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Facebook Smartphone a Dumb Idea, Says Farhad Manjoo

Posted by timothy on from the it'd-have-to-have-a-pretty-fancy-gimmick dept.

beaverdownunder writes "Farhad Manjoo examines Facebook's rumoured entry into the smartphone market, concluding, 'So what would be the point in using the Facebook phone? Well, remember, it will be cheap. But so are lots of Android phones. If Facebook makes a phone, then, the device will necessarily spark a battle for the low end of the phone market, with each company offering ever-cheaper devices in the hopes of cashing in on some future advertising bonanza. If you're looking for a cheap, ad-heavy phone based on a dubious business model, you should rejoice. Otherwise, try to stifle your yawns.'"

8 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Disagree by LingNoi · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Facebook is probably one of the most well known brands in the world. A facebook branded phone would get lots of sales regardless of how well the phone performed.

    1. Re:Disagree by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      So is Coca-Cola and McDonalds but I sure as hell wouldn't buy a phone of either of them.

    2. Re:Disagree by AngryDeuce · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I had the same problem for the short time I was in a commissioned sales position. I simply could not sell people products and service packages that I knew they did not need, a fact that put me squarely on the shit list of the higher-ups in the department. I underwent a lot of "sales training" and "workshops" at their command, the main gist of them being "whatever the customer tells you they need, you tell them they need more and don't stop until they're so pissed off that there is a danger of losing the sale entirely."

      As a customer, the "hard sell" always just turns me off, and I've seen first hand how much it turns off the bulk of the general public, so I really wonder where the hell people are seeing the success that warrants this mindset being pushed in the first place. Is it really worth one customer being upsold if we're alienating five other customers in the process? I guess it is to some people, but not to me...

  2. The FacePhone may be a dumb idea . . . by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 5, Insightful

    . . . but consumers are even dumber.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  3. who is Farhad Manjoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And why should I care what he thinks?

  4. Caring what Farhad Manjoo thinks a Dumb Idea by MasterPatricko · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Says random Slashdot poster

    --
    I'd tell a UDP joke, but you may not get it. I'd tell a TCP joke, but I'd have to keep repeating it until you got it.
  5. Who is Farhad Manjoo? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    And why should I care about his opinion?

    Is this guy a prominent business person? Someone involved in the telecomm industry? An entrepreneur with a dozen tech companies in his portfolio? Or just some reporter desperate to get some page views?

  6. Re:Contrarian view... by arisvega · · Score: 3, Insightful

    FB stock got its ass kicked last week and there is just constant bad press [..] I'm beginning to think that maybe FB stock price may turn upward.

    Of course it may. And then it will crumble, and rise again, and so forth in this fashion. Now before you think that I am being a smartass, here is what I mean (albeit a bit off-topic):

    I can see four basic components in this company, and by increasing order of importance they are: a) the server hardware, b) the marketing profile, c) the lawyer layer and d) exploitable user data.

    The fact that the stock is "rising" or "dropping" in value is irrelevant: what is relevant, is that there is a stock, and that fb is in the stockmarket: it is essentially now an "immortal" in a corporate sense. Fb may very much so change ownership in the future, and perhaps even see a revamp of its logo (as in a "new-and-changed" product), and that may happen a lot: so the core of it, which is what investors are willing to pump money into, which is user data and profiles, will be "immortal" as well.

    That alone guarantees that your data will never ever be deleted, as they have become a valuable commodity- and unless you are a "player" in the stockmarket, or a billionaire looking to acquire it, I don't see why you should care about fb stocks.

    --
    The three laws of thermodynamics:(1) You can't win. (2) You can't break even. (3) You can't even quit.