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Nextel Preps Phone, Portal

You'll surf from your wireless phone (in some cities).

By Peggy King, PCWorld   

Nextel is shipping in July its Internet-ready Motorola i1000plus handset, priced at $299. The unit has the same small keys as the i1000 model, released in February, but offers some new voice features. Among them are an indicator for missed calls, storage for the last ten numbers called, phone number storage, and a one-key dialing feature.

With the i1000plus, you can take advantage of Nextel Online, an Internet portal to be used with the phone service. Nextel Online is similar to the wireless portal under development by Microsoft, which is also working with Nextel to extend MSN with that service. It will be first available in Chicago and five East Coast regions (New York, Atlanta, Philadelphia, the Carolinas, and Washington, D.C.) this year. When the portal is fully operational, its services will include e-mail, calendar and address book functions, and intranet access.

Nextel's announcement is an early indication that wireless Internet access will become more popular with U.S. consumers, says Alan Reiter, president of the consulting firm Wireless Internet & Mobile Computing. He notes that wireless phone service providers in the Czech Republic, Scandinavia, Hong Kong, and Singapore offer their subscribers a variety of Internet-based services not yet available to U.S. cellular customers.

Reiter notes that Nextel's core market is in "blue-collar verticals," industries in the service sector.

"With the availability of wireless Internet access, companies using Nextel will be able to create dispatch applications without having to own a private LAN for dispatch. Companies that begin by using the Internet for dispatching deliveries may soon add links to customer support and other Web-integrated services," he says.

Worth the Trouble?

The big question is whether users will go to the trouble of accessing online functions from the i1000plus handset.

"I can get carpal tunnel syndrome just from looking at that handset, and its poor navigational features make it a difficult user interface for Internet access," Reiter says.

David Coursey, an industry columnist and conference host for Upside Events, used the Nextel i1000 for two-way communication with Upside Events colleagues.

"The Nextel works well as a two-way radio except when it drops calls and I hear unintelligible digital gibberish. But it falls short as a phone," Coursey says. "The i1000 handset is hard to use because it has tiny keys arranged in an odd manner."