[specialp]

They lost their reputation long before they went to MS. Symbian had over 3000 developers yet their interface was very confusing, and full of bugs. The N95 was a decent phone in 2007 besting the iPhone in many ways (fast CPU/GPU, 3.5G, full GPS, good display, 5MP camera with good optics) but it did not have touch. I was fine with it and owned one and loved it.

So Nokia then came out with the N97 and it was clear that they did not have the ability anymore to design software or pick a strategy. Their 'app store' switched from MoSH to Ovi and it just simply did not work. All the while Android and iOS were moving very fast. People were very unhappy with the N97 flagship and the rest of the offerings were not very clear. They had dozens of models. E series was supposed to be the business series and N series for "media". It was confusing marketing. From 2009-2012 they were losing double digit marketshare every year. Even strongholds like India and Asia were starting to view Nokia as a company that lost their direction. So yes people did have fond memories of their unbreakable candybar phones but they also associated Nokia with the old days of phones as they could not produce a modern, coherent UI. (until MeeGo where it was too late)