Ubuntu Edge - Ubuntu Smartphone Announcement?


http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1j166z/hi_im_mark_shuttleworth_founder_of_ubuntu/

Mark Shuttleworth was answering questions regarding the project live.  

I think some of his comments were interesting: 

About the campaign:









Hello Mark!

How confident are you that the Indiegogo campaign will reach it's goal?

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[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 8 points

9 minutes  ago

It's going to be really tough, we'll need the support of a very large community of enthusiasts. A great start, for sure, but that's like all the folks in tutus and bearsuits at the starting line of a marathon. The finish is a little, erm, sweatier :)

 

By your best guess, about how much do you expect each edge to actually cost to produce?

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[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 10 points


27 minutes ago


Our best guess is $32m for 40,000 devices, not counting the money spent to date on design validation. If we did more devices we could lower the price, but that would just make the campaign goals harder. And really, we want to focus on cutting edge tech, so setting too high a production requirement might limit us to stuff that's more conventional. Hopefully we found a good balance, you be the judge!


 


Hello Mark. Thanks for doing this AMA.


What happens if the campaign gets fairly close to it's goal but is just a few million short? Will an "anonymous donor" (hint hint) buy out the rest that are required to get the project funded?


What processor are you expecting to choose for the Edge? Is it going to be a Haswell/Broadwell ULT or ULX chip?


Also, this isn't really a question, but more of a request... Please include a LARGE BATTERY in the device. I'd say that 4000 mAh should be the minimum design choice and hopefully more than that if possible. As a phone connoisseur, I really dislike that the standard flagship Android devices only have enough battery for a few hours of heavy usage (games, streaming video, etc.) I can easily kill my Galaxy S3 in less than 4 hours and I think that is unacceptable for a device that is supposed to be connected 24/7.


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[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 12 points


25 minutes ago


Lots of folks have speculated I might close the gap if it's close. But I think that would not be in the spirit of the project; rather I would hope someone smarter than me will come up with a better concept that DOES get greenlighted, because I really believe in the idea of crowdsourcing the signal to innovation.


 


 


Me likes:


 


[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 60 points


1 hour  ago


We want to support the edge with updates to 14.04 LTS and then through the life of 14.04 LTS, which would be a total of 6 years.


 


 


[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 14 points


 


32 minutes


 ago


That's good feedback. I would prefer a replaceable battery too so will take it up with the team and see if we can make that work.


 


Mr Shuttleworth,


Has Canonical been approached by the NSA regarding access to Ubuntu One?


 


[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 6 points


4 minutes  ago


No. I do have concerns that we have data in AWS and other US clouds which might be subject to PRISM. We're looking at a range of options to provide both security and also plausible deniability to users of Ubuntu who are surveilled.


 


[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 10 points 29 minutes ago



In a sense, perhaps, yes. But the real idea we're trying to express is that a community can make better decisions than a single person. So in making the Edge, we're also forming an extension to the Ubuntu community that can help with designing next generation Edges.


Mainstream volume PC and phone manufacturer is really best served by the existing players, I don't want to compete with them, we'd lose! But we're better setup to be a mediator between enthusiasts and those manufacturers, which is at the heart of this campaign.



 



[–]Mark_Shuttleworth 9 points 31 minutes ago


We're working with a few different games publishers on both PC and mobile, so yes, I think gaming on the edge will be pretty radical. It should certainly raise the bar on mobile gaming because we'll have a LOT of RAM and first-class GPU.



 


 


Me don't like:


 



–]Mark_Shuttleworth 7 points 14 minutes ago


The goal is a full day of high-end use. If we can get more juice in, we'll use it for performance rather than multi-day battery life.
 
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@ WizardStan, it was an example pricing / tiers - they would obviously price them to get the right balance. The point as mentioned, is that they need tiers with extras - not just tiers with nothing extra but escalating prices.  As for the tier perks I noted, most people are after a dock for it as well, the comment section is filled with people asking for it .  Also color normally does get a lot of people onboard for a tier that offers it - usually around 15-30%.

In the end, they need to get $800 , every other crowd funded project manages to hit there price/unit by  offering  reduced priced units and then making up the difference with premium priced units so that the average falls roughly where you want it.  In essence its the same marketing&Sales technique use for a lot of products generally - example like car manufacturers.

For example Canonical could start at $699(unlimited)  and offer the other tiers at prices that will end up with a $800 average overall.  As an Example the Ouya was offered (unlimited) at $99, with the other tiers they ended up with an average of $140/unit ie 40% higher.  In this case Canonical starting at $699(as an example) would hope its other tiers would drag the average price up 15% from $699 to $800.  That's how it normally works with these crowd funded projects.
 
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If it succeeds - we should design a dock and sell it. Maybe not OPT but a collective of members.
 
As for the interview with Mark Shuttleworth, Id be surprised if he didn't kick in some money or update the tiers at least.  There's way to much riding on this for them to let it fail.

If they cant get this crowd funded project up, then how on earth could they convince manufacturers to produce a Ubuntu mobile smart phone.  There is a huge amount riding on this project IMO

They will either add cheaper tiers and take a hit, do the right thing and add in cheap and premium tiers as I mentioned or fill the gap at the end with big pledges.  Of course there is still a narrow chance it will still hit its target at current tiers.
 
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I want this to succeed just for the single fact it will finally finally finally get ubuntu4android out in the wild... but holy shit batman thats expensive. Maybe they should do a tablet or something if the cellular radio is what is adding $300-$500 to similarly spec'd devices. I'm not one to talk about absurd prices but if people think the nvidia shield is expensive this price is just god damn ridiculous.
 
vcoleiro said:
They will either add cheaper tiers and take a hit, do the right thing and add in cheap and premium tiers as I mentioned or fill the gap at the end with big pledges.  Of course there is still a narrow chance it will still hit its target at current tiers.
Click to expand...
Mark S said $32m for 40,000 devices to produce. So the price should be at least $800.  Most tiers are already too cheap. 
 
^ They have no premium tiers to bring the average price upto $800.  The tiers are pretty flat at the moment. They need to introduce premium  tiers with additional bonuses (other than just the phone) to bring up the average, just like pretty much every other KS / Indiegogo project does.  Plus it wouldn't hurt to introduce tiers with a t-shirt for $50 etc as people have also requested

Most of their backers are after a dock, seems the feature that's most intriguing the backers is its ability to dock and turn into a PC. Yet they have no dock offering . That would have been the perfect premium tier. 

Another good perk premium tier would have been a case which everyone is after or color choice.  But again nope. I actually cant remember another KS/Indiegogo project that did not have premium tiers to boost the average - with extras like color choice , engraving, special edition or whatever.   

In regards to their  current tiering -  if the target is just met, it will bring the units in at about $778 on average, assuming about $300,000 for the $20 donations and $10,000 tiers etc. So  short of the $800. One of the team commented that they reviewed their spreadsheet and decidied they could do it at this new tier levels .
 
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Well, I think the price is currently already too high for most people so adding premium tiers will not attract a lot of people. A docking station maybe, but then the price level could be $1000+ and that is a definitely a psychological barrier. 

I think it will stall if we are in the $775 tier, I don't have a lot of confidence that this will succeed. 
 
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I get the feeling it will stall at $775 as well. Time will tell I guess.


The point re premium tiers was to allow cheaper tiers, so in the end they average out to the required amount per unit.


On another front, they have just announced they will be adding a T-shirt tier next week.


Here's a live progress graph for project


http://xubuntix.org/weblog/2013/07/ubuntu-edge
 
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They have added something new, everyone contributing can win a prize. a personalised Ubuntu Edge phone engraved with your name.

THE RULES

You have one week. The person who drives the most money in referral contributions between now and 4.00pm BST on Friday 2 August will win this great prize. (Prize is conditional on the Ubuntu Edge being fully funded.)

Every extra backer takes us closer to our goal, and by taking part you’ll be playing a vital role in getting the Ubuntu Edge 

Nice, but I don't think that will bring the momentum back. 
 
131916645670.jpg
 
I don't see it happening if it continues like this.  They need to do something more drastic. T-shirts and the personalized phone trophy may be fun but it doesn't generate lots of new buyers/money. Or they good could just give up....  
 
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Holy god... that is the first time in my life I've seen an absurd amount of money (almost 8 million dollars) actually look disappointing.
 
Seven and a half million after 8 days, and I don't think it's moved 100k in the last 16 hours. I do believe there is no hope of it succeeding. :(

Still, useful for marketing. $775 seems to be the hard cut off. If they return with some ideas of how to keep the cost to $750 they may have a second chance.
 
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