A Nokia person

Someone once described themselves as a Nokia person. I think it was Chaditsa at the CyberFest event in Teesside University. Everyone laughed as they understood what she meant. She was not at the bleeding edge of technical innovation and was more comfortable with the simpler user interfaces that we used to enjoy.

I realised that I too am an Nokia person when I bought myself a MiFi, a mobile broadband hotspot. I’m sure you have seen them, they are a small gadget that allow you to connect your laptop to the internet using a mobile connection. Rod had suggested that such a thing would be ideal for when I am out and about and WiFi is not available and so off I duly went to my local retailer.

I was due to attend a Dynamo board meeting that evening at the North East Futures UTC and had expected to be able to get onto their WiFi but for one reason or another it was not available. This gave me the ideal opportunity to try out my new gizmo and this is when my Nokia moment arrived.

Getting the case open to put the battery in was hard enough. I had to ask Charlie to help. I plugged it all in only to find I couldn’t get a signal. Fortunately Graham was on hand who discovered, after he had opened the case, that the SIM card was not seated correctly. Progress was made and the device sprung into action only for me to realise that the UTC building was like a Faraday cage with a very poor mobile signal at best.

I gave up after a few minutes and packed it away only to realise that it had actually worked and so had to unpack it again.

For someone who works at the fringes of technology, there are times when I am hopelessly out of my depth and even the simplest of devices throw me for a loop. Perhaps it is my age but my new MiFi definitely made me feel like a Nokia person.