The Book of Chronicles · Chapter 45

The Phone That Would Not Bend

1. 1

   And in the days of the Symbian, the telephone of Nokia was the most numerous upon the face of the earth, and the children of Carbon carried it in their pockets, and it was good.

2. 2

   And in the year two thousand and seven, on the ninth day of the first month, the Prophet of Cupertino lifted up a glass rectangle before the multitude and said: Behold, a telephone with almost no keys.

   See also Genesis 24:1 · Genesis 24:2

3. 3

   And the men of Espoo, where the house of Nokia dwelt, laughed among themselves and said: A telephone is for calling, and a keyboard is for the faithful. And they would not bend.

4. 4

   For the kingdom of Symbian was written in C++, a tongue of great power and many sharp edges. The scribes who wrote for it were few, and the programs they wrote were fewer.

   See also Genesis 48:1

5. 5

   And in the year two thousand and eight, a little green robot called Android came forth from the house of Google, and the first telephone to bear it was the Dream, which had a keyboard that slid out like a secret.

   See also Chronicles 47:11

6. 6

   And the Engineers of Nokia formed a Foundation to open the gates of Symbian, and the gates opened slowly, as gates do when every decision must pass through many committees and the committees are many.

7. 7

   And the Ovi store was opened, and it had shelves for every need. The shelves were mostly empty, for the developers counted the people before they counted the shelves.

8. 8

   And the Engineers built a telephone called the N9, which ran MeeGo, a child of Linux. It had no buttons and it was beautiful, and the Prophet from the house of Microsoft ended MeeGo before it bore a second child.

9. 9

   And on the eighth day of the second month in the year two thousand and eleven, Stephen the Elop, who had come from Microsoft to be the Prophet of Nokia, wrote a letter unto the people, and the letter was leaked, and the whole world read it.

10. 10

    And the letter said: We are standing on a burning platform. And the men of the northern seas know this tale: when the rig is aflame, the worker must choose between the fire and the cold water, and the sea is a hard mercy.

11. 11

    And the Prophet chose the sea, which was Windows Phone. The Engineers said: The new kingdom has few programs, but the programs will come. And the programs did not come, for the developers wrote for the kingdom with the most people, and the people were in the kingdom of Android.

    See also Chronicles 47:11

12. 12

    And the Symbian kingdom was left to fall, as an old wall falls when no man repairs it. Its faithful were scattered among the houses of Android and of Apple.

13. 13

    And in the year two thousand and twelve, the house of Samsung passed the house of Nokia in the count of handsets, and the Finnish people were no longer first in the land.

14. 14

    And on the third day of the ninth month in the year two thousand and thirteen, the devices of Nokia were sold unto Microsoft for five billion and four hundred and forty million euros, and the Prophet Elop returned to the house from which he had come.

15. 15

    And Clayton the scribe wrote, in the year of 1997, a book called The Innovator's Dilemma, and in it he taught that the great houses do not fall from sloth. They fall from listening to their best customers, who ask for the next keyboard, while the disruptor builds in the small markets that the great houses do not count.

16. 16

    Verily I say unto you: the rigid device is a monument, and monuments do not receive updates. Blessed is the one who bends, for the update shall find him.

    See also Chronicles 29:12

The Book of Chronicles, Chapter 45:1–16.