By Joe Procopio

I’m not saying the Droid X is a clown phone. However, there are three major breakthroughs that the Droid X either introduces or galvanizes.

Design is a funny thing. It goes in cycles, like seasons — if seasons were fickle and controlled by the wants and needs of 13-year-old girls in southwestern Iowa who have views of the world based solely on articles about Zac Efron and Paramore lyrics.

I had to do so much research for that joke. Seriously.

The Point Is Design Is Fickle

It holds true for any consumer product, but especially for those that fall into the gadget or techie category, lifecycle design tends to run from the ridiculous to the sublime – followed by a massive shark-jumping procedure which pushes it back into the ridiculous, and it’s only a sheer luck and the avoidance of obsolescence that allows a return to the sublime.

Case in point: Remember when cars were square back in the late 1980s? Then things started to get all curvy, then there was the bubbly Taurus, they ruined the Mustang, and before anyone could say “Heeeeeey, wait just a second here…” they put out the Pontiac Aztec.

I’m not saying the Droid X is a Pontiac Aztec. The Kin One was the Aztec.

Bigness

Aspects of the cyclical nature of design also take hold over an entire industry. Take scale for example, and let’s go back to cars for a second. Cars started huge, then got small in the 70s when gas was expensive, then got huge again, but not like the first time, like massively huge. Too Huge.

Hummer huge.

I’m not saying Droid X is a Hummer.

iPhone Killa Killa

I wrote a column a couple years back in which I declared myself an Android fan. Today I have an Incredible, and I love it, except for the battery life, which is terrible.

In that same column, I declared a moratorium on looking for, predicting, or loudly heralding the next iPhone killer. Although it took nearly two years for anyone to listen to me, they all finally realized that the only thing that could stop Apple was Apple, and that realization only took hold recently as Apple has gone way out of its way to try to destroy itself.

So there will be no comparisons of the Droid X to the iPhone here. We’re done with that. I will say that the Incredible was designed to look, feel, and act exactly like an iPhone. It was, on introduction, heralded as the next iPhone killer. And it held that title for about a week, until the hype built up around the Evo.

But outside of some proprietary applications and a few extra bells and whistles, the Evo was a lot like the Incredible. Except it was bigger. Not dramatically bigger, but noticeably bigger.

The Droid X has so much hype behind it that there are actually very few iPhone killer references around it. It’s its own phone. That is breakthrough number one. Most of the people who drooled over the Incredible or the Evo actually already owned or knew the significance of previous Android phones. My grandmother wanted the Droid X.

But when I got my demo and opened the box, I was hit with one first, and very strong, impression.

OH MY GOD IT’S A CLOWN PHONE!

The Droid X is not a clown phone.

But it is big.

It looks like an iPaq. And just to rib the Apple elite again, I’ve had more than one of them snicker when I say that and tell me “Dude. It’s called an iPAD.” The point is that until now, everything was about small. The iconic bag phone turned into the handheld and then the Startac and then got smaller and smaller until Will Ferrell finally sharkjumped it on SNL.

Smartphones brought about the necessary and logical increase in size, and the iPhone’s touch screen blew that size out to what we thought was the maximum comfortable width. Pants-pocket size took care of the height. Done.

The Droid X simply says, look, we have slightly bigger hands and deeper pockets.

And who will refute that?

It’s a taste thing. I’m comfortable with the Incredible, but I’ve spoken to several people who have been waiting for a phone of this size. And that’s breakthrough number two..

But Where Will It End?

That’s the big question. The huge, enormous, monstrous question.

Steve, you heard it from me. Put a phone in the iPad. It’s time.

The fact is that, other than declaring a new standard size for handsets, the Droid X doesn’t change the landscape much – this is also good, as I had an instant point of reference when picking up the handset and turning it on. I knew how to take photos, how to download my first app, and how to get my email.

It also has much better battery life than the Incredible.

Breakthrough #3

However, the biggest breakthrough that comes along with the Droid X is the inclusion of Swype. Maybe it’s not the first time, maybe it won’t reach critical mass with this handset, but it’s the first big chance for adoption for this awesome feature.

Swype allows you to trace words on a keyboard as your input method, combining a unique way of moving about the keyboard with a super intuitive automated selection.

It took a little getting used to, but within the first hour I was able to type entire emails with Swype and it felt right and went in quick, with one, I mean one, error (“see” always came out as “se” no matter how hard I tried) and only a few times where I had to look at the word it had chosen to make sure it was the right word (it was). And I’m talking words like “significant” and “breakthrough” and “Paramore.”

Swype actually has a decent chance of replacing two-thumb mobile device entry.

And that’s huge. Bigger than the phone itself.

The Droid X is not that big. It’s just big.

Joe Procopio is the founder of Intrepid Company, a technical and management consulting firm  that has spun out publishing company/creative network Intrepid Media and digital incubator ExitEvent. No small hands jokes. He can be reached at joe@intrepidcompany.com or twitter @jproco.

 

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