This little motivating something is a mention by the folks at Engadget on their podcast. You’ll have to wait for it but it pops up at around the 32:22 mark. I personally enjoyed the chummy first name basis they adopt. Or perhaps it’s more of a single name denoting ubiquitousness, like Prince or Fridgidare?

In any case, I suppose it’s human nature to conceive of new products or even new product categories in terms of what has come before. When we were making the Sidekick, the intent was never to create a “Blackberry-killer” or “Treo-killer,” despite the desire of some investors. The product category is not defined in terms of superficial attributes, but rather user benefits. It’s not two “QWERTY Smart Phones,” but rather “Business Email Mobile” and “Consumer Messaging Mobile.”

We were blue ocean strategists before it was trendy!

Somehow I’d missed this very nice little bit of it last year posed by Shawn Conahan on the Intercasting Corp blog.

“Matias Duarte, VP of Experience Design at Helio, is an indisputably innovative industrial designer … His kung fu is strong, all must respect him.”

It’s respect like that which really motivates a fellow to get up in the morning. That and oatmeal.

The whole thing is worth a read, not just for the shameless self promotion – which really I’ve just spoiled completely. Contrast this article to the more recent analysis out there now that some of our numbers and plans are public. “Is MySpace Driving Helio Subs?“

“Perhaps the bigger news is the money the company is generating from its growing user base. The company said it is generating monthly revenue in excess of $100 million a month and average revenue per user of about $100 a month, which is nearly twice what the big carriers are getting from their users.”

Read the whole thing, “Helio says its on track.“

“It’s an interesting time for mobile design,” says Matias Duarte, chief designer at Helio, a U.S. cellular carrier operated by South Korean phone giant SK Telecom. “The field is in transition from a technology to a design medium, much like the web was in the mid-’90s.”

Read the whole thing, “One Cellular Sensation.”
I’m only sorry I didn’t quite communicate just how radical I think the coming change in mobile design will be. The Web today is the result of a leap forward from it’s infancy just as great as the one from the Apple II to Mac OS X was. Yet that transition took place over ten years. I expect we’re soon going to be using UI that’s more Minority Report than OS X on our devices.
Hold on to your hat.

Really guys, only using mechanical advantage?! At Danger we used to operate on a totally different caliber of destruction… if you know what I mean.

No. I’m not going to post pictures.