Yeah, marketing: forcing you to buy shit you will never need.
On 2/3/10, sta...@cs.tu-berlin.de <sta...@cs.tu-berlin.de> wrote:
> * David Tweed <david.tw...@gmail.com> [2010-02-03 08:32]:
>> On Wed, Feb 3, 2010 at 4:15 AM, Noah Birnel <nbir...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> > On Mon, Feb 01, 2010 at 04:49:52PM +0100, sta...@cs.tu-berlin.de wrote:
>> >
>> >>... a mobile phone with integrated camera,
>> >> touch screen, 'apps' for learning languages, etc. is as much suckless
>> >> as an
>> >> axe with a door bell, toilet paper and nuclear power generator.
>> >>
>> > At this point a mobile phone is a general purpose portable computer. The
>> > camera is no more out of line than the speakers hooked up to your home
>> > box.
>>
>> I partly think it's perception shape by marketing. You can still buy a
>> mobile phone that only has voice functions. You can also buy a more
>> general communications/entertainment node device which has a host of
>> hardware and software that's all appropriate to that usage, including
>> as one component making voice calls. The only problem is that they're
>> still marketed as "phones"
>
> Perfectly right.
>
>> (I've never subscribed to the philosophy that an entity should "do one
>> thing well" but rather that "there should not have non-orthogonal
>> capabilities in the same entity". If you're into that sort of thing, I
>> don't see any reason why you'd consider mobile photo-taking, internet
>> browsing, causual entertainment games, etc, to be non-orthogonal to
>> chatting to friends: they're all ways to entertain yourself while not
>> at home.)
>
> Yes. I have no problem with integrated devices as long as they agree with
> the above philosophy, *and* as long as integration is not the cause for
> preventing them to fulfill their purpose. What is the benefit of a phone
> which has to be recharged every day, just because it is capable of playing
> music (not because you hear music every day)? Zero. Synergy^{-1}
>
> In addition, I definitely prefer to be able to take my phone, camera,
> portable computing device separately, when I need only one of them, with
> sane battery life, dimensions, etc.
>
> So, the solution is modular design with clear and simple interfaces. And
> this is possible. But we come again to the marketing division -- they would
> rather buy the license for such design, put it in the safe in the basement
> and be calm that nobody will come up with sth that cuts their sells a bit,
> even if it will make the world better. There are many examples of this.
>
> --
> stanio_
>
>
