Friends,

First of all, I apologize in advance if this will turn out to be a long post. I voted for "contributor" as the closest choice for my objectives.

I got a Nokia N950 as well, just recently. Did I buy it? Yes, and I humbly request holding off on untoward reactions (for a relatively low price from what is being sold at eBay or in other countries). Please allow me to explain.

While relatively new to the Linux world, I can say that I am very passionate from the first time I learned from it. A colleage at work introduced me to Ubuntu (10.04 at that time) and it really got me excited to the point that I did self-study. It eventually progressed towards the N900 when I learned that it runs on a Linux-based OS. Locally here in the Philippines, I embarked on a journey of advocacy...joining local forum sites and creating support threads for Ubuntu as well as the Nokia N900. It created a following for the local folks online, and the advocacy continued through face-to-face interactions (people at work, friends outside of work, family, etc.). I even purchased a Nokia N9, because I would like to further my learning with Linux on the desktop and mobile platforms in the hope of someday being able to write my own app.

I have made small (but still) contributions to the community by writing localized content of whatever is here in TMO as well as visual aids (step-by-step tutorials, uploaded video tutorials), so that it will be easier to understand by people around me (the Philippines is a bi-lingual country but there is still a gap in communication at least, to a certain extent). I thought that contributing in this manner helps to enhance awareness, learning, and understanding by the people around me. I felt that communication (in my perspective) is important, as it gets the message across from the very talented developers, down to the regular end-users because if not, people will not appreciate the efforts put in by developers (especially here in TMO where most are contributing out of acts of volunteerism).

I purchased my Nokia N9 just a little over a month ago. But a few weeks after, in a local forum site that I participate (which also has a section for buy-and-sell), I chanced upon a Nokia N950 on sale. Converting to US Dollars it would be priced at $282.95 as of this writing (it's about the price of a 2nd-hand 16GB N9 locally). I don't know if we can call it dirt-cheap, or maybe because the prices in eBay are exhorbitant, but it doesn't matter. What mattered was that there is a priceless piece of material - a treasure if we may - that would likely end up going to waste if it went to . This is not to "lift my chair and rise up from the deep blue sea" to say that I am deserving. Maybe - maybe not. All I knew at that point was that I needed to "rescue" that N950. What I know is that I have the passion to learn and contribute to the community (I took inspiration from a fellow TMO member named kojacker, who has been interacting with the folks over at the Nokia N900 Owners from Philippines Thread, who was really very encouraging and was patient to answer questions and has the desire to see someone from the Philippines start developing for the Maemo/MeeGo platform).

I am mustering courage as I post, for I have read some threads where some members have received negative remarks for either selling or buying one. But at this point, what matters is that I am writing this in full honesty and at the same time, I am sharing what I plan to do with it:

1. Learn how to be skilled (kojacker told me it takes time, but it starts with little steps) by self-study...if I have the money/time I will take some courses. But realistically for me, self-study is my best choice.
2. Continue what I'm doing: writing documentation, localizing content and breakthroughs made by the current developers.
3. Be able to come up with my contributon (i.e. program/app) as what the others are doing here.
4. If possible, find someone locally who can share the same plans/vision. I would be happy to see our country being represented as well to be part of the contributing group in this community.

So there, again apologies for the long post. Yes, I purchased one, but not to stash it like some trophy.

By the way, in a local forum site here, somebody posted a picture of the N950 back in August. It wasn't really acquired by the poster, but sent to him by his brother who is a developer as he claimed: link here.

The poster said:

I am not sure if the N950 that I have now is originally from him (the one who posted the picture), since trading of gadgets here in the Philippines is so fast, it's just like buying a pack of cigarettes...maybe because we're mostly on prepaid hence most are "open-line" devices, i.e. not tied to carriers/service providers.

What I do know is that the person who I got it from was not the first owner (I sort of interviewed him when we met up for the deal).

Here are the threads that I came up with from the local forum sites:

For this site you have to register for a free account so that you can post, see links, etc.:

http://www.symbianize.com/showthread.php?t=321834
http://www.symbianize.com/showthread.php?t=783262
http://www.symbianize.com/showthread.php?t=261361

You can read threads in this site without having to register, but may need to do so if you need to post links:

http://www.tipidcp.com/viewtopic.php?tid=18988&page=10