3G Phones Hit The Shops This Weekend
It almost feels like we're watching some sort of bizarre geek reality show - following every overhyped and over-publicized move of Hutchison's 3. Watch now as the (gasp!) actual phones arrive in stores. 3 is milking this "launch" for all it's worth. Technically, they launched back on March 3rd (03/03/03 - get it?), but it's a funny sort of launch when no phones are available. So, now the phones are here and 3's PR people get to celebrate their second "launch".Update (PA): On a trip to London earlier this week I checked out the 3 shop on Kennisington High Street. The well appointed store was empty and the employees were milling about fixing store displays, etc. It was about 10AM, so I didn't expect it to be very busy. They sat me down and gave me a demo and let me play with the NEC e808, the one with the keyboard. It has a nice screen which makes watching downloaded video easy. But it's too big to use as a phone. And in my brief testing I wasn't blown away by the email UI which I would have expected to be better for a device with a keyboard. For all the 3G speed hype, the services I tested, like maps and video downloads, looked great, but weren't exactly instant downloads. I will admit that video calling was neat. However it did take a couple of trys to make it work and I'm not sure if people will use it after the novelty wears off. That's if they know someone else with a 3 phone. When I asked the sales person how the pre-orders were going he predictably said "Quite well." Later on I jumped into one of the mobile phone chains that 3 has signed up as a reseller and asked them the same question. Despite the prominent 3 display the sales person said they hadn't taken any pre-orders yet. People are disappointed when they realize that they have to switch their current service and seem unsure of this new network.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: 3g
