I'd have to disagree about it being an ugly design. What was ugly was the hack of putting squares around every icon, when those icons were designed to live on their own, not in a square. That's what was ugly. I'm happy to see the squares gone and the design conform to the standard Android design guidelines. The dock of icons going away is also good. If I'm looking in the applications list it's because I'm looking for something that wasn't on the home screens, so why show me part of the home screen? Makes no sense.<p>I'm neutral on the lack of four-way symmetry and I'd have to agree that the avoidance of black is sad, though light-colored phones look great too (as Apple itself shows).
The community design is an "and", not an "or". The Galaxy Tab model which had issues with this in Germany, if you look at it, has <i>all</i>, not just one, of those characteristics. The "Apple thinks it owns the rectangle" meme is nice, but untrue.<p>Nilay Patel, in the Verge article linked by Android Community:<p><i>Now, some of these are a little ridiculous when taken individually — is Apple going to sue every digital photo frame maker that puts equal size black borders around the screen as well? — but in the end, the main question for the court will be whether or not Samsung has used all of these elements in a way that's likely to confuse consumers about what they're buying.</i><p>(Edit: is this wrong? If not, why downvote?)
Interesting theory but I'm not convinced the nuances of the Samsung/Apple case support it. I'm also not sold that Apple has had enough success with the legal actions against Samsung to spur such a major hardware design change especially when Samsung is simultaneously announcing a Siri clone that uses a highly derivative UI. You would have to believe Samsung is a total mess to accept they forgot to tell the software guys about the change in strategy. Just don't buy it.<p>I think the changes have a lot more to do with Samsung making a shift towards acting like the big player they are. Samsung <i>is</i> the Android market at this point. It's less about Apple and more about HTC, Sony, Google/Motorola, etc. I think you can see this in the significant software changes they introduced and the larger display. They are making a play to basically own the Android market. It is an effort to design a device that stands out instead of blending in. I think Samsung wants people to understand at a glance this device is not just another generic handset. It's Samsung Android -- not Google Android. So physically it has to have at least a slightly unconventional look as well. That being said I think they failed terribly by adopting this sort of tacky early 00s ascetic. It's the uncanny valley of retro design. We're not far enough removed from early 00s to want a device that reminds us of that era yet. Weird textured plastic, overuse of the blue/purple tint, etc. Once glance at it and somehow I'm reminded of the first popular wave of sub-1MP camera phones in the United States.<p>The other issue is the size of the device. The Galaxy S was still within the realm of the mainstream. Not too small, not too big. They are walking away from a big portion of the market by skipping both the small and medium sized market. They now have big and they have huge with the Note. Larger devices are a nice option but the mainstream option has to be a bit more reasonable. For a significant number of people this device is just going to be physically uncomfortable to use I suspect.
Honestly. The hardware is fine. The problem with android is still the <i>software</i> and only the software.<p>I'll take my handset in pink polka dots if it can finally scroll smoothly everywhere and not constantly annoy me with bugs in almost every single basic feature.<p>Instead they keep on shoving out bigger screens, faster CPU's every year - and the only UX issue ever being addressed is the camera finally snapping pics in reasonable time.
When I started reading the article, I was expecting to scroll down and see photos of some kind of rhombus-shaped, barbed, Frankenstein monstrosity. I was sorely disappointed. It seems like the author is defining non-ugliness as "looks like an iPhone." There's nothing so offensive about this phone's appearance that deserves the animosity expressed in the article.
Maybe it was designed by lawyers, but looking at the pictures, I actually like the shape and general look of the hardware. The software doesn't look as nice, especially the app menu with garish blue background, but the beauty of Android is that I can make it look however I like.<p>So it may have been designed by lawyers, but it isn't the worse off for it.
It's one of the ugliest phone's I've ever seen. Terrible engineering. Sure, the guts are great, but aesthetically it looks awful. Also can't believe that Apple has a patent on a damn square. Unbelievable.
wow, kudos to Samsung design team -- they had really think this one through to comply with all the rules AND come up with a good looking product.<p>Whats really is interesting here is that I read somewhere that each single iPhone is made of up to 60% Samsung components, solutions, patents, etc. How come then APPL is so bold with all those lawsuits? I know its a lot of money, but at some point Samsung could simply say "no more" and stop selling its technology to Apple, making it at least hard for them to keep up with the world demand.
I wonder what type of innovation would we see if only lawyers who were deathly scared of patent suits designed phones? After all, I think this isn't terrible, and I like it as a fresh take after seeing all the iPhone look-alikes.<p>Of course, my cynical side says that we'd either get no phones at all or they'd be oddly shaped polygons that hurt you whenever you try to use it. But still, maybe having attorneys in the room would encourage more creativity...
tbh, I actually like the new design better than the old one.<p>Given this side-by-side<p><a href="http://cdn.androidpolice.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/not-rounded-icons_thumb.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://cdn.androidpolice.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/not-...</a><p>I would choose the design on the right in a heartbeat. The only problem I have with the right-side phone is the busy/light wallpaper makes the icons and text a bit hard to read, but give that phone a black wallpaper like the one on the left has (and this is an easy user-tunable parameter) and problem solved.
All I think about when I look at that phone is that it is yet another bland slab phone running Android. That form factor is really holding back handset design in my opinion, and I had high hopes that Samsung was going to do something really innovative with this device when they released that teaser video about how they were going to stand out from the crowd, but sadly not with this.<p>Whatever about the input from the legal department into the design, to me all this phone does in confirm that Samsung is very conservative when it comes to design (and before anyone jumps on my back about specs, I'm strictly talking about form here, not function).
And yet, the white glass face still manages to evoke the iPhone 4, which is exactly what the carriers are looking for. It should be another blockbuster quarter for Samsung.<p>The carriers love Samsung, but they'll eventually turn. It always happens, it's just a matter of when. There are only so many $5 billion quarters that a manufacturer can earn before the manufacturer gets too cocky and the carriers pull the plug.<p>But it's fun to watch.<p>Keep an eye on the devices on display at your local carrier stores and take note of which manufacturers are featured more prominently. When the Samsung devices start to disappear, you'll know exactly what's happening.
This has to be one of the dumbest things I've read in a while. So because the phone has some differences to an Apple trademark (which may or may not hold up in court) it is safe to assume that Samsung's designers intentionally designed around the iPhone because the iPhone's design is just so badass?<p>Now certainly there had to be consideration of existing patents and trademarks. I can assure the author that Apple's designers and lawyers make the exact same considerations in their designs.<p>I like the iPhone design. It's okay. I like this phone's design better, and I'm going to be buying one when it goes on the market in June. I was about to buy another iPhone, but decided to hold off for this one because I like the design better. I'm not saying the iPhone is poorly designed. It's just not the optimal design for me. I like a larger screen and a slimmer profile. I prefer blue to black. You see, there are many, many worthy smartphone designs out there.
Patent law is nice when it ensures that innovators are compensated for their work, but Apple has clearly been compensated. Perhaps it could benefit from an addendum -- not enforceable when you're already making a ton of money off your innovation.
The article hints at a trend which isn't really happening: Apple's patents are hindering innovation in the Android space.<p>My terrible experience with Android stems from the lack of coordination between software and hardware.
It looks good to me. If it were designed by lawyers, unless they were designers, I think it would look like crap. The corners are still rounded and I think the other changes aren't that bad.
Considering the fact that the GSI and GSII were allegedly unoriginal, to what extent did Samsung actually sell its soul, if it didn't bother cultivating it to begin with?
Hey, this is a very entertaining story! I'd love to blog about this too, but what would really help is a photoshop of a "samsung" phone fitting the article's description while actually being ugly, so I don't look like an idiot when I do.<p>At a minimum it shouldn't look better than the previous samsung models next to it.<p>Thanks for any help!
And all the fandroid hostility is precisely because this ugly device doesn't look like an iPhone. Smartphones were mostly ugly before Apple came into the market, now Apple have set the aesthetic standard and all the wannabes can do is copy it. Now the fandroids wet their panties bacause the plagiarists are sued for plagiarism.<p>EDIT erroneous reference to microphone icon removed