Star Trek Nokia 5800: Set half-assed movie tie-ins to stun

By Rich Trenholm on 28 April 2009, 5:35pm

Let's imagine for a second you make mobile phones. Let's say you're planning a tie-in to the new Star Trek film. You've seen Star Trek, right? It's the show that involves such cool gear as flip-open handheld communication devices. Now, what kind of phone would you choose for your tie-in? One that flips open, obviously. So which phone has Nokia gone for? The 5800 XpressMusic phone. Is it a flip phone? No. No, it isn't.

The 5800 includes a 3.2-megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss optics, built-in GPS and a touchscreen with tactile feedback. A touchscreen? That's a bit too Next Generation for us.

Perhaps the 5800 will come in Starfleet mustard, blue and red? No. It comes in Nokia blue, red or black and silver. So what actually is the Trek connection? Take a wild guess. That's right. Screensavers, wallpapers and ringtones. As movie tie-ins go, it's hardly the final frontier.

Toshiba couldn't stretch to a Star Trek laptop, settling instead for themed stickers. We covered that because, well, it's Star Trek. But our geek largesse will only stretch so far. Here at Crave, we take our tech and our Trek very seriously -- except when we're taking the proverbial, of course -- but really all we ask is that these tie-ins are put together by someone who's, y'know, given it more than five seconds of thought. And someone who can spell 'phaser' right.

Yes, Nokia is offering a special 'Phazer' application. We give up.

The Star Trek Nokia 5800 will be beaming up -- no, our hearts aren't in it anymore. It's in Phones 4U from 1 May. We're off to read Captain Kirk's Guide to Women to cheer ourselves up.