The iPhone, made by Apple Inc, has been released in stores around July 2007, and it is estimated that in the first weeks, a whopping 700,000 units where sold. The iPhone along with the LG KE850 a.k.a the “LG Prada phone” launched in December 2006, are a new breed of multi-touch mobile phones.
Nokia has had much success with its second Web tablet model, the N800, which runs on a light Debian GNU/Linux. Released as open devices, the tablets now benefit from a broad user base and a plethora of third-pary applications. Very little has been disclosed about the LG KE850 interface, other than that it is a Macromedia-Flash driven GUI. Thus there is probably not much room left for upgrade or third-party application. Apple’s iPhone, on the other hand, is claimed to run on a full-scale OSX, which leaves the door open for third-party applications although it is still a closed device.
In light of all the development that has been done by Apple, LG and Prada and the patents that have been filed for, I can’t help but to think that Bang & Olufsen is the kind of company that should have been coming up with something similar… instead, the Danes collaborated with Samsung in 2005 to develop the Serene Mobile. A mobile phone that looks more like a corporate gift or a calculator than a sleek mobile device. The Serene was criticized by the press for its outrageous release price (US$ 1,250.00) and lack of functional consistency.
I mean, with their long history of unique appearance and user-interfaces, B&O should have invented something like the iPhone. Let’s hope they are already working on it.
I reviewed Inkscape in May 2006, and althought they were export filters to the ubiquitous PDF format, the output was’nt always perfect.
