One Device to Rule Them All. Or Not.

by Yeoh Siew Hoon

Well, despite last week’s resolution that I’d become a stealth serial communicator, I didn’t get the N95 as I thought I might.

Reason is, I was warned off it by someone who had tested it. “Slower than a dog. Eats batteries for lunch and dinner.”

Just the night before, a friend was also showing off her new Nokia E65 which combines the Blackberry interface with a mobile phone. “I like it. The battery life’s not so hot. But it works for me.”

Battery life being important to me, I have decided to stick with my Two-Gadget-Rule, so I have got myself a brand new Blackberry 8820 for my mails and the Nokia 6120 for all the other stuff.

The juggling act’s worked for me the last two years and I reckon it works best for my lifestyle where, with the amount of mail (most of it junk) I get and the time I spend on the road, I don’t really want to get buried under a communication avalanche on one device. At least, with two devices, you divide the load.

And so therein lies the Big Debate. Are we moving towards a world of One Device To Rule Them All or The Right Device For The Right Purpose?

Companies seem to be pushing us towards the former. Nokia touts its N95 as “what computers have become” and it’s just announced plans for a digital music store, a game service, social networking links and other mobile Internet initiatives under a new brand, Ovi. “Devices alone are not enough anymore,” said CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasuvo. “People want more; they want the complete experience.”

The move is obviously in answer to Apple which moved into the mobile phone space with iPhone. There is also speculation that a “Googlephone” may be on the way.

They call it convergence, I call it confusion.

There are those who do not believe in the One-Device rule. I recall an interview with Charles Reed, CEO of interTouch, the company that supplies Internet solutions to hotels. When we were discussing gadgets as one is wont to do these days, he said he did not believe that one device can do everything well.

I tend to agree with him.

I think it is impossible for one thing to do everything well, just as it is impossible for one person to do everything well.

On the other hand, I believe it is highly probable that if a person was to say, I want to do one thing well, and worked hard at it, and persevered, he would end up being very successful at it.

It’s called focus. Easy but elusive. Most of us are pretty good at everything and so we do everything and end up doing nothing – nothing SIGNIFICANT, that is.

We read about people who follow their passion and gift. Take the winner of Britain’s Got Talent, the British equivalent of American Idol, and started by the acerbic judge Simon Cowell.

Paul Potts, who sells mobile phones (see the connection?) for a living in the Welsh town of Port Talbot, knew he had a gift and he invested time and his hard-earned money in singing lessons in Italy.

He went on to dazzle judges and audiences with his rendition of the classical aria, Nessum Dorma, and now has signed a £1 million recording contract with Cowell.

The next thing he wants to work on is his teeth – he wants to get a smile like Cowell, he says. “I’d like to deal with the teeth because I do feel very self-conscious about them. It’d be nice to feel less self-conscious and to be able to smile with confidence.”

Yes, there’s a lot to be said for focus, whether in gadgets or people. So I guess I will remain a conspicuous communicator until the day The One Device To Rule Them All comes along.

Catch more of Yeoh Siew Hoon every week at The Transit Cafe

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