Nokia’s Communicator may have been the most capable phone computer of the pre iPhone era, but it didn’t change the world. It was too expensive, too closed, and not well enough marketed to change much of anything.
I’m surprised to see it glorified here, not because it wasn’t a nice piece of visionary tech, but because the company that made it had such little impact on changing the world despite pioneering the category.
Yes, they weren't in the hands of every stylish adult or high-spending teen, but it wasn't for them. I'd guarantee it influenced the thinking of other people building products in that category for at least a few years. And in the long run the world changed due to that product category.
Blackberry innovated by shrinking the keyboard to thumb size, and making do with a smaller display so it could fit in a pocket instead of requiring a handbag.
Those two innovations/ bold compromises over the Communicator enabled RIM to discover the first addictive euphoria of an always connected social device with the crack berry.
I say “social” but it wasn’t really because the app was really just email. But RIM got it into the gossip columns through Paris Hilton and Janet Jackson, setting the stage for the blockbuster device that landed in 2007 when Steve Jobs showed everybody what a leap forward into a new category could be.
That right there gave them a winner in those early days.
Now what gave Blackberry there consumer base was the PIN messaging which was a basic chat system that was simple and effective, something a bit more for those that grew up on SMS to engage with and they did.
But crux was, this was too dam expensive and heck a few years later Blackberry would have it's moment and that did more for the market than the Nokia communicator ever did. Heck the IBM Simon did more than the Nokia did for pushing things or about the same lack-lustre uptake. FWIW I got my communicator for free from a friend who orded one and got two with the company failing to take back the second one in a period of time that made it legally his (he notified in writing so was 3months, maybe 6).
I would also ad the Sony P800 was more game changer as well than the nokia communicator. Also owned that and for the era - pretty darn good.
The 5MX was released 1999 and the Communicator in 1996. That being said, I agree that the 5MX was fantastic piece of hardware that in many ways has never been matched.
I got sick of buying Psion 5's and 5MX's because they always broke in 6 months.