6 ms·
Tangent: You might appreciate the premise of "harbinger customers"[1]. The theory is that there actually are consumers who are a bit out of sync with the collec
by ckz 4y ago
Tangent: You might appreciate the premise of "harbinger customers"[1]. The theory is that there actually are consumers who are a bit out of sync with the collective and do indeed consistently value/buy products that lose out.
I suspect I'm a fellow harbinger. I thought Apple was cool in the 90s and that Microsoft was on to something in the 00s-early 10s (including Win8/Phone), so I'm at least a solid 5+ years off (or, as a positive spin, simply much too early).
[1] https://boingboing.net/2019/12/03/harbringer-of-doom.html https://boingboing.net/2019/12/03/harbringer-of-doom.html)
- bigiain 4y agoThanks! But: > Harbinger households tend to be white, suburban and headed by older, less-educated single parents. Ouch... > I thought Apple was cool in the 90s and that Microsoft was on to something in the 00s It's not on my shelf of bad decisions anymore, but in '95 I though I was making the best possible purchase when I bought a Mac 6100 DOS Compatible... A Mac with a daughterboard that had a 486DX2 which ran MS-DOS and Windows 3.1 and later Win95. (I paid $1200AUD for 3 8MB SIMMs for that, so the DOS board didn't;t have to share RAM with the Mac...)
- lupire 4y ago> > Harbinger households tend to be white, suburban and headed by older, less-educated single parents. Bad at picking products and life partners.
- neither_color 4y agoSounds like high school me buying a zen creative and a zune because they were "better than iPods" and hating iPhones when they came out because physical keyboards would always be superior.
- iratewizard 4y agoI still agree with your high school inner child. I never made a single apple purchase in my life and I'm glad I never fell for the marketing.
- xtracto 4y agoMarketing and peer pressure! See how punished you've been here for expressing a dissenting opinion!
- nayaketo 4y agoFrankly I hate on-screen keyboards. Wish phones were a little smaller but fatter with physical keyboards.
- smilespray 4y agoAre you really willing to trade all that screen real estate?
- jreese 4y agoI'd buy a iPhone with a slide-out keyboard—a la the HTC Dream/G1 [1]—in a heartbeat. I'm happy with the onscreen keyboard for simple things like a quick search or message, but I also really want the option for a proper, physical keyboard any time I need to dig in and write something in depth. Bonus points for slider style devices like the G1 because you still got the "full size" screen, without having to sacrifice on keyboard size either; it really was the best of both worlds, and it's still my favorite device form factor I've ever used. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Dream https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTC_Dream
- heckelson 4y agoThat article brings back memories - I had a HTC Desire Z which had a sick slide out mechanism. That was also my first smartphone! I remember it was great for emulation of SNES and GBA games because of its physical keyboard.
- jazzyjackson 4y agoI loved my Motorola Droid. Tiny phone (3.7" screen took up the whole body !) with a slide out full qwerty keyboard. If someone was crazy enough to make it today with a snapdragon I'd be all over it. Choice quote from this review to show how 2009 it was: > The Motorola Droid on Verizon is the first device to feature Google Maps Navigation. It’s a completely free service that offers 3D maps with voice guided turn-by-turn directions. The VZ Navigator available on most Verizon Wireless phones costs an additional $10 a month for use. A decent turn-by-turn direction App on the iPhone sells for a one time fee of nearly $80-$100. On the other hand Google Maps Navigation is entire free and is offers a lot more. https://skatter.com/2009/11/motorola-droid-verizon-review/ https://skatter.com/2009/11/motorola-droid-verizon-review/
- alpaca128 4y ago> physical keyboards would always be superior. And they still are. I hate virtual keyboards, it's just a terrible experience. It requires a lot of attention, has low accuracy and features like swipe are too unreliable that I find them useful in the long run.
- vletal 4y agoMulti lingual swipe works just fine on my iPhone with Google keyboard. If it is not it's just because I get too comfy and lazy, not actually "spelling" the words properly. With the dawn of on device language models I believe the typing experience will get even better in the upcoming years.
- alpaca128 4y agoLanguage models and dictionaries will always be incomplete and out of date. I just don't like being slowed down by a clever feature not working as expected and so for me a physical keyboard simply cannot be replaced. It always feels like a fragile crutch otherwise.
- vletal 4y agoThe only claim which I am making is that the p(word|swiped pattern) is inferior to p(word|swiped pattern, previous words).
- kbenson 4y agoSpeaking of reliability, I suspect that screen keyboards are much more reliable than physical ones for a pocket device such as a phone or tablet. Much worse in usability and feel (if we ignore their ability to easily reconfigure to the task, such as a dedicated numpad where it makes sense), but likely more reliable as long as you don't break your screen, as there's less mechanical parts to break.
- alpaca128 4y agoBased on my experience with a Blackberry phone I'd say the average physical keyboard lasts significantly longer than the phone's update support. Sure it's got mechanical parts but reliable switches are not rocket science. Now analog sticks are a different story apparently.
- Schroedingersat 4y ago> hating iPhones when they came out because physical keyboards would always be superior. I mean you're not wrong. They're just sl8ghtly more expensive
- dehrmann 4y agoWhat do you think the next big thing it? What product segments and companies look really promising?
- squarefoot 4y agoIf the correlation turns out accurate, that would explain why marketers use every possible tactics to collect data about who we are and what we purchase, as it could give them an indicator of which product will fail. Such profiling is already done for targeted advertising, although this way it means buyers are also finely categorized including data about their political orientation and other sensitive aspects of their life. ps. I like a lot Cory Doctorow's articles; also Boing Boing was among my favorite sites in the early 2k; I'm saddened to see what it has become today: mostly a shop for overpriced crap. Suffice to say that after noticing my account was terminated during my long hospitalization in late 2020 with no warnings given, I didn't create another and removed the site from my bookmarks.
- simsla 4y agoThe Zune was one of the nicest pieces of tech I've ever owned, and nothing anyone says will convince me otherwise.
- xtracto 4y agoDid you manage to squirt a random Zuner in public transport?
- causality0 4y agoOh yeah. The soft-touch casing that still hasn't degraded and the d-circle were the peak of ergonomic satisfaction.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- technofiend 4y agoThought Iridium would really be a good investment. Same with the JAZ drive.
- rchaud 4y agoYou can count me in that group. I'm that guy who bought weird Toshiba and Archos MP3 players because they supported USB mass storage. I am now buying a Unihertz Pocket, a QWERTY phone in 2022.
- causality0 4y agoI'd be beating down their door if they offered a model that swapped the keyboard for a d-pad, circle pad, and buttons.