Nothing has changed since Palm announced the Pre, except that the competitive landscape for smartphones has become even more competitive. I did not give the Pre a chance at that time and it is now clear that as predicted, it did not succeed. Since nothing has changed, I cannot see why the Pixi should succeed. Developers, the kingmakers of today, will still shun WebOS which will mean the slow death of WebOS and all of Palm’s handsets.
Pity. I still have a warm spot in my heart for Palm, but reality is their exit strategy is to be acquired. Let’s hope it will happen…
Update: Sprint announced their Q2 results today. In one word: Ugly. They lost even more subscribers in Q2 than they did in the first 3 months of this year. And that’s despite selling the Palm Pre since early June. Frankly, I’m shaking my head – I would have thought the Palm had more of an impact on Sprint’s numbers than it apparently did. Sprint got to reverse this trend in Q3. Regardless of whether they manage that, the Palm Pre is still doomed in the long term. Consolidation will happen and I just cannot see Palm to survive. So it’s a matter of when, not if. Pity!
With only days to go until the release of the Palm Pre, major newspapers have now reviewed the Palm Pre. While all like the Pre as a device, many of them point out the lack of apps and lack of developer support. Just to sample a few, Walt Mossberg in his Wall Street Journal Personal Technology column sums it up nicely: “… could give the iPhone and BlackBerry strong competition — but only if it fixes its app store and can attract third-party developers.” David Pogue in his New York Times column states that “Palm intends to approve thousands more in the coming weeks, but they won’t be as diverse or powerful as the iPhone’s”. And last, but not least, Steve Wildstrom called it “A Smartphone not quite smart enough” in Business Week.
All of these reviews underscore the point I made in my post “Why the Palm Pre will fail (and thus, we will stick with the iPhonePhotoShow)” a few weeks ago: While the Pre will see a spike in sales, in the long run, Developers go where the money is. And that’s not with Palm.
If that point needs any more emphasis, consider today’s Wall Street Journal article on Adobe, where Ben Worthren writes about Adobe’s efforts to crack the smart-phone market and open it up for Adobe Flash: “… Adobe has struck alliances with chip designers and phone makers and offered millions of dollars to developers willing to write programs for mobile devices that use its software.” It takes money –a lot of money– to get the developers rallying around your product. Money that unfortunately Palm does not have.
I stick with my prediction that the Palm Pre will fail in the long run. And thus we still have no plans to do a Palm Pre Photo Show.
With only days to go until the release of the Palm Pre, major newspapers have now reviewed the Palm Pre. While all like the Pre as a device, many of them point out the lack of apps and lack of developer support. Just to sample a few, Walt Mossberg in his Wall Street Journal Personal Technology column sums it up nicely: “… could give the iPhone and BlackBerry strong competition — but only if it fixes its app store and can attract third-party developers.” David Pogue in his New York Times column states that “Palm intends to approve thousands more in the coming weeks, but they won’t be as diverse or powerful as the iPhone’s”. And last, but not least, Steve Wildstrom called it “A Smartphone not quite smart enough” in Business Week.
All of these reviews underscore the point I made in my post “Why the Palm Pre will fail (and thus, we will stick with the iPhonePhotoShow)” a few weeks ago: While the Pre will see a spike in sales, in the long run, Developers go where the money is. And that’s not with Palm.
If that point needs any more emphasis, consider today’s Wall Street Journal article on Adobe, where Ben Worthren writes about Adobe’s efforts to crack the smart-phone market and open it up for Adobe Flash: “… Adobe has struck alliances with chip designers and phone makers and offered millions of dollars to developers willing to write programs for mobile devices that use its software.” It takes money –a lot of money– to get the developers rallying around your product. Money that unfortunately Palm does not have.
I stick with my prediction that the Palm Pre will fail in the long run. And thus we still have no plans to do a Palm Pre Photo Show.
I hope this will be the shortest article that I will ever write on this blog.
In short, all the reasons why the Palm Pre will fail also apply to the Zune HD. Actually, no matter how good the device ends up being, the Zune line itself has already failed to catch on and the Zune brand is as tainted as Vista. So the ecosystem will not abandon the iPhone and rally around Zune.
And thus we will not do a Zune HD Photo Show, either.
