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HTC's blockchain-powered Exodus smartphone is a risky bet that needs to pay off
In May, HTC first announced that it was working on a blockchain-powered smartphone called the Exodus. The news came as one of the company's more intriguing projects after a poor start to the year. Last year, HTC shipped over 2 million products in Q1. This year, it shipped only 630,000 products in Q1, according to numbers from IDC.
HTC is in pretty poor shape after a round of layoffs last week where the company laid off 1,500 employees in Taiwan in hopes of becoming profitable. Sales in June were down 68 percent, according to the company. Its latest flagship, the U12 Plus, has received largely negative reviews over its odd solid-state buttons and software bugs.
It's a less than stellar time for blockchain, as well. Cryptocurrency prices are low, and last month, bitcoin was tied to price manipulation in a report from researchers at the University of Texas at Austin.
Considering HTC's financial situation, there's a lot at stake with the Exodus phone. Now we have details from HTC's Phil Chen about when we can expect the phone to be released and an estimate on how much it might cost. Although Chen was vague on specifics, he told The Verge that we can expect the phone around the end of this year and we can expect a price announcement by the end of Q3. When I mentioned that the world's first blockchain-powered phone called Finney, created by Sirin Labs, costs $1000, Chen said the price of Exodus would be "comparable."
And it comes with CryptoKitties!
See also: Wikileaks breeds and sells Cryptokitties, gifts them to Trump and Clinton
Previously: HTC Announces a "Blockchain-Powered" Smartphone
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday July 12 2018, @02:43AM (10 children)
Well, I stand corrected then. I have never actually owned an HTC phone, but have considered them in the past, but they cost more than they're worth (in my view, of course).
As far as Samsung goes, I would never buy one of their current flagship models, because they cost stupid money too, but last years flagship can usually be had for a reasonable price.
I have a Galaxy S7, and it does everything I need in a timely manner if that is any sort of recommendation.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday July 12 2018, @03:01AM (9 children)
Just for fun, let me list a few of the issues:
First thing when you power it on the dang thing demands a google login. There we go, out of box, very first experience, screw you. I bought you I paid for you and you don't need a google login.
There's no source included and even if I had the source what would I compile it with? What kind of crap is this?
It has many times the computing resources of some of my previous PCs, yet none of that is made available to me. It's reserved for the purpose of tracking me, spying on me, annoying me, but there are no provisions for me to make use of it.
Now that's bad enough, but it gets worse. Ok, all the 'smart' stuff is no use to me, fine, at least it's a phone, right? Well, it's an absurdly bad one. Touchscreens are the worst interface yet invented for a computer, I'd rather use punch cards, the damn things are that cumbersome and unreliable. If I wash my hands it doesn't respond at all, if I leave them dirty it's more responsive but still horribly buggy and unreliable. Just placing a call, a task I can do from an old-fashioned phone or from my pc in seconds, can take a minute or more because of this atrocious interface. Or even longer if I'm lights-out of course, in that case you can't use it at all!
THEN, when we get to the end of the call, and I hit the hangup button, well we're right back at it. A 'phone' that cost the better part of a grand new and takes multiple seconds just to hang up. What garbage! I had a phone that was better in nearly every way (and no worse in the rest) back in 2001, and it only cost half as much. It had physical buttons and when I dialed it dialed and when I hit 'hang up' it hung up. Still works great, but no carrier will provide service for that anymore.
I get that they are 'good enough' in some sense for most people but I honestly can't imagine how that could be. They fail virtually every test that I can think of, and the only reason I have one is because I can't get service with anything usable.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 1) by anubi on Thursday July 12 2018, @03:40AM
Do you have any insights on Alcatels? I'm considering that dual mode (GSM/CDMA) one [amazon.com].
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 12 2018, @03:43AM (1 child)
Make a new one, specify that you are a citizen of Elbonia, live in Antarctica.
It is available. Apps are not written by gods, but you have access to Linux underneath Java.
The rest is about HTC. My phone hangs up instantly.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Arik on Thursday July 12 2018, @04:46AM
Doesn't matter, they'll profile me by the phone numbers I call and know who I am in less than a week.
It's the principle of the matter. Refusing to give them any info at all sends a stronger message than submitting false information. Refusing to spend a penny on evil crap engineered from the ground up to betray you and destroy your race sends an even stronger message, and I'll go back to that just as soon as I can get by without mobile phone service.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 3, Touché) by Mykl on Thursday July 12 2018, @04:47AM (2 children)
Wut.
You do realise that touchscreen phones are backlit?
(Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday July 12 2018, @05:12AM (1 child)
Touchscreens are also a horrible choice for this application in particular because of form factor, btw. I'm sure it's possible to use a dialpad, maybe even a full on-screen keyboard, via touch screen, with some degree of ease if it's relatively large. But I don't want a large cellphone, that's bad for so many reasons. And it's just an exercise in masochism to try to type anything on a screen small enough to be reasonable on a cellphone. My current device is a compromise and it sucks on both ends, it's too big to be a phone, and too small to be anything else.
My old cellphone, the one that didn't suck, was about twice as thick but only a little over half as wide. Fit perfectly in my pocket, no worry of breaking it. Could operate it by touch, nice raised keys that I could operate without error or lag in the dark or without taking it out of my pocket. (Which last I *often* did, using a handsfree, that worked great.) And on top of that it could hold a charge for a week.
It wasn't the cheapest phone around but it wasn't the most expensive either. It's just absurd that 17 years later we can't produce anything half as fit for purpose at any price.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday July 12 2018, @05:59AM
Heh, wait until you discover compromises between more than two ends.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday July 12 2018, @04:48PM (2 children)
So ... what about HTC is the problem ?
I just read a list of rambling about touchscreen phones, which is so familiar my dad would have written it if it wasn't in English.
Do you have any specific reason to hate HTC more than you hate Samsung, Apple, or whoever made a phone since 2007 ?
My wife just replaced an HTC with a newer one, and I would really love it if she hated them and didn't spend so much damn time staring at them.
(Score: 2) by Arik on Thursday July 12 2018, @06:15PM (1 child)
Only owning two of them, compared to one Samsung (which I did say was even worse.) Oh and I've had tons of iphones shoved in my hands too. "You hate android, you must try this!"
They all suck. They combine actively customer-hostile software with hardware that is fundamentally unsuited to purpose. The differences are just in which specific insults and annoyances are attached on top of that.
If laughter is the best medicine, who are the best doctors?
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday July 12 2018, @06:41PM
Way upthread:
OP > > [about HTC] They are not awful phones, but massively overpriced.
Arik> Being the unhappy owner of one, I can't agree. It's absolutely awful at every level
You might have needed, at that point, to declare your global hate of touchscreen phones (you're not alone)
The implication of your answer was that HTC deserved more scorn than other manufacturers, which is quite misleading.