In this morning's Wall Street Journal, Walt Mossborg reviews Verizon's new Chocolate Phone from LG Group. While he praises the style and some aspects of the physical design, he was generally negative on the phone due primarily to issues with the phone's software that make it difficult to use.
The LG phone does get some software / UI things right - including having dedicated buttons for the media player and camera. However, software problems prevented Mossberg from correctly transferring or playing music in some cases. He makes a very unflattering comparison between Samsung and Apple in the software skills department.
In my experience and while working on the book "Irresistible Electronics" we concluded that software is indeed one of the key drivers of usability for consumer electronics. I decided to do a somewhat unscientific test and see if that is the case for Walt Mossberg's reviews of consumer electronics over the last couple of years. A quick check showed that, roughly, where there were negative reviews, there were driven by software flaws more often than any other single cause, but that was not an overwhelming majority.
LG Chocolate Phone: Generally negative reviews, key issue was software
Nokia 770: Generally positive review, but key issues with software
UMPC: Strongly negative review, did not mention software
MacMini: Very positive on both hardware and software
Kodak Dual Lens Cameras: Very positive, did not mention software
Nuvi GPS: Negative based on price and accuracy
Kodak WiFi Camera: Negative, much of that related to software
Samsung i730 Phone: Neutral, no comments on software
Portable Media Centers: Negative due to lack of content
Of the 5 negative reviews given out, two were related to software, though perhaps if the UMPCs and portable media centers had overcome their other problems, they might have received a shellacked for their poor software as well, in my opinion.
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