News Firefox OS phones go on sale, sell out immediately

The first phones to run Firefox OS have gone on sale, sold out and crashed the company's website.
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2013/04/23/geeksphone-firefox-os-phones-on-sale/1

 

I personally think that they're too late to make a difference. In terms of open source OS', Android already holds a dominance that I really can't see Firefox changing. We'll just have to see what happens with Samsung possibly planning to ditch Android.

Still, I'm looking forward to a review, because they could turn out to be very nice budget phones!

 

If peeps are still looking for 'just' a phone with web functionality and some sort of games support then yes this could be a contender.....

I have to admit, my phone is far more capable than what I actually use it for, example, I have just got an app that scans business cards and adds them to my contacts, instead of me manually entering the contacts to my mail account and then synchronising the phone etc......proving that the weakest link of a modern smartphone is the person using it and it will reach the limits of the user before itself......well definitely in my case anyway

These phones will probably satisfy the requirements for >50% of all the phone users worldwide - but if it's recognised as the 'lada' of mobiles, people in the developed world will avoid regardless...I wish them luck, I don't like monopolies and competition can only be a good thing.

 

To be honest, I'm kind of underwhelmed. The specs are sure to be enough to handle the OS and keep costs down but in a world of 1080p monster phones with multicore processers, I'm inclined to say big whoop.

That, and holy crap. Samsung got sued for something that vaguely resembled an iPhone 4. The firefox phone... almost feels like it hails from the Kia school of design.

 

Greetings!

What may help:

 

I thought they were too late, but with what i'm seeing lately, I think they have it right. There are too many people with phones that are overpowered / too complex for them and I have seen a few people moving from iPhones to Galaxy Aces or Cheap HTC Windows. The majority of people with smart phones don't pay for apps and a fairly large portion of them don't download apps at all. These people just want a cheap phone, especially in the current economic climate, and as long as it does the basic things (phone/ text/ email/ web/ photos/ music/ movies/ camera/ fb/ twitter) I don't think there is too much to worry about - it just comes down to word of mouth and marketing.

 

I think the bigger issue and reason for these people switching is the finances. People no longer can or want to spend a fortune on a phone and as high end phones have reached a level where the hardware is far more powerful than the usage demands, people can have just the same experience on lesser powered devices that cost far less.
As for these being the answer, there have always been cheap alternatives to the iPhones and such but people wanted and could afford the best they could get, times change. As the release of these devices wasn't exactly publicised, nor are they officially released through network providers, this seems like a hype over 'inside purchases' and they are far from becoming anything close to being considered mainstream.

 

I also wonder if Firefox OS could do well because it hasnt got the "top end" device. I think a lot of people want cheaper phones but dont want to be jeleous of a higher specced phone than the one they already have! Since the "top spec" firefox OS phone is still under £200 theres no risk of them being shown up by their mate who has got a higher specced version and shows it off every night out

 

Firefox OS won't be the only new kid on the block for long, there is a whole lot of new mobile operating systems set to come soon, personally I'm excited, simply put, if Apple and Google get a frequent kick in their behind then we can get some innovation unlike with PCs where we are stuck at the mercy of Microsoft for decades.

 

Agreed, I don't know how many mobile users are just waiting it out re smartphones. I waited until it was a free upgrade with no change to current contract details except an extension. I just wasn't going to spend the extra cash on one or in the case of an iPhone, PC money.

As a very minor added reason Mozilla and Firefox does have its hardcore set of fans who will buy the T-Shirts and other stuff Moz-related, the sales rush could also be a question of being the first to own a piece of that.

 

I think its mainly down to the lower end tech catching up and being usable. I got my missus a Galaxy Europe which at the time was a decent budget android, but the lag/freezes meant it was a pain to use. Yeah it could do things her old phone couldn't, but it couldn't do them very well. Now we are seeing budget phones do the basics very well.
Firefox also had almost half the browser market to itself until recently and is sitting around 30% now. So it will have recognition with a large portion of the public, Something almost all the other upcoming upstarts don't have.
I know I would have got the missus one if I hadn't bought her a Nexus 4 recently.