TryPhone -- or maybe not

TryPhone is, I suppose, an interesting idea. It supposedly helps you "try" different phones through interactive demos, and provides specifications and reviews. The idea is, I guess, to help you make up your mind about which phone to buy.

I didn't get much out of the demos. There are only four phones listed, and while I'm sure they've done their best, the demos aren't very complete, and tend to be fairly unresponsive.

To their credit, I have first-hand knowledge of just how complex and difficult it is to create a complete Flash simulation of a device like a phone, even a simple one, and these demos are remarkably bug-free and operate consistently.

I don't know how far they're going to be able to take this -- there are hundreds of phones on the market, and while four is a good start, it's not that good. Then there's the issue of how much even the best demo differs from the experience of actually using the device itself. It's possible to emulate S60 software on a windows system. I do this all the time, and it simply isn't an experience frought with verisimilitude.

Still, I wish them luck, and hope their flash coders don't get RSI or keel over from overwork!