17 ms·

Jolla

734 points by Geee 13y ago

atwebb 13y ago
Perhaps I'm not in the know (I'm not) but it took me way too long to figure out it was a phone and not some UI overlay/Android enhancement suite.
- sudomal 13y ago
  It's like a lot of things that appear on HN... strange and unfamiliar words without context. Yep, a smartphone.
  - missing_cipher 13y ago
    It's the title's fault, OP made no effort to explain what he was linking. Pretty annoying actually.
    - nicholassmith 13y ago
      That'd be editorialising the title which is expressly discouraged by the site moderators.
amalag 13y ago
So this is an Android fork with UI improvements?
- lewispollard 13y ago
  Looks like it isn't a direct Android fork but does use the Android app runtime.
- robin_reala 13y ago
  No, this is the current state of Nokia’s Meego OS.
- conexions 13y ago
  Jolla is based on what was left of Nokia's Maemo/Meego.
- LrQSs8Dq 13y ago
  It's a phone from a small finnish company with a new (as in not MS, Google or Apple) operating system, that happens to have an Android compatibility layer, so you can run native Sailfish apps and Android apps. If you happen to have heard of the N900, it's the team who made that one. They founded their own company after Nokia sold its soul to MS.
  - blahbl4hblahtoo 13y ago
    Nokia had a soul? It was a corporation.
    - agilebyte 13y ago
      Corporate social responsibility could be thought of as (a part of) a soul of a company. http://www.nokia.com/global/about-nokia/people-and-planet/strategy/reports/sustainability-reports/ http://www.nokia.com/global/about-nokia/people-and-planet/st...
      - blahbl4hblahtoo 13y ago
        It's not a person. Microsoft has statements like that. Why don't they have a soul? I'm actually not trying to be flippant. I think that people need to question their assumptions about "companies as people"...Nokia didn't "have a soul". It was a business. The fact that people think it did reflects more on their marketing than anything else.
        agilebyte 13y ago
        Have you seen Hank Poulsen's documentary about precious materials that make it into mobiles? He referred to Nokia as a company that does not do bad and is responsible. If only to force/guilt-trip companies to do better and be responsible to their workforce, customers, supply chain, country etc., I am going to talk about companies and their soul. http://bloodinthemobile.org/ http://bloodinthemobile.org/
        13y ago
- gmuslera 13y ago
  Is as much android as BB10, in fact have a lot in common with Blackberry 10 like the user interface or being based on QT/QML for native apps. If you want, is a maemo/meego fork, with a compatibility layer to run Android apps, and won't be surprised if it runs also Firefox OS, Tizen and Ubuntu Touch apps in some moment.
- Zigurd 13y ago
  No, it is a Mer-derived Linux with Qt as the UI toolkit. The OS is called Sailfish. The Android app capability comes from an Android runtime. I have not tried it myself but the compatibility layer could come from Myriad's "Turbo Dalvik," which is something I heard rumored some time ago, or Jolla might have done it themselves.
fracchio 13y ago
My opinion is: "wat"
easytiger 13y ago
Hint: most global mega corps block youtube. Host videos locally for product demos if you can pay for the bandwidth. You will reach a bigger audience.
- kfinley 13y ago
  Is Vimeo a good alternative, or is it also blocked?
  - hsuresh 13y ago
    Vimeo is terribly slow, at least from here in India.
speeder 13y ago
I was wondering why a condom site was on HN, then I entered and saw it was the mobile phone one... Too bad for them their name (at least in Brazil) still sounds like a condom name though. (the most popular condom in Brazil is named "Olla") More on topic edit: > The original Finnish design, with no front-facing buttons, stands out from the pack. Only me find this... ironic? I mean, almost all smarphones now come without front-facing buttons (a design I hate by the way, specially when your hands are wet or oiled for whatever reason, or when you sneeze in the screen and it go ballistic).
- Sharlin 13y ago
  Um, iPhones, Androids and Windows Phones all have at least one front-facing button, either physical or virtual.
  - 1rae 13y ago
    Blackberry has no front-facing buttons and also uses only a gestures-based interface.
    - Pxtl 13y ago
      And I think that was a strategically terrible move. They're trying to come from behind and they launched with a non-intuitive interface that makes the phone unusable in a demo. You put a Z10 in a user's hands without the tutorial enabled and they're just helpless.
      - 1rae 13y ago
        For new users perhaps it is a bit of a leap for them to take, but don't you think they can overlook this fact because they know they are working with a new operating system? Once you understand how the BB10 OS works its nice to use. The same thing happened recently with Windows 8 when everyone had to learn how to use the gestures for tables. The main point however is that jolla doesn't stand out from the pack just because they have no front-facing buttons...
  - 13y ago
networked 13y ago
>Jolla brings you the best of both worlds – super intuitive Sailfish OS apps and the latest Android™ apps. The recent article on OS/2 [1] makes me wonder whether such compatibility (which, as I understand, is full and not selective) is actually good for them. Either way, tough, I wish Jolla success; I'd like to see Sailfish OS [2] on an actual device. [1] See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6792010 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6792010. The short of it is that the Ars Technica article claims OS/2's compatibility with Windows made developers less inclined to write native applications for OS/2. Some discussion on whether that was the case can be found in the comments to this response to the article: http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2144 http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2144. [2] https://sailfishos.org/ https://sailfishos.org/
- denis1 13y ago
  I think their main focus right now is getting the devices in peoples hands. Do you think compatibility with android would help with this?
- untog 13y ago
  I thought of that article too, but I think one of the key differences is that neither OS/2 nor Windows had totally taken over the market when the Windows compatibility was introduced. So it turned the 'what to make apps for' question easy to answer. The smartphone industry is way beyond that - people are making iOS and Android apps, and very little else.
- dserban 13y ago
  It's different. os/2 vs. windows was about two players attempting to prevent each other from monopolizing the industry. I don't think the Jolla guys go into this with a business plan of one day being a monopoly, or preventing another player from dominating the mobile industry. Jolla is - I think - about offering consumers what nokia under elop was unwilling to give them: a MeeGo device.
- salient 13y ago
  Canonical refused to offer Android emulation for that reason. They didn't think it would be beneficial for Ubuntu Touch in the long term.
shimon_e 13y ago
it will be interesting to see how this competes against the Chinese competitors in this arena. Just yesterday Gionee announced the E7 for about the same price. A phone that includes a camera sensor from a point and shoot. http://www.gsmarena.com/16mp_gionee_elife_e7_claims_to_be_the_best_android_cameraphone-news-7262.php http://www.gsmarena.com/16mp_gionee_elife_e7_claims_to_be_th...
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
bananacurve 13y ago
While trying to open the video to full size, some was cut off, I found Google's 'Stats for Nerds' on right click. Not expecting that, but gave me a chuckle. As for the phone I don't think it is wise to do promotions with no word on availability.
pliny 13y ago
The Peek and Pull features exists on the iPhone - but the directions are reversed. Changing the directions means that app developers cannot develop the same app for both iOS and Sailfish since they have to place important information that shouldn't be covered up by notifications, or shouldn't be interacted with in a way that could activate the notifications menu, on the bottom in iOS and on the top on Sailfish. Is there any benefit to changing the directions notifications come from?
- untog 13y ago
  The benefit may be not being sued for patent infringement. Sadly.
- brodney 13y ago
  Developing the same app for both platforms is a Bad Thing. I want Android apps on Android, iPhone apps on iPhone. Mixing never works out well in the long term.
  - untog 13y ago
    Sure, but realistically not every organisation has the capacity to develop entirely different apps for every platform. And especially not for minority platforms like Jolla.
MehdiEG 13y ago
For those who are wondering why this is up on the front page: Jolla is launching their first handset tonight in Helsinki: http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/jolla-sailfish-os-phone-november-27-release/ http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/jolla-sailfish-os-phone-... I always wondered why Jolla is getting so little love from HN. To me and from a geek / hacker point of view, Jolla is an awful lot more interesting than Android. Anyone who's had the chance to own a Meego device knows how incredibly talented and passionate the team behind Jolla is. I'm really looking forward to see how the OS and apps feel on Jolla. The OS also appears to be a lot more open and hackable than Android (although the proof will be in the pudding so we'll see how it all pans out).
- lambda 13y ago
  Probably hasn't been getting much attention because so far it is vaporware (until you can actually buy a device, it's not all that interesting), and it's a member of the complicated Maemo/Moblin/Meego/Tizen/Mer/Sailfish family that keeps on promising great things but seems to be reinvented every year and never actually delivers a working or supported ecosystem. Yes, a few devices have been released in that family, but have been immediately EOLed (the N900, DOA as it was released just as Nokia decided to go Windows only) or sold only as specialized developer previews or whatnot. This whole family has been promising lots of things for a long time, but never seems to actually deliver, while you can get an Android phone in any corner store. I might get interested once I can actually buy a device and write an application for it. Until then, I'm going to be extremely skeptical of this whole family of devices since they seem to consistently over-promise and under-deliver.
  - jggonz 13y ago
    > Probably hasn't been getting much attention because so far it is vaporware (until you can actually buy a device, it's not all that interesting I think having other "Android"-compatible phones out there is very interesting. The more options there are for the consumer, the better off we are. Take a look at the iPhone vs Android scene. If it weren't for other options being available, we'd still be living with 3.5" LCDs and a completely closed-source operating system. Btw, you could call any product vaporware at some point. (take a look at kickstarter and other crowdfunding sites. most of those products are in some form vaporware, yet lots of people now know the Pebble, Oculus Rift... etc...)
mattholtom 13y ago
Does no-one answer phone calls from their Mom anymore? Just me?
- jzzskijj 13y ago
  I was very saddened because of this and called my mom immediately with my Android. Jolla - For people who don't answer to their mothers. That's a strategy. Not necessarily the best, but strategy at least. I was a little bit lost because they were boasting so much about "Yoyo get Sailfish and you can run Android apps". Like in Blackberry phones before they realized they have to "reclaim their success".
ye 13y ago
So I watched the video, and I still have no idea what Jolla is. I was not impressed by anything in the video, but that's besides the point. If you're a technology company, this hipster crap is ok, but you need to start with explaining what it is and how it's better. Showing a bunch of gestures does nothing - Android can do that.
- thomholwerda 13y ago
  You have to click one link on the front page to a short summary of what Jolla is. One link. One. Of, you can just scroll down. That's it.
  - username42 13y ago
    is it open source ? Is it unblocked by default (root account) ?
  - ddd1600 13y ago
    Its a bad video/sales-pitch Gary, either that or an unimpressive phone. You pick
  - Semaphor 13y ago
    "Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load the phone with top Android™ apps." I assume you are talking about this? Because that really told me nothing worthwhile. I wish these (horribly to use scrolling) sites would just give me link that takes me to a half page description that explains in some detail what the heck they are talking about.
    - CatMtKing 13y ago
      What do you mean nothing worthwhile? Isn't that exactly what it is? A phone with an OS that isn't Android/iOS/Windows/Ubuntu/Firefox? What other description are you expecting?
      - 13y ago
gesman 13y ago
Suggestion: add a text "elevator pitch" on a front page. Forcing me to watch video is a sure way to Ctrl+F4
- xer0x 13y ago
  Yeah, I didn't realize there was more than the video until I read these comments.
davexunit 13y ago
Can anyone comment on how free this device will be? From what I recall, Sailfish is partially free software, but contains proprietary software as well which is a real shame.
- pekk 13y ago
  What is your alternative?
  - zokier 13y ago
    Nemo, replicant, webos? All fully free OSs afaik.
  - daliusd 13y ago
    Firefox OS, Ubuntu Touch
    - fulafel 13y ago
      The Firefox OS phone (Zte Open) has proprietary stuff.
      - rhelmer 13y ago
        Are there any phones that do not require proprietary drivers? I am not aware of any.
        fulafel 13y ago
        Yes. The most free one is OpenMoko, even the baseband firmware: http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2012-July/067276.html http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2012-July/0672... (runnig non-certified baseband firmware is illegal in many places however, from spectrum use regulations)
  - davexunit 13y ago
    Replicant is the only project committed to software freedom that I know of.
jdalgetty 13y ago
Looks cool but I wish it had beefier hardware specs.
- koide 13y ago
  What are you missing concretely and why?
  - zanny 13y ago
    Just compare it to the Nexus 5 at the same price point. Half the memory, probably lower res screen, the sd card slot is great but I don't think it justifies a $100+ price premium. I'd rather see Nexus 5's flashed with Ubuntu Phone / Plasma Active / Tizen / Sailfish than all these companies trying to batch order hardware of their own that never has the economies of scale Google could pull off.
    - pekk 13y ago
      You aren't comparing apples to apples. It's pretty clear that Jolla was never intended to launch as a lower-cost competitor to Nexus 5. That makes it a bit silly to criticize it for not being one, particularly at launch. How long has the Android platform had to bring costs down? A long time.
    - shooper 13y ago
      It's unfair to compare a phone hardware company that needs to make money to survive to a company that gets almost all its money from ads, searches, cloud and personal data and uses that money to subsidize hardware as a loss leader(or making bare profits) both to gain marketshare and also to undercut and weaken other smartphone companies' profit margins so that they have less money to compete in web search now or in the future. [1] From a consumer point of view, you're right though. The market is heading towards commoditization and Jolla will most likely fall into the moat if people compare them on price alone. [1] http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/25/search-googles-castle-moat/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/25/search-googles-castle-moat/
Zigurd 13y ago
It will be interesting to see if customers see Jolla as a continuation of Nokia's handset business. Lots of people liked N9 and Meego, and when that product was killed it was out-selling Nokia's Windows Phone products.
jasonkester 13y ago
They seem to put a lot of effort into telling you things other than "what is this thing?" It sorta looks like a phone. Is it a phone? "Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS." Sweet. How is that relevant? It must be important because it spends the rest of the page telling you about the OS. I'm back here, with honestly no idea what it is. Probably not the impression they want to leave on people, assuming (as a guess) that this is a consumer product of some kind. It seems they put the engineers in charge of designing the website.
- jggonz 13y ago
  On the homepage "Jolla.com" it says: Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load the phone with top Android™ apps. So it is a phone since they call it a phone. :)
  - millerc 13y ago
    Beyond that simple statement, I'd agree with Jason. My first impression upon reading their webpage was "why?" Scrolling through I didn't find an answer. No differentiator in apps, function, power, memory or price. I've often been wrong when I wondered that about a product, for this once I genuinely would like to know if there's an answer to the question. Why a new phone called Jolla?
  - jasonkester 13y ago
    Imagine the difference had they said "Jolla is a smart phone powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load it with top Android™ apps." rather than bury the most important point on the whole website as a single word at the end of a long paragraph full of technical jargon. That would qualify as calling it a phone. Better still would be "Jolla is a smart phone", dispensing with 28 unnecessary words. Hopefully somebody at their end has the homepage up in an editor and can make the fix.
    - tixocloud 13y ago
CookWithMe 13y ago
> To get back to Home from any app, swipe from either side of the screen. I don't think it's a great idea to reserve the "swipe from side of screen" gesture for the OS. Especially the left-swipe is used in many apps to reveal a menu, which is a UI-pattern I like a lot. Anyway, looks interesting, would love to try one out!
- k-mcgrady 13y ago
  >> "I don't think it's a great idea to reserve the "swipe from side of screen" gesture for the OS." In iOS 7 a gesture from the left side towards the right navigates back in an app.
buster 13y ago
It would be awesome if Jolla would become a successful company after Nokia sold out to MS (because it seems like Jolla is a continuation of what would have been Nokias route without MS). Also i only heard good things about the N900, i love linux, i hope the handset/os is "free"... and 399€ doesn't seem to be too expensive. Also it looks well designed. Good luck, Jolla Team!
- purringmeow 13y ago
  I think 400 euro is a lot for a device with these specs though. They are letting a huge number of devices "fly under them"(be cheaper) and the average consumer doesn't give a damn if the phone runs Sailfish OS or Android. Nevertheless, I too wish them luck :)
616c 13y ago
What is interesting is that anyone that comes here, likes it (I do from what I see) and goes to check on the Mer Project where this work stems from will see their git repos have been largely untouched for two years. [0] I find that strange because I had to search a few pages into their wiki to even find that URL. I wish people who liked Meego would support the latest update to the truly free OpenMoko project. [1] You can build your own upgrade or buy the whole thing in an old GA02 case (the second revision OpenMoko phone). I am waiting out for pocket change to buy one of those. Buy a real open handset and fight the power guys! [0] http://gitweb.merproject.org/gitweb http://gitweb.merproject.org/gitweb [1] http://projects.goldelico.com/p/gta04-main/ http://projects.goldelico.com/p/gta04-main/
ddd1600 13y ago
What does this phone do differently from all the other smart phones?
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luxpir 13y ago
As a (still happy) n900 user looking for an upgrade path to a decent open phone with modern hardware, I'm hoping that Sailfish gives you command line/root access. Realistically that probably won't happen in this first iteration, but I've held out for long enough now to be able to wait another 6 months to see what happens. A hardware keyboard would also be nice, the bigger the better, but you can't have it all...
- Brakenshire 13y ago
  As I recall, there is some talk about using the 'other half' feature of this to attach a hardware keyboard. A quick search reveals: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=91535 http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=91535
  - luxpir 13y ago
    Ah, I'd misunderstood the 'other half' in that case, thinking it just to be a fancy name for the rear case with a 'colour feature'. There may be hope yet, although nobody seems to know if that command line/root access is possible. It's entirely possible that the Maemo/Google search queries I've run may be letting me down, it'd be great if the Jolla documentation made some mention of this.
- Jhsto 13y ago
  Jukka Eklund tweeted the following: https://twitter.com/jukkaeklund/status/405766972765642752 https://twitter.com/jukkaeklund/status/405766972765642752 Seems like the phone already has the command line implemented. Great for them.
iamtheike 13y ago
If you know some finish guy, you will definitely understand that this mobile is going to rock.
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itsbits 13y ago
When does this mobile technology gonna saturate?
rodolphoarruda 13y ago
I wonder how the name is pronounced. My first language is Brazilian Portuguese, but I tend to read it in Spanish because of the double "L". But that in turn would make it sound like the Portuguese version of "cork", like a bottle cork.
- sharpneli 13y ago
  "Yol-la" probably confers the intended spelling in English. The word Jolla is Finnish and means a small boat. It's a reference to the famous burning platform memo. P.S. I was one of the 450 guys who got their phone today. Got it literally 20 minutes ago.
  - LiamMcCalloway 13y ago
    Can you confirm it's got LTE _everywhere_? (6 continents)
    - sharpneli 13y ago
      I cannot. They didn't really speak about it. However my first impressions as a developer: It is a breath of fresh air that instead of fiddling with AndroidSDK and having to deploy an apk my first test of their toolchain was simple compilation -> scp the binary into the phone and run it in dev mode terminal (or via ssh from a desktop). They naturally have a full fledged packaging system like apk but the point is that it's not forced upon us. My phone is now basically (just like N900 was) just a Linux running on arm platform, with fancy UI for consumer usage on top.
      - voltagex_ 13y ago
        How restricted are you? Can you get root on it?
        sharpneli 13y ago
        There are practically no restrictions whatsoever. You have root as soon as you enable the developer mode from options. You can even flash your own images to the device.
chrisarriola 13y ago
Do we seriously need another mobile operating system?
SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
I value my smartphone a lot, but I find it hard to get excited about this smart phone vs that smartphone. Android, Samsung android fork, iPhone, WinPhone, whatever. They're all good, they all roll out a faster better version every year. They all have twitter, facebook, email, maps, search, a camera, app store. etc. Oh yeah, and SMS and voice calls too. So why should we get excited about this flavour of hand-held connected computer? What's the USP?
- daliusd 13y ago
  Linux ? (not just Linux kernel)
  - SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
    Linux is a good thing, but Linux as a thing in itself delivers a lot of geek cred and is a good platform for other software, but it is not a feature that gives phone users any value. Will the average buyer know or care? Is it more stable? Cheaper? Android phones are stable and cheap already. Does it run new kinds of apps or run existing apps faster? Make coffee and wash dishes? What does it do for me that my current phone does not?
    - daliusd 13y ago
      I absolutely agree with you. Still you have asked personal question "So why should __we__ get excited" and I made assumption that __we__ as hackers. If __we__ as people - IMHO nothing interesting about this phone from average user perspective. N950 and N9 were interesting phones for me as geek (because of QtQuick) but QtQuick performance gain is not that important/significant if compared to HTML(5). The only reason why I love different brands than Android is to play with something interesting and different. That's why Firefox OS looks particularly interesting for me currently with my simple needs and low dependence on Google.
      - SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
        Good answer, thanks. "real linux" is a feature for a certain group of people. ... as is "low dependence on Google"
LeicaLatte 13y ago
Liked what i saw. Easily better than any iphone ad of recent times.
dschiptsov 13y ago
Weaker than S III hardware to run Android apps for 400 euro? Did I miss something?)
- pekk 13y ago
  You missed that it is not designed as a lower-cost Android phone?
uxwtf 13y ago
A phone for messy people? Why put so much junk in the video to defocus viewer's attention?
shooper 13y ago
Kinda off topic, but as soon as I opened that page in a new background tab, it froze my browser and PC for about a minute with an hourglass before it would respond to my inputs. I thought it crashed the system, but everything is okay now. I did close the tab after giving it a cursory look because it looked too noisy and light on content. Perhaps someone can analyze how much RAM, CPU and bandwidth that page takes up. And I am rocking a quadcore computer with 8 gigs of RAM. Sigh, the more the hardware giveth, the more the new fangled web pages taketh away.
- sampo 13y ago
  I have an old laptop with Core 2 Duo and 2 gigs of RAM. Had no problem with the website.
snth 13y ago
I really wish we could edit submission titles to be more informative.
ender7 13y ago
The UI is pretty, but it's dropping frames like crazy during your demo video. It's super smooth most of the time, but not at the critical times. Horseshoes and hand grenades, etc.
neakor 13y ago
Am I supposed to be impressed by this? "truly open and gesture based OS". I thought the open card has been played and dead already. And don't iOS and Android both have plenty of gestures? I didn't see anything new at all.
- 7952 13y ago
  Of course they are not selling open software but a hardware product (which may or may not be locked down).
trekky1700 13y ago
Anyone else really distracted by the extremely messy desks. Who honestly leaves a wet, browning apple core just sitting on their desk. That's just going to be a sticky bloody mess later.
- brianmcdonough 13y ago
  That's hilarious. Not to knock the phone, which may or may not be quite good, but I was also more interested in the things on the desk than the phone. Who's the person who said, let's put the apple in there? I'd like to know more about that decision as well.
- skc 13y ago
  Subliminal message perhaps? Would be chuckle worthy if it was deliberate.
- lttlrck 13y ago
  I thought the desks were a brilliant touch...
pm90 13y ago
>User-replaceable battery OH. GOD. YES!
Fauntleroy 13y ago
It really bothers me that they didn't do something about the flickering infrared light in the video. I know it's not going to show up in real life, but that's going to confuse some people who aren't aware of the fact cameras can see some things we don't.
rjohnk 13y ago
I have no idea what the web design of the type Jolla has, but it's getting old really fast. Yes, it looks neat at first, but then it's confusing. Crashplan recently did their update with the same style. I'll shut up now if I'm the only one bothered by this trend.
- criswell 13y ago
  I think it's mostly just weird because the fixed header doesn't have a border or anything along the bottom to let you know where it ends and the content begins. I see no reason for it to be fixed at all to be honest, the content isn't extremely useful. I also wish more sites would do min-height media queries before fixing elements to my screen. The header and footer here are pretty greedy with the spacing on this site.
jrockway 13y ago
> GSM/3G/4G LTE* (Works on 6 continents). What, no service in Antarctica?
jokoon 13y ago
$400 ? nope.
scrozier 13y ago
"A new beginning." And a web site and video that look exactly like every iOS and Android device ever made. For HN readers, there's some geek cred here, but as a consumer product, they need some marketing help.
- SeppoErviala 13y ago
  This is the new beginning after the burning platform company has finally been sold to Microsoft. Alternatively the new beginning for maemo/moblin/meego/whatever.
LandoCalrissian 13y ago
OK, all the garbage in the video is really, really strange. It completely distracted me and kind of grossed me out. I don't know who thought that was a good idea.
Cyclenerd 13y ago
Why should I buy this device now? 400EUR a lot of money and on Twitter they write: Calendar sync is not supported at the moment. MMS is not supported at the moment. We do not have DLNA support at the moment.
- chappi42 13y ago
  You cannot buy it now, thus... If - I'm speculating - we 'normal' people can buy the device in spring it will have more features. (I'm interested as it's linux based, and a good alternative to the closed apple world and the dominant 'Android-one-Google-data-collecting' universe.)
shmerl 13y ago
I'll be getting it as soon as they'll confirm compatibility with T-Mobile LTE.
shmerl 13y ago
FYI: those who wonder about the technology, check out these sites: * https://sailfishos.org https://sailfishos.org * http://merproject.org http://merproject.org * https://wiki.merproject.org https://wiki.merproject.org * http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/04/wayland-utilizing-android-gpu-drivers.html http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/04/wayland-utilizing-an... * http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/05/wayland-utilizing-android-gpu-drivers.html http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/05/wayland-utilizing-an... Jolla.com is more consumer oriented, so that can puzzle some who look for technical details. It's probably good to provide some links to the above from the Jolla.com. You can give them feedback, they are even present on Diaspora*: https://joindiaspora.com/u/jolla https://joindiaspora.com/u/jolla
abjorn 13y ago
All I learned from the video is that this is a phone for people with very messy desks.
znowi 13y ago
One of their implicit pitch is that Jolla is "surveillance free". And it can run Android apps. I think these two features are good enough to spark an interest. The spec looks also impressive. But freedom doesn't come cheap at almost $550. Nonetheless, a very exciting development. I'm also waiting for Firefox OS to mature and produce more devices. I can't wait to drop Android. Each release takes more freedom away from the user and gets increasingly integrated with whatever social, cloud, data milking services they have at their disposal. Funny how freedom becomes a competitive advantage for startups against the big and evil Internet giants.
- sbierwagen 13y ago
  One of their implicit pitch is that Jolla is "surveillance free". Bullshit. Unless the phone can lie to the phone company about which cell tower its connected to, or some magic like that, it's not going to be anything like "surveillance free."
  - king-coconut 13y ago
    I think he ment that if you want to use the phone, you are not forced to use a ecosystem monitored by USA.
okso 13y ago
Finally a great Mobile OS for Python ?
namuol 13y ago
I like how the video gives us the heads-up about how easy it is to accidentally hang up on your mother.
xmus 13y ago
i don't know about you but it TRIES to look like ios7, i say LET IT GO - smart-phone business is OWNED by Apple, the sooner we accept that the sooner we can move on to a TRULY different thing - this includes Android too, just DIE you're NOT "original" - instead of coming up with NEW ideas you try to rip-off one another and it's getting annoying [most of the time the company that started the idea WINS] in summary: - it's a phone [i think] - looks elegant - looks simple to use - it's smart [i think --- am thinking a lot aren't i :)] - android apps [hope it's better in security than Android] - gesture based [OMG, didn't see that one coming] sound familiar - well it should - iPhone which STARTED all of THIS! NOTE: am not even an iPhone user, Blackberry [Loyal to the end :)] CONCLUSION: BORING! PLEASE if there's something NEW about the OS and the HARDWARE tell me!
javindo 13y ago
That looks cool and all but please get Swype on board. I find it an indispensable part of mobile use nowadays and any US without it is seriously missing out.
grigio 13y ago
mhm.. - FirefoxOS is just web - Ubuntu Phone is cool and gestures - Windows Phone is pushed by Microsoft's money - Jolla / Sailfish is .. Sorry I don't see a killer feature :(
espadrine 13y ago
Why couldn't Ubuntu do that? Is it because device manufacturers won't put trust in anything but the Android brand?

734 points by Geee 13y ago

Perhaps I'm not in the know (I'm not) but it took me way too long to figure out it was a phone and not some UI overlay/Android enhancement suite.

sudomal 13y ago
It's like a lot of things that appear on HN... strange and unfamiliar words without context. Yep, a smartphone.
- missing_cipher 13y ago
  It's the title's fault, OP made no effort to explain what he was linking. Pretty annoying actually.
  - nicholassmith 13y ago
    That'd be editorialising the title which is expressly discouraged by the site moderators.

amalag 13y ago

So this is an Android fork with UI improvements?

lewispollard 13y ago
Looks like it isn't a direct Android fork but does use the Android app runtime.
robin_reala 13y ago
No, this is the current state of Nokia’s Meego OS.
conexions 13y ago
Jolla is based on what was left of Nokia's Maemo/Meego.
LrQSs8Dq 13y ago
It's a phone from a small finnish company with a new (as in not MS, Google or Apple) operating system, that happens to have an Android compatibility layer, so you can run native Sailfish apps and Android apps. If you happen to have heard of the N900, it's the team who made that one. They founded their own company after Nokia sold its soul to MS.
- blahbl4hblahtoo 13y ago
  Nokia had a soul? It was a corporation.
  - agilebyte 13y ago
    Corporate social responsibility could be thought of as (a part of) a soul of a company. http://www.nokia.com/global/about-nokia/people-and-planet/strategy/reports/sustainability-reports/ http://www.nokia.com/global/about-nokia/people-and-planet/st...
    - blahbl4hblahtoo 13y ago
      It's not a person. Microsoft has statements like that. Why don't they have a soul? I'm actually not trying to be flippant. I think that people need to question their assumptions about "companies as people"...Nokia didn't "have a soul". It was a business. The fact that people think it did reflects more on their marketing than anything else.
      - agilebyte 13y ago
        Have you seen Hank Poulsen's documentary about precious materials that make it into mobiles? He referred to Nokia as a company that does not do bad and is responsible. If only to force/guilt-trip companies to do better and be responsible to their workforce, customers, supply chain, country etc., I am going to talk about companies and their soul. http://bloodinthemobile.org/ http://bloodinthemobile.org/
        13y ago
gmuslera 13y ago
Is as much android as BB10, in fact have a lot in common with Blackberry 10 like the user interface or being based on QT/QML for native apps. If you want, is a maemo/meego fork, with a compatibility layer to run Android apps, and won't be surprised if it runs also Firefox OS, Tizen and Ubuntu Touch apps in some moment.
Zigurd 13y ago
No, it is a Mer-derived Linux with Qt as the UI toolkit. The OS is called Sailfish. The Android app capability comes from an Android runtime. I have not tried it myself but the compatibility layer could come from Myriad's "Turbo Dalvik," which is something I heard rumored some time ago, or Jolla might have done it themselves.

fracchio 13y ago

My opinion is: "wat"

easytiger 13y ago

Hint: most global mega corps block youtube. Host videos locally for product demos if you can pay for the bandwidth. You will reach a bigger audience.

kfinley 13y ago
Is Vimeo a good alternative, or is it also blocked?
- hsuresh 13y ago
  Vimeo is terribly slow, at least from here in India.

speeder 13y ago

I was wondering why a condom site was on HN, then I entered and saw it was the mobile phone one... Too bad for them their name (at least in Brazil) still sounds like a condom name though. (the most popular condom in Brazil is named "Olla") More on topic edit: > The original Finnish design, with no front-facing buttons, stands out from the pack. Only me find this... ironic? I mean, almost all smarphones now come without front-facing buttons (a design I hate by the way, specially when your hands are wet or oiled for whatever reason, or when you sneeze in the screen and it go ballistic).

Sharlin 13y ago
Um, iPhones, Androids and Windows Phones all have at least one front-facing button, either physical or virtual.
- 1rae 13y ago
  Blackberry has no front-facing buttons and also uses only a gestures-based interface.
  - Pxtl 13y ago
    And I think that was a strategically terrible move. They're trying to come from behind and they launched with a non-intuitive interface that makes the phone unusable in a demo. You put a Z10 in a user's hands without the tutorial enabled and they're just helpless.
    - 1rae 13y ago
      For new users perhaps it is a bit of a leap for them to take, but don't you think they can overlook this fact because they know they are working with a new operating system? Once you understand how the BB10 OS works its nice to use. The same thing happened recently with Windows 8 when everyone had to learn how to use the gestures for tables. The main point however is that jolla doesn't stand out from the pack just because they have no front-facing buttons...
- 13y ago

networked 13y ago

>Jolla brings you the best of both worlds – super intuitive Sailfish OS apps and the latest Android™ apps. The recent article on OS/2 [1] makes me wonder whether such compatibility (which, as I understand, is full and not selective) is actually good for them. Either way, tough, I wish Jolla success; I'd like to see Sailfish OS [2] on an actual device. [1] See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6792010 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6792010. The short of it is that the Ars Technica article claims OS/2's compatibility with Windows made developers less inclined to write native applications for OS/2. Some discussion on whether that was the case can be found in the comments to this response to the article: http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2144 http://www.os2museum.com/wp/?p=2144. [2] https://sailfishos.org/ https://sailfishos.org/

denis1 13y ago
I think their main focus right now is getting the devices in peoples hands. Do you think compatibility with android would help with this?
untog 13y ago
I thought of that article too, but I think one of the key differences is that neither OS/2 nor Windows had totally taken over the market when the Windows compatibility was introduced. So it turned the 'what to make apps for' question easy to answer. The smartphone industry is way beyond that - people are making iOS and Android apps, and very little else.
dserban 13y ago
It's different. os/2 vs. windows was about two players attempting to prevent each other from monopolizing the industry. I don't think the Jolla guys go into this with a business plan of one day being a monopoly, or preventing another player from dominating the mobile industry. Jolla is - I think - about offering consumers what nokia under elop was unwilling to give them: a MeeGo device.
salient 13y ago
Canonical refused to offer Android emulation for that reason. They didn't think it would be beneficial for Ubuntu Touch in the long term.

shimon_e 13y ago

it will be interesting to see how this competes against the Chinese competitors in this arena. Just yesterday Gionee announced the E7 for about the same price. A phone that includes a camera sensor from a point and shoot. http://www.gsmarena.com/16mp_gionee_elife_e7_claims_to_be_the_best_android_cameraphone-news-7262.php http://www.gsmarena.com/16mp_gionee_elife_e7_claims_to_be_th...

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

bananacurve 13y ago

While trying to open the video to full size, some was cut off, I found Google's 'Stats for Nerds' on right click. Not expecting that, but gave me a chuckle. As for the phone I don't think it is wise to do promotions with no word on availability.

pliny 13y ago

The Peek and Pull features exists on the iPhone - but the directions are reversed. Changing the directions means that app developers cannot develop the same app for both iOS and Sailfish since they have to place important information that shouldn't be covered up by notifications, or shouldn't be interacted with in a way that could activate the notifications menu, on the bottom in iOS and on the top on Sailfish. Is there any benefit to changing the directions notifications come from?

untog 13y ago
The benefit may be not being sued for patent infringement. Sadly.
brodney 13y ago
Developing the same app for both platforms is a Bad Thing. I want Android apps on Android, iPhone apps on iPhone. Mixing never works out well in the long term.
- untog 13y ago
  Sure, but realistically not every organisation has the capacity to develop entirely different apps for every platform. And especially not for minority platforms like Jolla.

MehdiEG 13y ago

For those who are wondering why this is up on the front page: Jolla is launching their first handset tonight in Helsinki: http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/jolla-sailfish-os-phone-november-27-release/ http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/jolla-sailfish-os-phone-... I always wondered why Jolla is getting so little love from HN. To me and from a geek / hacker point of view, Jolla is an awful lot more interesting than Android. Anyone who's had the chance to own a Meego device knows how incredibly talented and passionate the team behind Jolla is. I'm really looking forward to see how the OS and apps feel on Jolla. The OS also appears to be a lot more open and hackable than Android (although the proof will be in the pudding so we'll see how it all pans out).

lambda 13y ago
Probably hasn't been getting much attention because so far it is vaporware (until you can actually buy a device, it's not all that interesting), and it's a member of the complicated Maemo/Moblin/Meego/Tizen/Mer/Sailfish family that keeps on promising great things but seems to be reinvented every year and never actually delivers a working or supported ecosystem. Yes, a few devices have been released in that family, but have been immediately EOLed (the N900, DOA as it was released just as Nokia decided to go Windows only) or sold only as specialized developer previews or whatnot. This whole family has been promising lots of things for a long time, but never seems to actually deliver, while you can get an Android phone in any corner store. I might get interested once I can actually buy a device and write an application for it. Until then, I'm going to be extremely skeptical of this whole family of devices since they seem to consistently over-promise and under-deliver.
- jggonz 13y ago
  > Probably hasn't been getting much attention because so far it is vaporware (until you can actually buy a device, it's not all that interesting I think having other "Android"-compatible phones out there is very interesting. The more options there are for the consumer, the better off we are. Take a look at the iPhone vs Android scene. If it weren't for other options being available, we'd still be living with 3.5" LCDs and a completely closed-source operating system. Btw, you could call any product vaporware at some point. (take a look at kickstarter and other crowdfunding sites. most of those products are in some form vaporware, yet lots of people now know the Pebble, Oculus Rift... etc...)

mattholtom 13y ago

Does no-one answer phone calls from their Mom anymore? Just me?

jzzskijj 13y ago
I was very saddened because of this and called my mom immediately with my Android. Jolla - For people who don't answer to their mothers. That's a strategy. Not necessarily the best, but strategy at least. I was a little bit lost because they were boasting so much about "Yoyo get Sailfish and you can run Android apps". Like in Blackberry phones before they realized they have to "reclaim their success".

ye 13y ago

So I watched the video, and I still have no idea what Jolla is. I was not impressed by anything in the video, but that's besides the point. If you're a technology company, this hipster crap is ok, but you need to start with explaining what it is and how it's better. Showing a bunch of gestures does nothing - Android can do that.

thomholwerda 13y ago
You have to click one link on the front page to a short summary of what Jolla is. One link. One. Of, you can just scroll down. That's it.
- username42 13y ago
  is it open source ? Is it unblocked by default (root account) ?
- ddd1600 13y ago
  Its a bad video/sales-pitch Gary, either that or an unimpressive phone. You pick
- Semaphor 13y ago
  "Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load the phone with top Android™ apps." I assume you are talking about this? Because that really told me nothing worthwhile. I wish these (horribly to use scrolling) sites would just give me link that takes me to a half page description that explains in some detail what the heck they are talking about.
  - CatMtKing 13y ago
    What do you mean nothing worthwhile? Isn't that exactly what it is? A phone with an OS that isn't Android/iOS/Windows/Ubuntu/Firefox? What other description are you expecting?
    - 13y ago

gesman 13y ago

Suggestion: add a text "elevator pitch" on a front page. Forcing me to watch video is a sure way to Ctrl+F4

xer0x 13y ago
Yeah, I didn't realize there was more than the video until I read these comments.

davexunit 13y ago

Can anyone comment on how free this device will be? From what I recall, Sailfish is partially free software, but contains proprietary software as well which is a real shame.

pekk 13y ago
What is your alternative?
- zokier 13y ago
  Nemo, replicant, webos? All fully free OSs afaik.
- daliusd 13y ago
  Firefox OS, Ubuntu Touch
  - fulafel 13y ago
    The Firefox OS phone (Zte Open) has proprietary stuff.
    - rhelmer 13y ago
      Are there any phones that do not require proprietary drivers? I am not aware of any.
      - fulafel 13y ago
        Yes. The most free one is OpenMoko, even the baseband firmware: http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2012-July/067276.html http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2012-July/0672... (runnig non-certified baseband firmware is illegal in many places however, from spectrum use regulations)
- davexunit 13y ago
  Replicant is the only project committed to software freedom that I know of.

jdalgetty 13y ago

Looks cool but I wish it had beefier hardware specs.

koide 13y ago
What are you missing concretely and why?
- zanny 13y ago
  Just compare it to the Nexus 5 at the same price point. Half the memory, probably lower res screen, the sd card slot is great but I don't think it justifies a $100+ price premium. I'd rather see Nexus 5's flashed with Ubuntu Phone / Plasma Active / Tizen / Sailfish than all these companies trying to batch order hardware of their own that never has the economies of scale Google could pull off.
  - pekk 13y ago
    You aren't comparing apples to apples. It's pretty clear that Jolla was never intended to launch as a lower-cost competitor to Nexus 5. That makes it a bit silly to criticize it for not being one, particularly at launch. How long has the Android platform had to bring costs down? A long time.
  - shooper 13y ago
    It's unfair to compare a phone hardware company that needs to make money to survive to a company that gets almost all its money from ads, searches, cloud and personal data and uses that money to subsidize hardware as a loss leader(or making bare profits) both to gain marketshare and also to undercut and weaken other smartphone companies' profit margins so that they have less money to compete in web search now or in the future. [1] From a consumer point of view, you're right though. The market is heading towards commoditization and Jolla will most likely fall into the moat if people compare them on price alone. [1] http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/25/search-googles-castle-moat/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/03/25/search-googles-castle-moat/

Zigurd 13y ago

It will be interesting to see if customers see Jolla as a continuation of Nokia's handset business. Lots of people liked N9 and Meego, and when that product was killed it was out-selling Nokia's Windows Phone products.

jasonkester 13y ago

They seem to put a lot of effort into telling you things other than "what is this thing?" It sorta looks like a phone. Is it a phone? "Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS." Sweet. How is that relevant? It must be important because it spends the rest of the page telling you about the OS. I'm back here, with honestly no idea what it is. Probably not the impression they want to leave on people, assuming (as a guess) that this is a consumer product of some kind. It seems they put the engineers in charge of designing the website.

jggonz 13y ago
On the homepage "Jolla.com" it says: Jolla is powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load the phone with top Android™ apps. So it is a phone since they call it a phone. :)
- millerc 13y ago
  Beyond that simple statement, I'd agree with Jason. My first impression upon reading their webpage was "why?" Scrolling through I didn't find an answer. No differentiator in apps, function, power, memory or price. I've often been wrong when I wondered that about a product, for this once I genuinely would like to know if there's an answer to the question. Why a new phone called Jolla?
- jasonkester 13y ago
  Imagine the difference had they said "Jolla is a smart phone powered by Sailfish OS, a truly open and distinct mobile operating system. Navigate effortlessly with the gesture-based user interface and load it with top Android™ apps." rather than bury the most important point on the whole website as a single word at the end of a long paragraph full of technical jargon. That would qualify as calling it a phone. Better still would be "Jolla is a smart phone", dispensing with 28 unnecessary words. Hopefully somebody at their end has the homepage up in an editor and can make the fix.
  - tixocloud 13y ago

CookWithMe 13y ago

> To get back to Home from any app, swipe from either side of the screen. I don't think it's a great idea to reserve the "swipe from side of screen" gesture for the OS. Especially the left-swipe is used in many apps to reveal a menu, which is a UI-pattern I like a lot. Anyway, looks interesting, would love to try one out!

k-mcgrady 13y ago
>> "I don't think it's a great idea to reserve the "swipe from side of screen" gesture for the OS." In iOS 7 a gesture from the left side towards the right navigates back in an app.

buster 13y ago

It would be awesome if Jolla would become a successful company after Nokia sold out to MS (because it seems like Jolla is a continuation of what would have been Nokias route without MS). Also i only heard good things about the N900, i love linux, i hope the handset/os is "free"... and 399€ doesn't seem to be too expensive. Also it looks well designed. Good luck, Jolla Team!

purringmeow 13y ago
I think 400 euro is a lot for a device with these specs though. They are letting a huge number of devices "fly under them"(be cheaper) and the average consumer doesn't give a damn if the phone runs Sailfish OS or Android. Nevertheless, I too wish them luck :)

616c 13y ago

What is interesting is that anyone that comes here, likes it (I do from what I see) and goes to check on the Mer Project where this work stems from will see their git repos have been largely untouched for two years. [0] I find that strange because I had to search a few pages into their wiki to even find that URL. I wish people who liked Meego would support the latest update to the truly free OpenMoko project. [1] You can build your own upgrade or buy the whole thing in an old GA02 case (the second revision OpenMoko phone). I am waiting out for pocket change to buy one of those. Buy a real open handset and fight the power guys! [0] http://gitweb.merproject.org/gitweb http://gitweb.merproject.org/gitweb [1] http://projects.goldelico.com/p/gta04-main/ http://projects.goldelico.com/p/gta04-main/

ddd1600 13y ago

What does this phone do differently from all the other smart phones?

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luxpir 13y ago

As a (still happy) n900 user looking for an upgrade path to a decent open phone with modern hardware, I'm hoping that Sailfish gives you command line/root access. Realistically that probably won't happen in this first iteration, but I've held out for long enough now to be able to wait another 6 months to see what happens. A hardware keyboard would also be nice, the bigger the better, but you can't have it all...

Brakenshire 13y ago
As I recall, there is some talk about using the 'other half' feature of this to attach a hardware keyboard. A quick search reveals: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=91535 http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=91535
- luxpir 13y ago
  Ah, I'd misunderstood the 'other half' in that case, thinking it just to be a fancy name for the rear case with a 'colour feature'. There may be hope yet, although nobody seems to know if that command line/root access is possible. It's entirely possible that the Maemo/Google search queries I've run may be letting me down, it'd be great if the Jolla documentation made some mention of this.
Jhsto 13y ago
Jukka Eklund tweeted the following: https://twitter.com/jukkaeklund/status/405766972765642752 https://twitter.com/jukkaeklund/status/405766972765642752 Seems like the phone already has the command line implemented. Great for them.

iamtheike 13y ago

If you know some finish guy, you will definitely understand that this mobile is going to rock.

deleted 13y ago

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itsbits 13y ago

When does this mobile technology gonna saturate?

rodolphoarruda 13y ago

I wonder how the name is pronounced. My first language is Brazilian Portuguese, but I tend to read it in Spanish because of the double "L". But that in turn would make it sound like the Portuguese version of "cork", like a bottle cork.

sharpneli 13y ago
"Yol-la" probably confers the intended spelling in English. The word Jolla is Finnish and means a small boat. It's a reference to the famous burning platform memo. P.S. I was one of the 450 guys who got their phone today. Got it literally 20 minutes ago.
- LiamMcCalloway 13y ago
  Can you confirm it's got LTE _everywhere_? (6 continents)
  - sharpneli 13y ago
    I cannot. They didn't really speak about it. However my first impressions as a developer: It is a breath of fresh air that instead of fiddling with AndroidSDK and having to deploy an apk my first test of their toolchain was simple compilation -> scp the binary into the phone and run it in dev mode terminal (or via ssh from a desktop). They naturally have a full fledged packaging system like apk but the point is that it's not forced upon us. My phone is now basically (just like N900 was) just a Linux running on arm platform, with fancy UI for consumer usage on top.
    - voltagex_ 13y ago
      How restricted are you? Can you get root on it?
      - sharpneli 13y ago
        There are practically no restrictions whatsoever. You have root as soon as you enable the developer mode from options. You can even flash your own images to the device.

chrisarriola 13y ago

Do we seriously need another mobile operating system?

SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago

I value my smartphone a lot, but I find it hard to get excited about this smart phone vs that smartphone. Android, Samsung android fork, iPhone, WinPhone, whatever. They're all good, they all roll out a faster better version every year. They all have twitter, facebook, email, maps, search, a camera, app store. etc. Oh yeah, and SMS and voice calls too. So why should we get excited about this flavour of hand-held connected computer? What's the USP?

daliusd 13y ago
Linux ? (not just Linux kernel)
- SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
  Linux is a good thing, but Linux as a thing in itself delivers a lot of geek cred and is a good platform for other software, but it is not a feature that gives phone users any value. Will the average buyer know or care? Is it more stable? Cheaper? Android phones are stable and cheap already. Does it run new kinds of apps or run existing apps faster? Make coffee and wash dishes? What does it do for me that my current phone does not?
  - daliusd 13y ago
    I absolutely agree with you. Still you have asked personal question "So why should __we__ get excited" and I made assumption that __we__ as hackers. If __we__ as people - IMHO nothing interesting about this phone from average user perspective. N950 and N9 were interesting phones for me as geek (because of QtQuick) but QtQuick performance gain is not that important/significant if compared to HTML(5). The only reason why I love different brands than Android is to play with something interesting and different. That's why Firefox OS looks particularly interesting for me currently with my simple needs and low dependence on Google.
    - SideburnsOfDoom 13y ago
      Good answer, thanks. "real linux" is a feature for a certain group of people. ... as is "low dependence on Google"

LeicaLatte 13y ago

Liked what i saw. Easily better than any iphone ad of recent times.

dschiptsov 13y ago

Weaker than S III hardware to run Android apps for 400 euro? Did I miss something?)

pekk 13y ago
You missed that it is not designed as a lower-cost Android phone?

uxwtf 13y ago

A phone for messy people? Why put so much junk in the video to defocus viewer's attention?

shooper 13y ago

Kinda off topic, but as soon as I opened that page in a new background tab, it froze my browser and PC for about a minute with an hourglass before it would respond to my inputs. I thought it crashed the system, but everything is okay now. I did close the tab after giving it a cursory look because it looked too noisy and light on content. Perhaps someone can analyze how much RAM, CPU and bandwidth that page takes up. And I am rocking a quadcore computer with 8 gigs of RAM. Sigh, the more the hardware giveth, the more the new fangled web pages taketh away.

sampo 13y ago
I have an old laptop with Core 2 Duo and 2 gigs of RAM. Had no problem with the website.

snth 13y ago

I really wish we could edit submission titles to be more informative.

ender7 13y ago

The UI is pretty, but it's dropping frames like crazy during your demo video. It's super smooth most of the time, but not at the critical times. Horseshoes and hand grenades, etc.

neakor 13y ago

Am I supposed to be impressed by this? "truly open and gesture based OS". I thought the open card has been played and dead already. And don't iOS and Android both have plenty of gestures? I didn't see anything new at all.

7952 13y ago
Of course they are not selling open software but a hardware product (which may or may not be locked down).

trekky1700 13y ago

Anyone else really distracted by the extremely messy desks. Who honestly leaves a wet, browning apple core just sitting on their desk. That's just going to be a sticky bloody mess later.

brianmcdonough 13y ago
That's hilarious. Not to knock the phone, which may or may not be quite good, but I was also more interested in the things on the desk than the phone. Who's the person who said, let's put the apple in there? I'd like to know more about that decision as well.
skc 13y ago
Subliminal message perhaps? Would be chuckle worthy if it was deliberate.
lttlrck 13y ago
I thought the desks were a brilliant touch...

pm90 13y ago

>User-replaceable battery OH. GOD. YES!

Fauntleroy 13y ago

It really bothers me that they didn't do something about the flickering infrared light in the video. I know it's not going to show up in real life, but that's going to confuse some people who aren't aware of the fact cameras can see some things we don't.

rjohnk 13y ago

I have no idea what the web design of the type Jolla has, but it's getting old really fast. Yes, it looks neat at first, but then it's confusing. Crashplan recently did their update with the same style. I'll shut up now if I'm the only one bothered by this trend.

criswell 13y ago
I think it's mostly just weird because the fixed header doesn't have a border or anything along the bottom to let you know where it ends and the content begins. I see no reason for it to be fixed at all to be honest, the content isn't extremely useful. I also wish more sites would do min-height media queries before fixing elements to my screen. The header and footer here are pretty greedy with the spacing on this site.

jrockway 13y ago

> GSM/3G/4G LTE* (Works on 6 continents). What, no service in Antarctica?

jokoon 13y ago

$400 ? nope.

scrozier 13y ago

"A new beginning." And a web site and video that look exactly like every iOS and Android device ever made. For HN readers, there's some geek cred here, but as a consumer product, they need some marketing help.

SeppoErviala 13y ago
This is the new beginning after the burning platform company has finally been sold to Microsoft. Alternatively the new beginning for maemo/moblin/meego/whatever.

LandoCalrissian 13y ago

OK, all the garbage in the video is really, really strange. It completely distracted me and kind of grossed me out. I don't know who thought that was a good idea.

Cyclenerd 13y ago

Why should I buy this device now? 400EUR a lot of money and on Twitter they write: Calendar sync is not supported at the moment. MMS is not supported at the moment. We do not have DLNA support at the moment.

chappi42 13y ago
You cannot buy it now, thus... If - I'm speculating - we 'normal' people can buy the device in spring it will have more features. (I'm interested as it's linux based, and a good alternative to the closed apple world and the dominant 'Android-one-Google-data-collecting' universe.)

shmerl 13y ago

I'll be getting it as soon as they'll confirm compatibility with T-Mobile LTE.

shmerl 13y ago

FYI: those who wonder about the technology, check out these sites: * https://sailfishos.org https://sailfishos.org * http://merproject.org http://merproject.org * https://wiki.merproject.org https://wiki.merproject.org * http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/04/wayland-utilizing-android-gpu-drivers.html http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/04/wayland-utilizing-an... * http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/05/wayland-utilizing-android-gpu-drivers.html http://mer-project.blogspot.com/2013/05/wayland-utilizing-an... Jolla.com is more consumer oriented, so that can puzzle some who look for technical details. It's probably good to provide some links to the above from the Jolla.com. You can give them feedback, they are even present on Diaspora*: https://joindiaspora.com/u/jolla https://joindiaspora.com/u/jolla

abjorn 13y ago

All I learned from the video is that this is a phone for people with very messy desks.

znowi 13y ago

One of their implicit pitch is that Jolla is "surveillance free". And it can run Android apps. I think these two features are good enough to spark an interest. The spec looks also impressive. But freedom doesn't come cheap at almost $550. Nonetheless, a very exciting development. I'm also waiting for Firefox OS to mature and produce more devices. I can't wait to drop Android. Each release takes more freedom away from the user and gets increasingly integrated with whatever social, cloud, data milking services they have at their disposal. Funny how freedom becomes a competitive advantage for startups against the big and evil Internet giants.

sbierwagen 13y ago
One of their implicit pitch is that Jolla is "surveillance free". Bullshit. Unless the phone can lie to the phone company about which cell tower its connected to, or some magic like that, it's not going to be anything like "surveillance free."
- king-coconut 13y ago
  I think he ment that if you want to use the phone, you are not forced to use a ecosystem monitored by USA.

okso 13y ago

Finally a great Mobile OS for Python ?

namuol 13y ago

I like how the video gives us the heads-up about how easy it is to accidentally hang up on your mother.

xmus 13y ago

i don't know about you but it TRIES to look like ios7, i say LET IT GO - smart-phone business is OWNED by Apple, the sooner we accept that the sooner we can move on to a TRULY different thing - this includes Android too, just DIE you're NOT "original" - instead of coming up with NEW ideas you try to rip-off one another and it's getting annoying [most of the time the company that started the idea WINS] in summary: - it's a phone [i think] - looks elegant - looks simple to use - it's smart [i think --- am thinking a lot aren't i :)] - android apps [hope it's better in security than Android] - gesture based [OMG, didn't see that one coming] sound familiar - well it should - iPhone which STARTED all of THIS! NOTE: am not even an iPhone user, Blackberry [Loyal to the end :)] CONCLUSION: BORING! PLEASE if there's something NEW about the OS and the HARDWARE tell me!

javindo 13y ago

That looks cool and all but please get Swype on board. I find it an indispensable part of mobile use nowadays and any US without it is seriously missing out.

grigio 13y ago

mhm.. - FirefoxOS is just web - Ubuntu Phone is cool and gestures - Windows Phone is pushed by Microsoft's money - Jolla / Sailfish is .. Sorry I don't see a killer feature :(

espadrine 13y ago

Why couldn't Ubuntu do that? Is it because device manufacturers won't put trust in anything but the Android brand?