Haven't they learned anything? You shouldn't be able to control device fundamentals from the browser, it's a complete security nightmare. Modern OS and browser designs try to sandbox the browser from the underlying architecture with good reason. Remember ActiveX? That was a security disaster. Java is the modern equivalent, I probably patch it more often that I use it. If the Firefox OS ever takes off then the weak security model will probably ensure that it crashes down to earth.

The world doesn't need another mobile OS, it doesn't matter how good it is.. and by all account MeeGo is pretty good. iOS, Android, Windows Phone, BlackBerry OS, WebOS, Bada, Tizen, Symbian, OPhone, Firefox OS.. the list goes on and on. Apart from the Google/Apple duopoly, everyone else is jus fighting over scraps..

A French McDonalds isn't the same as a North American McDonalds. If you're a McDonald's fan then it's kind of interesting to see the difference.

And remember, one thing about the French is that they eat an awful lot of French food.. all the time.

Dashboard cameras in cars do the same thing - if there's an impact then they save the current video clip and do not overwrite it. Not so difficult to do.

The same goes for installing ANY application. This is a stupid knee-jerk reaction.

I think they lucked into awesome success though - BlackBerry always was a corporate solution, it just turned out that consumers were looking for the same sort of thing they were already making and they managed to jump on that market.

As for innovation, well look at the whole QNX acquisition mess. RIM bought QNX in 2010, but it's going to take until 2013 (at least!) to come up with a QNX-based OS (BlackBerry 10) for their smartphones. The only place they are using QNX is the dead-end PlayBook OS. By 2013 it really won't matter if they can make QNX work on their smartphones or not as they will have passed into irrelevance.

IMO, iOS has a future. Android has a future. Windows might be a niche player. Bada is bound to get some percentage points simply because it is being backed by Samsung. Everything else is irrelevant.. that's not to say that there aren't good OSes out there (MeeGo, Tizen and yes, QNX) but that they are simply more than customers need.

RIM must be smarting because it *was* a market disrupter.. it's just that the market continued to evolve. Their problem now is.. how to disrupt the market again? I honestly don't think they can do it without radical and painful surgery to their business model.

My two cents worth.. RIM should dump plans for BB10. The world doesn't want another mobile OS, regardless of how good it might be from a technical POV. RIM should slot itself in with Android or perhaps Windows, but then differentiate itself with its software and services offerings (e.g. BBM, BES etc). If you offered me a truly enterprise-capable Android phone I would rip it out of your hands! Sure, margins will be thinner and the glory days will be behind them.. but they would probably survive, and that gives them time to look at the next way of disrupting the market.

Any Android 2.0+ handset has a more polished OS than the N900, but that shouldn't have been a problem if Nokia had pressed on with Maemo development. But they shitcanned the Maemo platform and tried to merge it with Moblin into MeeGo at a critical moment, so they expected follow-on handset never turned up.. Nokia wasted a LOT of time messing around with MeeGo. By the time the N9 came out, it was basically irrelevant.

Even so.. there's a brisk trade in N9s on eBay, and if you really want to see something expensive check out the prices that the N950s are going for..

They're just ripping off Telephore*:

telephore's contextual cellular ad system uses advanced speech recognition technology to monitor and record subscriber conversations. It can then deliver advertising in call to connect your customer with high-quality ads that meet their needs.

For example, if your customer has a medical problem that they discuss with their doctor, our ad system can then later deliver an audio advertising message when they use the phone on a subsequent occasion.

Better still, the other party on the call also hears the ad. So, if they have common interests then they can share the enjoyment!

* Yeah, it's a spoof.

Indeed, it's the copyright holder or a nominee that can file a DMCA complaint. But it's of limited use as FJ's web host is in the Netherlands and is therefore not in the US jurisdiction. The Oatmeal could file a DMCA complaint with the major search engines, but it would be pretty pointless in that case I think.

I thought it stood for "Emacs Makes A Computer Slow"..

I'm not even going to bother looking at this new version, every time I've tried FF on Android before it has been so slow and unreliable as to be unusable. I really can't see how it is salvageable. If you want something better than the stock browser, the Opera is pretty nice.