I've had my old, simple phone for two-plus years now, and Verizon's telling me I need a new one. Fair enough. I started looking at phones and realized that Verizon is focusing its product specs in all the wrong areas. I don't care how nice the camera is, or how many MBs of music it can play, or what things I can buy online for it. These are the things I want to know about a phone: Can I put it on silent mode without it making a sound? How many button presses to turn on/off the ringer? How many button presses to send a text message? How many button presses to look up someone in the phone book? How big are the buttons? How big is the screen? If I try to make a call will I have service? (To its credit, Verizon usually has a signal) How navigable is the menu? How many recent calls will it store? Motorola, Nokia, Samsung, LG, and whoever else makes phones, this is the Apple approach. Design phones with the user in mind and you'll reap the benefits. Maybe not immediate fiscal benefits, but rewards in terms of user loyalty.

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