05-16-2011, 05:00 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Palm: The Rise and Fall of a Legend
"I was there, when the Pilot landed. It was the summer of 1996, and the US Robotics Pilot 5000 had just arrived in the bootLab (‘boot Magazine' was the then-newly-launched precursor to Maximum PC). With unprecedented ferocity, we editors were fighting gladiator style for dibs on reviewing this tiny bit of pocket-sized plastic with its dingy monochrome screen. Not even the latest uber-PC or 3D graphics card generated such editorial lust." 
Although it feels like ancient history now, it was only a few years ago that neither the iPhone, nor Android, existed and the smartphone wars were fought between the likes of Palm, Microsoft, and RIM. It's amazing how fast things change. This article, written by Chris Dunphy - a fellow I had a good natured rivalry with back in 2001 - covers the inception of Palm, the effective dissolution of Palm (some might say multiple times), and everything in between. It's an excellent read and gives some insight into what Palm did, and didn't do, right.
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05-16-2011, 06:54 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 190
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Really cool look back ...I was mostly using my HP200LX when the Palm arrived and also had a Newton, so for me it WAS a joke ... but the quick market dominance taught many folks something. I owned a few Palms through the years, but ultimately they were never 'enough' for me ... not like the HP, the Newton MP2k, Psion, and Pocket PCs ...
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05-16-2011, 07:33 PM
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Contributing Editor
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 2,503
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Palms were awesome. Still loved my Treo 600. Pity they just couldn't bring it forward to the modern Internet age.
__________________
Baka. Soku. Zan. - The justice behind the dysORDer.
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05-18-2011, 02:29 PM
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Contributing Editor
Join Date: Sep 2006
Posts: 524
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I think WebOS is the first good product Palm has had. I only had one Palm OS device, a Treo 700. Even though that was much later than the earlier Palm Pilots it was terrible. It would just freeze all the time when switching networks/towers or something and I'd have to wait for it to respond in the middle of text entry or anything else. The interface was annoying and inefficient and the screen resolution was very low. I'm glad we moved away from those at work. I think WebOS is great but it's pretty late to the game and needs a lot of developer support. It will be interesting to see how HP does with the TouchPad, Veer, and Pre 3. I wish them well as I think these devices are worthy competitors in the current smartphone market and seem to have a great operating system behind them.
When the Palm came out I was disappointed at how crippled and restrictive it was. I bought an HP OmniGo 120. It was awesome! It was more flexible and more upgradable. It came with more and better software too. People said you didn't need those extra features. They said the same thing about Windows Mobile which had many of the features that I enjoy with Android now and iOS still doesn't have.
I think iOS is the Palm OS of today. As Apple continues to try to catch up to Android by adding things Android had first like Copy & Paste, Multitasking, and Folders it will become more and more clear that iOS and its Wii rip-off do-nothing-but-launch-apps interface will die the death palm did going from what everyone thought was the best to being something nobody would consider buying. It may take a few years but the way Apple is going people will start getting sick of the inherent limitations and restrictions in iOS. As more and more Android devices come out that keep getting better and better it's going to be harder for Apple to convince anyone that they really want a small screen, less features, and less choices.
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05-18-2011, 10:37 PM
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Executive Editor
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 29,160
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Craig Horlacher
As Apple continues to try to catch up to Android by adding things Android had first like Copy & Paste, Multitasking, and Folders it will become more and more clear that iOS and its Wii rip-off do-nothing-but-launch-apps interface will die the death palm did going from what everyone thought was the best to being something nobody would consider buying. It may take a few years but the way Apple is going people will start getting sick of the inherent limitations and restrictions in iOS.
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Apple is a *master* of "Good Enough". While the iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch don't do everything other competing products do, they do things "good enough" for many people out there. I do think it will be interesting to watch how Apple responses to the raging sales of Android phones...
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05-19-2011, 12:44 AM
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Theorist
Join Date: Sep 2003
Posts: 307
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I remember vividly how Palm buried their heads in the sand when the Pocket PC wave hit - they wasted an awful lot of time and energy loudly proclaiming against all evidence that all anybody needed or wanted was effectively an electronic Filofax.
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05-19-2011, 01:20 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jun 2005
Posts: 190
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jason Dunn
Apple is a *master* of "Good Enough". While the iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch don't do everything other competing products do, they do things "good enough" for many people out there. I do think it will be interesting to watch how Apple responses to the raging sales of Android phones...
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Actually, not exactly right.
Apple is the master of absolute best quality and customer service. EVERY year they top the lists. For computers, MP3 players, and now phones.
They also use the best components available - not always the buzzword processor or GPU, but in test after test it has been shown that for a given class of laptop, the best performer is Windows running on a Mac. Personally I love running Win7 on my Macbook Pro Core i7 ... it blows away my i7 Alienware on general stuff (the more powerful GPU gives the Alienware the gaming edge).
As for the Android thing ... I love Android and would be loathe to give up my phone (had original Droid, now Droid Pro). But remember - Apple has one phone with (for last 2.5 months) 2 carriers. Yet what is the #1 selling phone? Yep, iPhone. In fact, one phone on one carrier was doing battle with multiple carriers, literally dozens of phones across pretty much every other MFG except Apple/RIM/Nokia ... and maintaining solid performance.
But you are right - time doesn't stand still. The MS/Nokia thing is happening, and so is HP/Palm. Android is growing now, but while all the anti-Apple folks point to how it can't last for Apple, there is seldom any talk about the issues of Android including fragmentation etc. Every brand, every vendor has issues ...
I also think that Apple's arrogance and recent tendency to be evil is starting to bite them. They have pulled crap with their monolithic approach (ebooks as an example) that are inexcusable. Unless they change course they will slowly fade into the background again.
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