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Nokia Shows Off Phone with Printable Faceplate
jonknee writes "Nokia is prepping a new phone that one-ups all the other attempts at face plates... you can print your own! Just place one of the template pages it comes with (you can buy more) into your ink jet, and make a nifty design that isn't mass marketed at every mall this side of the Mississippi. The template is perforated so you can get a nice fit around the keys. The phone looks pretty nifty as well: camera, flashlight, FM radio and about everything else." It might be fun to rename someone's keys as a practical joke, not that I've ever done it to anyone's computer keyboard.
But can you actually make phone calls with it?
So I shall print out my girlfriend with the great body, but ugly face. A face that will be covered by the display :-)
All together now, class, "Wow, that's just nifty."
I believe you can't actually rebadge the keys, the template has holes punched out that fit around the keys, much like Nokia's faceplates for the current phones.
SO you actually don't see that much of your design on the front -- it is all keys and screen -- but a lot of it on the back.
... I recall hex editing someone's keyboard mappings (Windows) so that the misplaced keys still generated the correct letters.
Hours of fun, especially for touch typists =)
With a Sharpie, any phone has a paintable face.
Just in case anybody is interested how this thing actually looks:
http://www.nokia.com/nokia/0,,42298,00.html
There's specs and some more PR stuff on the 3200 from the Nokia site.
Sounds like something that'll catch on with the younger crowd; I'm surprised that no one else has done it yet. On the other hand, faceplates are a big business with that same demographic, so maybe no one's tried it because they'd rather make you pay to customize.
The bold print giveth, and the fine print taketh away
Does the ink run? Holding a cell phone in your hand on a hot day is a recipe for running ink... as is drinking a glass of water next to the phone and touching the glass to the phone accidentally. Is there some sort of lamination or waterproofing provided? Otherwise, I don't think the printouts will last too long in "real world" use.
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
That mobile phones, one of the most useful applications of technology ever are so ubiqutious they are now practically being treated as fashion accessories rather than technology.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
If I had heard about this any place except Slashdot, I would have assumed that the intended market for this product was 12-year-old girls. I had to re-read the article twice to confirm that there really wasn't anything at all interesting about this phone. News for Nerds? What the hell?
I thought to myself: How on earth am I supposed to dial with those keys?
Am I the only one thinking about this ?
Now I can keep my vi cheatsheet with me wherever I go.
I immediately thought of all the other applications to a well designed case that could take printed sheets, such as computers, mice, laptop backs, keyboards etc... ...then I realised Nokia have probably patented it already and we won't see it on anything but phones. And I bet people don't print their own designs out but still download the damned things online... and probably pay $5 each for them. Bah! people are sheep!
Make your time ! Sombody set us up the phone !!
:)
All you base are belong to us !!!
Nokia
"Science is like sex: sometimes something useful comes out, but that is not the reason we are doing it" Richard Feynman
Slashdotters will take advantage of the personalization oportunities offered by this and will all have something unique.... the penguin. :)
Slashdot Sig. version 0.1alpha. Use at your own risk.
Many, many moons ago the place I worked at had a computer tech with a bizzare sense of humor.
Every year in December, he'd replace the boss' keyboard's L with a J key. We'd ask him why, and he'd say "because this way you now have a Christmas keyboard".
"Huh?"
"No L".
*cymbal crash*
Endless arguments over trivial contradictions in books written by ignorant savages to explain thunder in the dark.
you can see why Nokia's market share is dropping, instead of concentrating on making a product that actually performs better and is more functional they are wasting time developing enhancements such as this, either make a better more reliable phone or at least get out the way of people who want to move technology forward
From the article:
Integrated camera Polyphonic ringtones Customized contact list (images and ringtones) Integrated flashlight FM radio IR JavaTM
Why is it Nokia will release phones with all sorts of 'features' like a radio and a calorie counter, but can't give us more phones with bluetooth? I know they have a couple, but for the US market the offerings are pretty slim unless you want to carry around the big (by today's standards) 3650. IR isn't dead but it should be.
That Nokia 3200 has transparent covers, so you can put any print under it.
Same can be done with Apple iBooks.
Yeah, similarly I could put the phone's number keys the same way up as the keys on my calculator and the numeric keypad on my computer keyboard, with "7 8 9" up the top instead of "1 2 3" up the top.
Does anyone know why phones' keys are upside down compared to a computer keyboard and a calculator?
News for Nerds? What the hell?
What if the submitter had suggested a custom faceplate showing Natalie Portman, naked and petrified, eating a bowl of hot grits?
What's up with Nokia keypad layouts, anyway?
Go here and look at some phones.
The 3650 are in a circle. I gave up rotary dial decades ago, I don't want to be reminded.
The 3510 is like a spider web or something.
The 8910i doesn't have any keys at all! (Just kidding... I know they're under a cover.)
This 3200 looks like it doesn't have enough keys.
The 2100 looks like a smiley face.
With all these funky keys, how does Nokia expect me to dial a freakin' phone while I'm driving my SUV at 90mph in the right lane eating two cheese burgers and a Coke?
For those interested in such things, here is the full specs on Nokia's site.
What I want in a phone, and no phone seems to have it yet, is some kind of public key system that encrypts the data. You would have your two keys, and you could send your contact info + public key to someone else. When they call you, it enrcypts all the data both ways..
But that's probably cause I'm a terrorist...
They are getting unhappily close to monopolies in a lot of places.
My Panasonic has a removable transparent back that I can put pictures under. I got it 2 or 3 months ago.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Even though this Nokia phone looks good but I would spend my $$ on this one:
Handspring Treo 600 Getting Closer
The story behind it's design
More images
Another image
More info on how it will look like
Treo 600 in Europe next week?
Future Phones/PDA's
No Bluetooth how can you ever think about getting this phone, my next phone will be a Sony E. 610 looks good but Z600 might do, until that my I65 will just work fine.
I just hate bit SPAM, (www.netnoise.com.kh)
I followed the link and music that sounded like level excepts from Jax & Daxter started blaring out of my speakers. Not cool when one is at the office.
How in the world could someone think that hi-jacking my speakers is a bright way to present information on a phone to an end-user? I felt like I had hit a geocities page.
Apple's PowerBook 1400 did it already with the BookCover. There's a removable clear plastic cover (they also included one of grey plastic in case you didn't like the idea) that slides off the top part of the laptop, and underneath you can put any appropriately shaped piece of paper. It even came with templates pre-installed on the hard drive so you could design something to place there. Was kind of a cool idea, but it didn't really take off, as one can easily see.
My English teacher once told me that two positives don't make a negative. Two words for her: Yeah, right.
im not sure id like finguring, holding, and poking tux like that. that is, unless he giggles like the Tickle-Me-Elmo.
> "I allege that SCO is full of it" -Linus
No thanks. I use a bluetooth headset and connect my phone to my notebook using bluetooth.
Until Nokia stop being total wankers and resume support bluetooth on their phones I'm not buying one -- no matter how many "features" it has.
People have been abandoning Nokia like hell because they've stopped making "professional" products. I mean, who wants an FM(!) radio (!) over bluetooth?
Joke would be on you if you did this to someone like me who types on a QWERTY keyboard but with the OS set to Dvorak. They probably wouldn't notice the renaming.
since phonescoop.com seems to be down, here is another site with more info about the phone.
And quite well i might say, no custom designs yet, but you can get a matching computer skin and mouse pad
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
WhoTF needs a phone with a camera, flashlight, radio and other bullshit, if what a true geek needs is gprs, bluetooth and maybe 802.11?
I got tired of having the mall I goto have the same stuff this side of the Mississippi, I wanted something unique so I moved to the other side of the Mighty Mississip, and now there are LOTS of things I can get and a printable face plate was one along time ago...
You really should think about moving.
moo.
can't see any use for this phone, and those keys... well at least you could print out your pr0n and change the design every now and than
Replace the paper faceplate with a programmable LCD color screen. Now you can animate your faceplate, take a photo with the camera and display it right away on the back of your phone... endless possibilities.
So what if it sucks the batteries? It sells phones.
Printible faceplates, but that still dont' negate the total lack of quality of Nokia's products.
--
Adobe's anti-counterfeiting softw
Strangely enough, I've just posted to a diabetes newsgroup on this...
Having a mobile phone with a built-in blood glucose meter would be a real useful thing, especially since the number of people with the disease is growing at an alarming rate.
Imagine what could also be done--you could IR, bluetooth, USB or phone in your results to your computer or an online data store or your docs. If your BG indicated a possible hypo or hyper attack you could press OK to dial one or more numbers for assistance, or the phone could be pre-programmed to automatically dial for help if you did not hit NO/Cancel within, say 10 seconds. With calendaring and alarms, the phone could also remind when it's time to take medication.
As a type 2 diabetic, I have to carry a meter around with me that's about the same size as a mobile phone, so having the two integrated would be great.
AT&ROFLMAO
"It might be fun to rename someone's keys as a practical joke, not that I've ever done it to anyone's computer keyboard."
Man, that CowboyNeal, he sure has some wackyfun ideas! What will he think of next? Livin' on the Edge!
Download my free songs!
...have been available for years now, for just about all of their entry-level phones that have user-replaceable covers. I've had a couple before; it was kind of cool holding up a phone where you could see the raw internals... ...sliding a printed sheet of paper underneath the plastic somehow doesn't sound like an improvement :\ ...
This "innovation" reminds me of the Mattel Intellivision game console from the 1980s. Take a look at the front page of IntellivisionLives.com - you can see the plastic faceplate on one of the controllers.
;-)
Now that I think about it - the controllers have a very phone-like interface. I wonder where the Nokia engineers got the idea..
__
Zarathustra.fi
Modern man has no goal, no aim, no ideals.
response from handango
Is this too much to ask for? A decent entry-level PDA can be had for around $100. If a phone's $100, then where are all the $200 PDA phone combos?
I want the Samsung SPH-i500 - but it's $600! This is crazy - who spends $600 on a phone?
It's the same way that I'd like a new $300 notebook. At that price it would be close to disposable and I wouldn't worry too much about breaking it. I don't even want a color screen - but nobody makes low spec notebooks because $800 is the lowest anyone is willing to sell them for these days (and they're full color with 2 GHz processors).
Best theft protection ever: just put the goatse guy on.
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
The Sidekick is getting OS 1.1 this month sent via wireless to all devices. It will finally give us a download manager, copy and paste, and some minor but needed tweaks. The lack of influx of third-party software is really going to make it look bad if the treo launches before the SK has a chance to update and give us a download app. You can see the sneak preview here:
http://www.danger.com/developers_peek.php
...that isn't mass marketed at every mall this side of the Mississippi.
Funny how that expression seems to work no matter where in the US you live...
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Give me a phone that works with my email and calendar. I have tried the Sony ericsson, but it froze a couple of times, which were unacceptable since it was when it was lying idle on my desk or in the middle of the night, when I was on call duty.
So I swithed to a Nokia phone with Bluetooth and the it is great that the phone just needs to be near my pc in the office for me to sync it with Notes. But the sync. of the phone is too annoying when you have tried a PDA. It's not a one touch update like my Palm was(press the update in the cradle), I first have to connect the serial via bluetooth, then start the Nokia program, press sync, then choose not to see the log file and then exit the program again.
While having a camera in my phone is a fun thing, I would rather want that it worked seamlessly with the groupware products that I use.
Nokia (and everyone else) can keep the Camera, Mp3 player (which never has enough Flash RAM anyway, Color Display, Video Games, Randomly Placed Keys, Transparent Multi-Colored Blinking Case, and in exchange, they can give me a small phone that is Waterproof...
What the hell is wrong with EVERYONE?
Where's the spork?
--
"Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
Well, It's just a phone. Ment to be a cheap camera phone for young people. That is 'no bluetooth for geeks' as it is 'a cheap camera phone for young people'.
P800 = $700+
3200 = ~$70+
Order of magnitude ya idjit...