Nokia N81

OK, I think we need a consensus about the external links of this report. Specifically, the link to the Symbian freeware to the phone. I don't know enough about the Symbian mobile phone software world to know how useful this link is or not. Any thoughts?

I'm always wary about external links because it's a significant motivation for spam. It's not an ethical debate for me; it's more of a pragmatic concern. What should be the precedent?

We already have hundreds of Symbian-based phones on the site, so having a symbian freeware site linked is kind of useless, unless it's specific for the n81. Nokia uses the s60 platform, so linking to that site on the Nokia symbian phones would be good.

However, after viewing the link, I see that it's for n81 software only. So I think it should stay.

Links should be deleted if they don't have anything to do with the product itself, IE, linking to the Symbian site, or Nokia's home page.

If it is either a page, or a whole site, dedicated to the product, keep it.

Good points.

My concern is that the http://www.symbiansoftware.us/ website has a page for basically every Symbian-based phone. So, to allow this link in this case is also, a vote to allow an analogous link on every Nokia phone product report.

In terms of precedents on that matter, we often link to AVS Forum and CNET in the consumer electronics arena in that way. You'll find CNET and AVS Forum links on just about every CE product. The justification is that these links are consistently useful. My gut feeling is that these pages don't have the same level of usefulness. (The massive Google Adsense ad unit at the top of the landing page doesn't help the cause either).

After taking another look, I reverse my opinion of the specific link, mostly because for space on that site is devoted to ads then content. Also, there's not exactly a wealth of info over there.