Okay, so Nokia just dropped three phones onto us, and they’re pretty crazy, and by ‘crazy’ I mean ‘sort of ugly.’ I have to cop to sort of liking the Tron-style and the asymetrical design – the one round corner, one square corner ‘new Nokia’ look – but I have a feeling I’ll be in the minority. Would it kill them to just release a nice, silver phone that you could take home to mom?
Anyway, here’s the breakdown, and I’ll probably go after this post in a couple of waves. The one pictured here is the Nokia 7280, which you might notice doesn’t have a keypad. That’s because Nokia designed it to be “sleek,” “sexy,” and “edgy.” (I’m not joking.)
Read – Press Release [Nokia]
More pictures of the new phones and links after the jump.
Here’s the Nokia 7270, which is a lot more practical looking – and a clamshell from Nokia, be still my heart! And features-wise, it’s utterly pedestrian, with just a VGA camera and – wait for it – “Chic Pinball.” Wow, Nokia, could you telescope your desire to be cool out any further? “Chic Pinball” is the phone equivilent of a chunky pre-teen wearing a “Too Sassy” halter top.
Then there’s the Nokia 7260, who we’ve seen before, albeit in the red-and-black version, where it met almost universal derison. I don’t think the cream-colored version is so bad, but it’s still extremely plain as far as features go.
So there you have it – one mildly interesting phonesque stick, a clamshell that can’t get a date to the prom, and candy bar phone with just enough weird swoops and curves to keep most people far, far away from it. Way to go, Nokia! I applaud your courage to look at your slumping sales numbers and continue to pioneer daring phone designs that have to be forced down customers’ throats with terms like “fashion-forward” and “Art-Deco-meets-Industrial-Design” and – god help us – “Garbo-esque.”
Look – Nokia 7280 Images Page [Nokia]
Look – Nokia 7270 Images Page [Nokia]
Look – Nokia 7260 Images Page [Nokia]
Update: Ooh, It looks like Nokia’s handsets may not be selling so badly after all! Oh well, soaring stock doesn’t make these not ugly.
Read – Nokia ups 3Q outlook, shares jump [Money.CNN]
