[geeks] Cell phones: block incoming calls

[Mike Meredith]

On Thu, 6 Dec 2007 13:21:00 -0500, Joshua Boyd wrote:
> PalmOS seems like a good start of a system.
> 
> OTOH, more than 10 years later, it would have been nice if they could
> have progressed beyond only a good start.

I think the Palm management slowly spelled out the letters that were
appearing on the wall, came out with "Microsoft" and thought "Hey!
Great! We can get rid of all those overpriced developers now".

In conventional business terms it would have worked too ... if
Microsoft had managed to swallow up the phone market. Of course safe
conventional business methods merely allow you to survive never thrive.

> Unless we get a iPod Touch SDK that is really good, I'm beginning to
> think that what we need is an entirely new OS for this sort of thing.

Well, an iPhone SDK *and* a decent upgrade to the iPhone ... the
current one is a very fancy interface around a rather mediocre phone.
No matter how many fancy flowers you wrap around a turd, it is still a
turd :)

I'm not sure we need a new OS, what with Symbian (Series 60, Series 80,
UIQ), PalmOS, Linux (with multiple different APIs on top), Windows
Mobile (or whatever I'm supposed to call it), and now OSX. What we need
is a little "Apple magic" to smooth out the rough edges on the other
OSes. 

Most of the functionality is there at least in the form of an API. What
is needed is for the implementation to be done, or the interface to be
made more natural.

> But would there be a market for it with how many people now prefer
> smart phones? 

I think that's one of the things that allows phone manufacturers to get
away with mediocre interfaces. Perhaps most of the people using
smartphones have them thrust upon them. Certainly at work, the managers
have the latest Win-thing provided ... presumably it's chosen by
someone who goes through a checklist of features (WiFi, 3Mpix
camera, ...) without trying to ascertain usability ("it's Windows, how
hard can it be?").

Personally I want a cli-phone :-

$ call $(contact-search jones)


-- 
Mike Meredith (http://zonky.org/)
  No security outfit ever went broke relying on the stupidity of users.