HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event: A Review Part 3 of 3

This is the last of the three-part review I am making for the HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event held last January 27, 2011 at Mandarin Hotel.

What I sensed from Sense.com (pun intended) is that it is a community site made by HTC that serves several purposes for its clients. Mr. Wayne Tang described it as a a portal service that is free of charge for HTC users specifically for their latest HTC cellphones released last year 2010 and this year 2011. By using Sense.com, an HTC user can link his HTC phone to the server, back-up all of his phonebook contacts, check his call history, send sms using the server, locate messages even those years ago by using a keyword search, manage his HTC phone remotely and ring his phone even when it is in silent mode. Using Sense.com, an HTC user can also forward his calls to another number in case that person forgot to bring his HTC cellphone with him.

Another cool function which I hope you don't have to use is if in case you lost your phone, an HTC user can lock his phone using Sense.com and instead of showing the usual phone screen, an HTC phone will display the owner's contact details for it (HTC phone) to be returned. In the likelihood (which is high nowadays) that the person who found your HTC phone was not able to return it to you, the phone's information is useless to him (unless he finds a person from the cellphone land called Greenhills) because using Sense 2.0, you can erase all the contents of an HTC phone including the information stored in your Micro SD. As for the end user, your information can be retrieved from Sense.com to lessen the inconvenience of building your network and phonebook from ground zero.

During the HTC Sense Workshop I only had one question in mind, "How safe is the information stored in the Sense 2.0 or Sense.com?" Mr. Wayne Tang answered "it (Sense.com) is hosted together with Google; it (information) will not be released using the latest international standard servers from Taiwan, Singapore and Australia". What I deduced from his brief answer was that HTC users don't need to worry about storing their information inside Sense.com because HTC is using the latest international means to protect its users' information from being stolen.

Let's not create an issue here but identity theft is something we have heard before and information such as bank data, personal information, e-mails, sms, and other private data will be out there in a website. Thus, if HTC has really the means to protect all of its users. I consider it to be one great feat.

Other concerns that came up were valid issues raised by HTC users themselves including the short battery life for the HTC Desire lines and the unavailability of Sense.com at certain times. Mr. Tang acknowledged the first issue and stated that HTC is still finding a way to address the battery life. As for the second issue, he explained that because Sense.com is still being developed and updated hence there will be times that it will be unavailable for maintenance. However, he sort of promised that much improvements are to be expected this year 2011 from HTC to address all these concerns.

Photos taken from HTC Sense Workshop album in Facebook http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=586455943#!/album.php?aid=33105&id=154076797971723

And that concludes my 3-part review of the HTC workshop. I am still waiting for that text message or any form of message Mr. Mark Sergio promised to give the attendees which is a P1000 discount for its HTC phones. However, its been two weeks now and I haven't heard any from the HTC team.

Did the workshop do its purpose of motivating its attendees from buying an HTC phone. I think, generally, it did. However, there are still a lot of gray areas for me. But its not easy being first to promise a free of charge service portal like Sense.com. It's not easy to claim an intuitive phone. But I do hope HTC delivers what it promised in its "quietly brilliant" way.

P.S. I am not paid in any manner by HTC to make this post. This post is purely based on this blogger's perspective on what she understood based from the HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event last January 27, 2010.

HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event: A Review Part 2 of 3

Just as I promised I will give the meat of my experience in the second part of my blog about the HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event.


The first statement that got me to pay attention to Mr. Wayne Tang, HTC Singapore product manager, was when he said that "HTC Sense is an experience". In my head, I did not expect a program to be defined in such a personal manner. So the next question that popped in my head was that what kind of experience can HTC provide its users that will be different from what the other smartphones in the market are already promising?

So I listened intently to what the Singaporean manager has to say about HTC Sense and here are the things that further caught my attention:
1. Sense 2.0 is not an overlay.

2. Sense 2.0 is not a user interface

3. There are about 300+++ features in the HTC Desire phones (I'm thinking this is enough to keep somebody busy to learn one feature a day)

4. HTC Desire phones want to give its users a holistic experience. Holistic according to the web definitions I googled means "Looking at the whole system rather than just concentrating on individual components. The overall sum can be greater than a simple totaling of the individual parts, because the "system" adds something in addition. Another term is "systems thinking"."

Systems thinking? does it mean AI?

So what makes HTC Desire phones and Sense 2.0 a holistic experience? Mr. Weng Tan gave concrete real-life experiences a modern busy person can encounter on a regular business day and how his HTC Desire phone can be of service.

1. When a phone is left in your bag it recognizes that it is inside your bag and hence rings louder. Once you touch the phone it detects the human presence and it rings softer.

2. In a business meeting and your phone rings, you do not have to scurry to turn it off or cancel the phone, you just have to flip the phone to silence it.

3. When you receive a phone call the latest Facebook status update and photo of your friend will appear.

4. The phone has a birthday counter which will allow you to remember important dates.

5. The HTC Desire phones when turned on requires only 10 seconds to open.

6. Using your HTC Desire phones can allow you t merge several e-mail accounts in one folder wherein each e-mail account can be identified by color.

7. You can choose e-mails by assigning then in your priority list and you can move from unread to priority list mails by just moving the screen left or right.

8. All you need to do to get the remaining data of your e-mail is to scroll up. Unlike other phones that will ask you if you want to continue to read on. HTC figured that this adjustments can save a person seconds of his time and make the experience of reading e-mails more pleasant.

9. I am not good in finding locations so when Mr. Wayne Tang discussed about HTC Map Solutions I became curious if this is the phone that can help me with my problem. Because of Sense 2.0 and the features of the new HTC phones, its users are provided with HTC Map Solutions wherein you can download the entire google map of country and store it on your phone. And unlike for other Android phone, this service is provided for free by HTC.

10. Speaking of navigation, Mr. Wayne Tang also discussed that with the HTC Desire lines the user can continue to navigate and accept calls at the same time. Making it possible for the user to mutitask or choose the task he wants to prioritize.

11. In your travels, you take photos and videos of your explorations. With HTC phones they claim that you can now wirelessly stream your photo and videos on your TV.

12. The HTC user can also upload photos and videos directly from his or her Desire phone to his social networking sites. There is no need to remove SD cards and transfer to the laptop. The process is now shortened and made more convenient for the end user.

According to Mr. Wayne Tang, these are the some of the integral features of the HTC Desire line.

Tomorrow I will be detailing the things I learned about HTC Sense.com. I could add the information on HTC Sense.com in this post but I want my readers to savor the wealth of information about HTC Desire phones here to avoid overwhelming your brain.


Till the next blog post...

P.S. I am not paid in any manner by HTC to make this post. This post is purely based on this blogger's perspective on what she understood based from the HTC Sense 2.0 and Sense.com Workshop Event last January 27, 2010.