The Moto X is the first phone to offer some serious customization to the body of the device beside simply picking a color. You can choose different colors for the back, front and accents and you can even engrave a custom message on the back of the device. Last week we saw that Motorola was censoring some words like Samsung, Apple or Droid from being engraved as well as profanity words but now Motorola has decided to pull the plug on the feature for now so it won’t be available this Friday when it launches.
Motorola told JR Raphael that they were dealing with quality issues in the engraving area and that the quality of the printing wasn’t meeting their standards. A spokesperson from Motorola said that they hope to work out the issues and offer the option to consumers soon.
Motorola has created the MotoMaker tool for consumers to design they own smartphone not only with colors but also storage size, wallpapers and even have it already signed-in to Google. We also know that Motorola plans to expand the customization options and that wood will be available later this year as they’re currently testing 4 different types of wood for the back of the Moto X.
I believe that in the future Motorola will go beyond superficial options and will let you choose specs like battery size, RAM, processor speed or even camera size. This is all new to the smartphone industry and we’re still years away for Motorola (or anyone else) to have a manufacturing process that allows this type of internal customization effectively.
Motorola is marketing the Moto X as a fashion icon that goes with your personality so having the option to engrave a message available is a big deal although to be honest, if you’re planning on selling the device once your done with it, you might want to hold back on the engraving since it can make it difficult to sell.
The Moto X launches on August 23rd and MotoMaker will be exclusive to AT&T for now but Verizon has already confirmed that they’re getting it later this year. Hopefully engraving will be back to the MotoMaker soon so you can really make it your own.