They're big enough that any internal standard e.g. S60 becomes a de facto standard just through sheer volume.

The other thing is that if you lock something down to a standard - particularly a complete platform - it becomes stale and dies. How exactly do you introduce something new to the market if the 'standard' can't cope with it?

I would guess the reality will be the current situation - the hardware is more or less standardised, as is the software platform. Each device is slightly different, but that's what you expect with evolving designs.

The PC platform isn't enormously different - there is no real 'standard' platform, everyone builds things differently, new bits are added all the time, compatibility is something of an afterthought and those who sell the most create the standards though sales volume.

So I really can't see a standard phone platform happening beyond the current manufacturer internal standardisation.

I've heard is rendition of "My Way" LIVE with accompaniment (a nice theater type organ). Boy was he a fanboi of the iphone. It was funny at the time, but it went on way too long! Trust me, he won't win a Grammy Award!

When will the mobile phone industry learn that all I want to do is TALK. Anything else is just fluff and junk I need to learn. That silly phone I see on TV that only has dial buttons is getting more and more appealing to me every day.

After all, the "PC" platform, being a so called standard that was adopted by thousands of manufacturers over the years, drove down component costs. Manufacturers who exist off proprietary hardware tend to have higher costs.

That the "standard" actually evolves doesn't matter, so long as everyone's singing from the same sheet.

This is perhaps even the same with car manufacture as many cars across manufacturers share the same basic platform, which probably reduces costs.

Nokia kind of already go this way with software (S60 and Symbian for example which is a common software platform shared by other manufactures), so I guess they're thinking the same with hardware.

So some child receives too much doting attention before kindergarten starts, and 40 years later the consequences are... this.

I blame the mother.

"It will be less and less about the device and more and more about what the device is sensing."...... Hmmm. That sounds very much like PromoClient-Based Iterative Need Feedback, Mr Ianucci, aka/akin to HyperRadioProActivity with Satellite Mars Mobile Space Bases for the Seasoned XXXXPerienced Traveller in AIMaster Piloted ProgramMIng /Quantum Communication Virtual TelePortation Project?

Ziggery Pokery with CyberIntelAIgent Web Spiders building Imperfect Alien Webs for more Human InterAction/SMARTer Input for NeuReal Virtual Future InfraStructure Build.

Valiant Vulcan Victor Viking Kraftwerk, Nokia? Danegeld Sorties with Complete Programs and ProgramMIng Keys 42 Pass/Pass Go?

Is to ask the Question, to know the Answer is Ja/Yes?

<Ping>

Symbian is really the mobile phone standard and just like PCs it's a bloatware POS.

But seriously I can probably see this new standard being the google android however it really all depends on what Nokia does now. Do they attempt to stay with Symbian (I can't see how they would with the competition from Apple) or do they attempt to build a new OS with Erricson and maybe Motorola (a better idea) or simply go with Microsoft's or google's (the best).

Apple like with PCs won't license their OS and unlike the PC war they can actually win in the dominance war as it's very early days and they have such a head start technically (market share means very little at the moment when choosing a new phone) and the ability to supply the world like they did with iPod. Infact their iPod and iTunes business almost makes it necessary that they do that.

It's time for the mobile operators to waken up and realise the danger from Apple as they've been too arrogant up to now.

Personally I think it will come down to MS and Apple again, perhaps Linux or Android will have more of a say. I think Symbian will get dumped in the next year or two.

As a former developer for SymbianOS/S60, I pity the mobile developers of the world if that becomes the standard for all mobile development. It's an exceedingly clunky and frustrating platform to develop for.