Details are scant but an announcement that Palm will finally announce something kinda seems buzz-worthy. Should we hold our shares through this event? What is the probability that Palm announces something that moves the dial in this super-competitive market?
![palm-invite-ces-2009[1]](http://www.pyslent.com/wp-content/oldstuff/palm-invite-ces-2009%5B1%5D_2.jpg)
Palm Announces a Press Event for CES
This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 10th, 2008 at 3:57 pm by Kelvin and is filed under Portable Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
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December 10th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
I’m in shock.
December 10th, 2008 at 5:07 pm
OK. Let me add that I think this is exactly what Palm has to do. They have to swing for the fences, establish high expectations then meet or exceed them. That’s not the way you want to run your company, but the truth is that Palm has so mismanaged their company the last 5 years that they really have no alternative.
They don’t have to be better than the iPhone. But this new wonder gadget has to be better than Android and the other iPhone wannabees. If Palm can establish the NovaTreo as the clear #2, they’ll do great. If it doesn’t stand out from the Instinct/ BlackJack/ Bold/ Storm/ G1/ N97 crowd, then trouble.
December 10th, 2008 at 5:50 pm
What do you guys think about the N97? I really like the widget platform… looks like you can add up to 6 widgets on the home screen that are dynamically updated and actually show content. it’s kinda like the windows mobile Today screen, but propobably more customizable and graphically pleasing.
December 10th, 2008 at 7:05 pm
BTW, I don’t think Palm would have a gadget yet to show– I think at best we see the OS running on an emulator. They’ll want to start priming the pump on developers as soon as possible, so I imagine they are where Google was when they first released the Android Beta SDK last Nov (2007).
Why do you think it has to outdo Android? I think Android has for too much momentum for Palm to match it in terms of unit sales. Too many people not working for Palm have a stake in making Android good.
Engadget is now also revealing some insider hype: Couple this news with recent chats we’ve had with sources close to the company suggesting that something kind of amazing is coming that “won’t disappoint,”.
What could it be, Palm?
December 10th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
I don’t think it has to have more sales than the G1, I just think it has to be a better device/ platform.
The N97 widgets look good, and actually useful. Info has always been so easy to get at a computer that I never saw the point of widgets. The paradigm makes much more sense for a phone.
I remember when the Treo used to be cool.
December 15th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
This article in Business Week has some tantilizing tidbits. Specifically, it says that Palm will target the “fat middle” between the iPhone and Blackberry. Palm goes on to criticize the iPhone’s battery life. Oh, also: “Some of the stuff we’re working on here is mind-blowingóbetter than anything I’ve seen before.” And a flippant comment about targetting 20 million in unit sales a year. Typical pie-in-the-sky stuff from Palm, but consider me intrigued.
December 15th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Saw that two. Seem to be hinting at device previews. Our campaign to make Palm create buzz & preview their stuff seems to have paid off!
December 15th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
As is clear from the 7 duplicate comments above, Palm definitely has some fixin’ up to do…
December 15th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Hey Mike, isn’t there something you can do to restrict these legacy Palm users from cluttering up the Board 🙂 ?
The best part of the article is this line: The iPhone comes closest to handling such divergent needs, but is so packed with features that its battery power is quickly depleted, McNamee says. “Because of power limitations, nobody dominates the whole market,”
The skeptic in me envisions the Palm brainstorming meeting going something like this: So what can we take out of an iPhone to extend battery life? Well, does anyone really need WiFi? Also, the screen is about a third too big, multitasking is overated, & what’s the point of a standard headphone jack?
December 15th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
I actually haven’t heard many people complaining about the battery life since one of the last couple of firmware updates improved it for 3G users.
I also think the “nobody dominates the whole market,” while literally true, constitutes Palm sticking its head in the sand. The truth is, everybody *but* Palm dominates the market. Every other smartphone OS has passed them by.
Jake, you’ve got a sweet deal on your voice/data plan — but if you could have an iPhone for the same price, would you switch?
December 16th, 2008 at 12:20 am
@Mike: yes. But I like a lot about the Treo form factor. If the Centro had a better browser, I’d pick it over the iPhone. Other stuff (media, apps) is really bonus. Phone, email and web are really the big three.
Do I need to repeat myself?
December 16th, 2008 at 12:21 am
I think it must be a latency issue. Sprint, Centro & Pyslent are a deadly combo.
December 16th, 2008 at 11:38 am
Agreed about the latency– yesterday, on the train, I was using my phone as a modem and inadvertently ordered a dvd rental twice from Redbox. Kudos to customer service, though– they offered to either refund me or give me 2 rental credits, which is like getting a rental for 50 cents!
December 16th, 2008 at 11:51 am
I’m pretty happy with my browser, considering it’s a phone. I do avoid certain sites that it hiccups on, which is certainly a pain, but for the most part, it works well enough to entertain me on the go. I could install a 3rd party app if it really bothered me.
It’s the native apps from the Apple store that I covet the most. Apps like Yelp and Opentable that use the GPS. Yes, both those websites have decent mobile versions of their websites, but don’t leverage the GPS like their iPhone app counterparts do. Will the developers show up for Nova like they once did for PalmOS and Foleo? Hard to say, but I think it’s telling that they aren’t interested in anything collectively but the iPhone, despite Android, WinMob, Symbian, and RIMM having all that traction.
Back to GPS, I recently installed Google Gears for WinMob, which opens up a GPS API to the browser, but it only works with supported websites (basically Google, for now).
December 18th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Engadget is spreading the brand a little thin these days… they recently launched a new Engadget Mobile podcast, and in the first episode, they spent nearly 40 minutes talking about Palm and speculating on the Nova announcement. I mean, who could spend that much time talking about something that no one has seen? 🙂
BTW, Palm’s earnings report this afternoon will be really fun for the rubbernecker in you!
December 18th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
Y’know, something just struck me about the Palmnote– I think Casino Royale would be a more apt spot for Palm than the Venetian.
December 18th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
You’re right, that’s gotta say something about their optimism.
December 19th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
More updates from Engadget. The last sentence is interesting on many levels,
December 23rd, 2008 at 2:31 am
Holy crap. The next Palm has just been described as the biggest-yet iPhone threat. “What did Steve Jobs do to his old buddy Bono? The Irish rock star, once the Apple CEO’s adoring buddy, is funding the most credible threat to the iPhone yet.” Link.
January 4th, 2009 at 11:13 pm
Details emerge. Spoiler alert!
January 5th, 2009 at 4:59 pm
My thoughts on a slider– you get the benefit of a larger screen at the cost of thickness. As for the vertical slide, seems like it means a very narrow thumbboard without any apparent benefit over the traditional side slider. The only advantage I can think of is that the Treo 5-way nav control is nice in that it’s balanced and centered on the device (compared to using a 5-way positioned at the bottom of a device). So an extended vertical slider might give you a better grip on the phone even if you weren’t using the thumboard.
As for the software, no details, other than it’s “amazing.”
January 6th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
Don’t know if he has any inside knowledge, but Dieter Bohn of Treocentral was very confident in saying that Nova will be better than Android out of the box in the Q&A segment of the Roundtable Part II podcast (around the 1 hour mark).