in terms of image - Apple iPhone Vs. Nokia N 96 – Nokia’s convergence flagship
But the way I look at it now, Apple could win round one – the first batch of sales, because a N96 still looks like a Nokia, and people have seen that look and are a little jaded. They want to flirt with design. And for people ready to pay that price – functionality can take a break for a while (until at least as long as they do not get bored with their iPhone)

3. This might sound a little provocative but I see a lot of girls buying the iPhone – it’s a beautiful thing to carry and it does cute things too!

To me while the iPhone is entertaining, N96 is entertainment converged but people will take time to discover the meaning of entertainment converged, till that time they will fiddle with their iPhones.Another thing, a little unrelated but interesting none the less, is to watch that will be useful to track is iPod sales in India after the iPhone launch. I understand that Apple will end up selling fewer of those, because the iPhone can do a good deal of personal stereo pretty well.

At the end, I look at iPhone’s launch and its predictable success, (unless the devices have a bug or something that makes people regret their decision) as an example of how great product design can cover many a weaknesses of the product. I see N96 as a great workhorse who unfortunately still looks like many other Nokia phones that came before that - one of the reasons why it would be overlooked by many who actually need it.May the better product win!