Goldilocks and the three Walkman phones

By Mary Lojkine on 19 October 2005, 9:54am

Once upon a time, Goldilocks went for a wander in the urban jungle. After a while she found herself outside the stylish modern apartment of the three bears, and the door was open, so she went in. The three bears had gone out for porridge, but they'd left their Walkman phones on the table in the hallway. Goldilocks decided to try them out.

The first phone she picked up was the Sony Ericsson W550 belonging to Baby Bear. "This is a cool phone," she said. "It's available on pay-as-you-go, and it has lots of funky features for young people, including a groovy swivel design, changeable faceplates and a big loop at the top so I can hang it round my neck. It has a 1.3-megapixel camera, 3D gaming and stereo speakers so I can play my music to my friends -- but it only has 256MB of internal memory, so it only stores 60-120 songs."

The next phone she tried was the Sony Ericsson W800i belonging to Mummy Bear. "This is a cool phone," she said. "It's quite small, but it has a 2-megapixel camera with autofocus and comes with a 512MB Memory Stick PRO Duo, which gives me space for 120-240 songs. It looks quite ordinary, though."

Finally, she tried Daddy Bear's brand new Sony Ericsson W900 (pictured). "Wow, this is a really, really cool phone," she said. "It uses the swivel design that made the Sony Ericsson S700i so popular, but the swivel is spring-loaded so I can open it with one hand. It comes in two colours, black and white, and has a great big 56mm (2.2-inch) screen. There's a 2-megapixel camera on the back, and a second camera on the front for video calling -- because this is a 3G phone that lets me download music, videos and games.

"And speaking of music, it has 470MB of internal memory, plus I can add up to 2GB more using Memory Stick PRO Duo cards, so I can store lots of songs. There's a remote control so I can change the music while the phone is in my pocket, and I can even buy the Home Audio System MDS-70, which is a charging stand connected to a pair of high-quality speakers. I can have music wherever I go, and I can have music at home. It's not going to be on sale until December, but it's definitely the phone for me."

And the W900 was the phone she stole. -ML

Crave does not condone mobile phone theft, happy slapping or iPod mugging... but if you're going out for porridge, you should lock your door.