DroidTalk : The first shift with Moto E #ChooseToStart

2007, the year of smartphone revolution when Apple launched the first iPhone and Google formed the Open Handset Alliance transformed our lives. I believe everyone would agree with that. Bringing the PC computability to our hands has been one of the biggest innovations done by the engineers to date which I don’t think anything has been able to catch it yet. Definitely there is an abstraction between what’s going in the research labs to what is made visible to us, but right now I am talking about the innovations which already have proven their potential.

Starting from PC computers which were way too big and bulky back like in 90s (I don’t know much about what was before because that’s when I was born) to laptops and further the birth mobile computers have been a like a sci-fi story which came true. I have been growing up with the technological evolution observing every stage of how things have shaped up now. Technology has never failed to amaze me either in its good way or bad, but they always have something to learn from. I remember the time when we only used to rely on landline phones for communication, hooked to a port at a static corner in home or work. Later came the mobile connectivity and the sudden rise of cellular handsets. Oh boy, it has been a pleasure watching them grow and take the lead. My dad bought his first mobile phone which was an old Nokia handset with an antenna. Time passed by and new models keep coming in, but my dad never gave up on the brand Nokia, not even by the time they actually gave up themselves to Microsoft. He never took the risk to loose his contacts, thus always been very reluctant on switching phones too often. This pretty much explains the reason why he was still on a feature phone until now.

Motorola being the first one to show the world what a mobile phone could do, has been around a while and fairly acquainted to my father after Nokia. He recently adopted quite a few the technological operations in his work routine, so I thought it would be a good time to gift him a smartphone which he might not be able to refuse. Even though there are a lot of options and better too, somehow Motorola Moto E fit in best for him. This was primarily because of two reasons, it should be compact, considering the fact that he is just switching from a feature phone and secondly, easy to use. Android being my preferable mobile operating system along with my sole responsibility to provide free tech support for life, Android my daily driver should be easy on me. Moto E due to the budget price point and stock Android experience which I believe provides the best user experience proved to be the suited option. All of the other features that might matter, my father kind of liked the new Moto E when I got it for review which rests above all.

About a month ago, I gave the Motorola Moto E 2nd Gen to my father which reoriented his thoughts towards technology definitely for good. I was surprised to see how well he picked up the change and he was enjoying it as well. Guess, it was time for him to adapt with the surroundings.

Setting up the Moto E was not much of a pain, at least not what I was expecting it to be. This has nothing to do with Motorola as such because it was something build into the operating system, rather than any app from Motorola which came pre-installed. Moving contacts from the feature phone via old school cable method, includes transferring them to a .vcf format and then importing it to Google contacts which actually got my father’s first approval to use this smartphone. My dad used to carry two feature phones for the much obvious reason, two numbers. Both of his SIM cards got inserted into one kinda got Moto E more love. In the past he had lost two or three feature phones, accidentally forgetting either one of them somewhere or dropping them at a crowded place. With the Moto E’s dual SIM capability, it was a relief for him to not handle two feature phones anymore.

Handing the smartphone with handful of utility apps including WhatsApp, Facebook, Mobile banking apps and Email configuration for personal and work routine, I saw a steep increase in the number of apps that got installed on dialy basis onto his smartphone. If we plot a graph with respective to the number of apps vs days, it will look something like this,

After a month I observed, my father is spending a lot more time on his smartphone than he ever used to on anything. Well, this was bound to happen considering the fact that a smartphone is not just meant for calling purposes and can also serve one’s entertainment needs. Apps like Saavn, Youtube etc. blend perfectly in his daily routine. The good part being Moto E is also helping him in work too. My father used to visit bank regularly once a day before going to office but now with the aid of Internet banking and mobile banking his vists have cut down a lot. This has not only helped him to spend more time on higher priority tasks but also avoid the tiring travelling. WhatsApp has its best use case for business as well as personal communications at times when only WhatsApp seems to be the appropriate means. Sharing media on the go is now possible and replying back to them instantly, helps him to speed up the process. With the ergonomic smartphone size the Moto E is easy for him to handle in daily routine. Taking it even further, the front camera and rear camera have also been put to good use. My father has been using the rear camera to scan documents for his personal records using the third party app called CamScanner. The secondary camera also comes to good use for video calling with relatives residing in different cities. This has been more of an excitement for him rather than anything used to its best but that’s the case with most of us. Although he is well aware of the maps in his hometown but he really appreciates the navigation feature on his smartphone for assisting him on his tour to other cities.

Overall if I talk about the experience with the Moto E, I see it to be one of those smartphones which are good to begin with. For first time users it is an excellent device, infact it works well for all with constrained budgets. The Motorola applications which come along with the stock Android helps to make the experience better right out of the box. For example, the Motorola Migrate app helps you to transfer your data from the old handset to your new one. The Moto LiveView is my favourite feature and I have kept it enabled for my dad as well. I wish if they could make it publicly available on like Play Store as well so that I can use it over Ambient display. Motorola as a brand having a reputation amongst people here in India has got an upper hand over the newly launched Chinese brands. Some of these are although better but are always in a doubt especially when it comes to asking parents. We should know that Motorola has now been acquired by Lenovo which is itself a Chinese firm, so everything in this category boils down to China.

It has been an enjoyable experience for me too educating my father about something that I know better. Thank you Motorola for this and I’ll look forward for more awkward tech conversations with my dad in future.