Navigation on your Nokia for free?

Nokia recently made the unprecedented move of making navigation free forever on some of their current handsets. Their marketing department came up with the slogan "Navigation on your Nokia. For free. Forever." emblazoned across their website with a list of compatible devices in very small and grey print at the moment of the page.

I presume they expected mobile phone users around the world to flock to phone shops to purchase the compatible handsets. While this may have happened to a certain extent, there was also a backlash in the form of owners of older Nokia handsets logging onto forums and complaining about being forgotten by Nokia. Some of these people did not read the fine print and were genuinely agrieved when they went to the Nokia website only to find that they could not download the free version because their phone were not supported.

The current list of compatible handsets are as follows:

1. X6 - S60 5th Ed
   
2. N97 Mini - S60 5th Ed
   
3. N97 - S60 5th Ed
   
4. E72 - S60 3rd Ed FP2
   
5. E55 - S60 3rd Ed FP2
   
6. E52 - S60 3rd Ed FP2
   
7. 6730 Classic - S60 3rd Ed FP2
   
8. 6710 Navigator - S60 3rd Ed FP2
9. 5800XM - S60 5th Ed
   
10. 5800 Navigation Edition - S60 5th Ed
11. 5230 - S60 5th Ed
    
12. N86 - S60 3Ed FP2
    
13. E71 - S60 3rd Ed FP1
    
14. E66 - S60 3rd Ed FP1

Indications are that no more S60 3rd Ed FP1 phones will be supported but the jury is still out on FP2 phones. We will just have to wait and see.

Have Nokia done anything wrong? No, not really because they always stated the list of compatible devices, albeit in fine print. It was not possible for them to anticipate the number of people who do not read the small print. Nevertheless, some of these people were genuinely agrieved, with some thinking they were duped by crafty advertising.

In addition to making navigation free for some phones, Nokia also substantially reduced the price of navigation licenses. The navigation license for the whole of europe is now only €9.99 for the year and €2.99 for a month.

Overall, I think it was a very positive development from Nokia although they could have been a little more forthright and put everything in big print. The marketing department needs a rap on the knuckles.