Nokia Lays Plan for More Web Services
Nokia will market its Ovi.com website as a "personal dashboard" where users can share photos with friends, buy music and access third-party services like Yahoo's Flickr photo site.
Nokia will also need more Internet-enabled phones in the market. It estimates that 3 billion people worldwide have a mobile phone, but only 300 million have advanced multimedia handsets, and only about 200 million of those are from Nokia. The devices also need to be easier to use, Vanjoki said. "A lot of improvement needs to take place," he said.
Ovi.com is being tested internally and will be rolled out for public beta next year, when the desktop software will also be released, Vanjoki said. The company demonstrated the software, which has snazzy interface elements, like a tool for organizing videos, photos and other files that makes them appear to be floating in three-dimensional space.
The service is likely to include an online storage component to make it easier to share files online. "We haven't yet announced the media-sharing service, but that will be part of the Ovi.com sales offering," said Nokia spokesman Kari Tuutti.
Access to Ovi.com and the desktop software will be free, Tuutti said. The software will be delivered on a CD with Nokia phones and offered for download over the Web.
Ovi is the Finnish word for "door," and the name is intended to imply that Nokia opens doors to the Web.
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