Normally I won't have much things to share, but today is not any normal day. It is death of once unrivalled king, how the mighty has fallen.
Many people will simply roll their eyes when I express my melancholy, and I don't really want to explain to those who are uninterested. But I will explain it here for who want to know and for my own future reference.
I grew up with Nokia. My first phone, humble Nokia 3100 with its glow-in-the-dark chassis, 4096 colour screen, polyphonic ringtone. It is the phone I used the least, with basically no feature other than making a call and SMS. Yet, now, 10 years later, it is still usable as a backup phone. How many phone can boast the ability of making call and SMS 10 years later?
My second phone, Nokia 5500, is the most short-lived in my history of phones, with its 2 years lifespan. Short as it is, it lived gloriously. I still remember spending my free time snuggling in bed, squinting my eyes to read tiny, tiny text on 2 inch screen. Oh, it was annoying to use, so full of weaknesses and compromise. The rubber that made the keypad fall off after not even 1 year of use. But yet, it is the phone that teach me the wonder of technology. The one who make me fall in love with my second love, technology. A phone that shape a big part of me. It is the most short-lived phone, the one with most problem, the most unreliable one, the ugliest one even. But yet, the one who has greatest impact of my life.
My 3rd phone, Nokia E63. The one I am still using 4 years later, which is now. It is so severely outdated and I question myself everyday as tech enthusiast, why I still use this phone that is barely usable even as feature phone? But yet, I love this thing, this baby, this power horse. I will probably going to change my phone soon and very soon, yet every time I use it, it is still bring a sense of joy, of wonder. How can this baby works so well even after 4 years of (ab)use is a mystery that may never be solved. In recent light of thing, I guess this will be my last Nokia smartphone, or even my last Nokia.
Nokia as smartphone maker is dead. Anybody who followed technology closely enough will mourn. Websites beginning to pour the stories in droves, Twitter is crowded with all grieving, speculation and questions. It is so befitting I guess; a tribute to the once King, to the one we all still loved despite everything.
Me, I feel that I lost an old and dear friend. I believe not only me feel that. Nokia, you truly change the life of millions and billions people in the world. I will never forget your motto: "Connecting people.". You did, to the rich and the poor. You make technology affordable, reachable even to those unprivileged.
You will be sorely missed.
