Jonathon Watkins
09-21-2005, 09:00 PM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.bargainpda.com/default.asp?newsID=2665' target='_blank'>http://www.bargainpda.com/default.asp?newsID=2665</a><br /><br /></div><i>"The handheld computer market is dead. Sales of traditional PDAs are tanking, the market is shrinking, and smartphones are the wave of the future. Well, not quite. If you follow the news of the handheld computing world at all, you've probably heard this before. . . There's no question that the number of connected devices is on the rise . . . But what I would like to know is where this idea that smartphones are the be-all and end-all of technology originated. Because whoever came up with it first, that person needs to be smacked."</i><br /><br />Adama Brown has written a thought provoking article debunking the 'death' of the PDA, which is something we hear thoughtlessly repeated depressingly frequently. A jack-of-all-trades device should be able to be computer and a phone and that involves tradeoffs. I think the key word for the article is 'compromise' and that's something that many folks don't seem to want to accept. You really should read the article, if only for Adama's vivid imagery. ;-)<br /><br /><i>"Vast numbers of "converged" devices . . . have died on the vine, either because no carriers wanted them, or because the manufacturer couldn't handle the technological equivalent of threading a needle in an open convertible while doing 120 miles per hour through a snowstorm somewhere in the Swiss Alps."</i>