NMT is is proud to present you Matthew Miller from Nokia Experts. Matthew is the host of NE another great addition to the Symbian community. Matthew Miller is widely known through because his insightful post and reviews and I welcome everyone to check out Nokia Experts for another interesting point of view in all things Symbian. Without further ado, I present to you Matthew Miller.
Hello and welcome to NokiaMobileTalk its great having you here.
Tell us a little bit about your background and what lead you to start blogging about Nokia?
I am a professional naval architect/ship designer who spent 12 years in the US Coast Guard. I discovered Palm PDAs back in 1997 and started writing for Geek.com about them in 2001. I then launched my ZDNet blogs in 2006 to talk about all things mobile. In January we kicked off the Nokia Experts site.
My first S60 device was the Nokia 3650 and I moved through a few of these smartphones from 2001 to 2005. In the Fall of 2005 I was invited to become a part of the outstanding Nokia Nseries Blogger Relations program run by Comunicano and had the opportunity to try out some fantastic Nseries devices. This experience led me to buy a few Eseries devices as well and I have been writing about Nokia devices and posting detailed reviews since 2005.
What are your favorite Symbian applications can you list your top 5
I love trying out 3rd party applications and my top 5 are RoadSync (for solid Exchange server synchronization with full HTML email support), Quickoffice (I need full Office support on my devices), Handy Taskman (a good application/task manager is essential for efficient use of the device), Nokia Podcasting (I am a podcast listening fiend and listen to them every day on my 1.5 hour commute), and Gravity (outstanding Twitter client with super user interface).
What’s your favorite theme?
As much as I use Nokia devices, I really do not change the theme too much and only customize my devices with wallpaper changes and custom ringtones (The Office theme song, Mission Impossible, and more).
What are your thoughts on the future of Nokia and the newly created Symbian Foundation.
We have all seen the decrease of Nokia’s global market share as others improve their devices, but Nokia is still way ahead of everyone else. I do think their UI is getting a bit outdated when you compare newer mobile operating systems, but S60 still performs extremely well and is liked by millions of users. Nokia seems to think a LOT about the future and how to use technology to make the world a better place so I am confident they will continue to lead in the mobile space through innovation. I would like to see more work on the UI and on optimizing touch in the future too.
I sat in on a couple of talks about the Symbian Foundation at CTIA in April and have to say it is still all a bit vague to me and even more so, I imagine, to the end user. I’m not quite clear on how Nokia transitions from S60 to the Symbian Foundation OS and it seems the Symbian Foundation will start out with S60 as the base or something. I’ll be keeping an eye on the program and hope that things clear up later in 2009 and early 2010.
What advice can you give to new bloggers?
Don’t write to try to make a profit or a living out of blogging because it is rare that it will ever come close to paying you even minimum wage for all of your time. Figure out what you are passionate about and what gets you excited and then share this with the world. I spend many, many hours online researching and writing about mobile phones because I am very interested in them and love sharing my experiences with others. It is not a profitable way to spend lots of time, but it is a blast and you should only do it as long as it is fun and enjoyable.
Which Nokia phones have you used in the past?
OK, you asked for it so here is the list of ones I have actually used or owned for at least a few weeks. Nokia 3650, 7610, N90, N70, N73, N93, N91, N95-1, N80ie, N81 8GB, N800 Internet Tablet, E61, E61i, N95-3, N810 IT, N82, N78, E71, N96, N85, 5800 XpressMusic, E75, and E71x.
What application are you waiting for Nokia to develop and why?
Nokia and the huge 3rd party developer community have created applications for just about every need I have and with the recent rollout of Gravity and Twittix I only have one last desire I can think of. I would like to have a Facebook application, rather than the browser shortcut link. I know the N97 has some kind of Facebook application on board and I am hopeful that the application will be released for other devices after the N97 launch as well.
What are your two favorite Nokia smartphones of all time and which Nokia smartphone are looking forward to use.
The Nokia E71 is my favorite of all Nokia smartphones I have ever used because of the optimizations (smart dial from standby screen, scrolling month view, standby/home screen application support) made to the OS, incredible build quality, slim form factor, extremely functional QWERTY keyboard, and wireless technologies.
The N95 still remains my favorite Nseries device with the outstanding camera, loud stereo speakers, and overall media support.
I know you didn’t ask for three, but the 5800 XpressMusic is the other device that currently lives in my bag (along with the E71x since the N95 has been retired) and this device has surprised me by how well I like it. It is awesome for watching Amazon Video On Demand content and is my default portable media player.
I am most looking forward to spending more time with the Nokia N97. I have played with it for about 15 minutes total at different events, but look forward to trying out a high-end Nseries device that adds a QWERTY keyboard. I still think something like the N95 with a SureType-like keyboard would be just about perfect.
What is your favorite color, movie, music band, and sport?
My favorite color is blue, my favorite movies are the Star Wars series, I like too many different types of music to have a real favorite band, and my favorite sport is clearly rugby. I played for 15 years on many different levels, including the Coast Guard national team, and it is in my blood to keep playing as long as possible. Football (American soccer) is in second since all three of my daughters play the sport.
Bonus Question/Statement
I think the iPhone is a fun device (with an easy UI) and it definitely has changed the mobile landscape and brought awareness to the masses that there are fantastically powerful mobile phones (computers really) available out here for everyone to enjoy. However, the iPhone is lacking in many basic smartphone functions and I would like to see all the other mobile players continue to think independently of what Apple has come up with and innovate to address the needs of consumers. Nokia smartphones are extremely stable, they have solid RF reception, they perform better than all the rest in phone clarity and functionality, and still have many other strengths that Nokia needs to continue to build upon.
Matthew, it was my pleasure having you thank you for participating 
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