Report: Job Cuts at Palm Inc
News.com is reporting on new round of job cuts at Palm Inc. today. The article says some workers are still in the process of being notified of the cuts this afternoon. The total number of layoffs is not known at this point.
"It's a small percentage of our workforce," Palm spokesman Jim Christensen told News.com, adding that Palm still has openings in some areas. The bulk of the jobs being eliminated are in the U.S. and in Palm's development ranks, though there are some cuts across the company, he said.Christensen said the move was "not about cost-cutting" but rather about "eliminating some of the hierarchy" at the company.
This news follows last week's announcement of Palm's plans to sell a 25% stake in the company to Elevation Partners. Along with the investment and recapitalization plan, Palm also announced major changes to its Board of directors with long time Chairman Eric Benhamou stepping down. Jon Rubinstein, former senior vice president of hardware engineering and head of the iPod division at Apple, is joining Palm as executive chairman of the board. Fred Anderson and Roger McNamee, managing directors and co-founders of Elevation, will also be joining Palm's board.
Palm is scheduled to report its Q4FY07 results June 28, 2007 at 1:30 PM PT.
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RE: Doubt this will help product support
The problems is at the top, not the bottom
I hope these Job cuts are in the Foolio division! They weren't needed.
-------------------------------
http://www.pocketfactory.com
http://www.elitistsnob.com
RE: The problems is at the top, not the bottom
Perhaps one of those 'hierarchical' cuts will be...
== "...eliminating some of the hierarchy..."
That would be an ... appropriate ... term for this, no?
Giggle.
PalmOS - it's dead, Jim
== and in Palm's development ranks..."
RE: PalmOS - it's dead, Jim
RE: PalmOS - it's dead, Jim
> time when they are so behind to begin with?
Well...they certainly don't need a "PDA division", right?
Frankly, I don't think they need that "third business" either.
That's a lot of saved bucks!
Build the Device that Makes the Foleo Make Sense
I am a daily PIC reader and long-time Palm user and like most of the people who read PIC, I'm tired of Palm's constant missteps and stupid decisions. The new management must fix the company or sell it to someone who will. The great Palm idea has been made a travesty and their time has nearly run out.
David
Palm III> Palm IIIx> Palm IIIc> Sony T615> Sony T665> Sony TH55
RE: Build the Device that Makes the Foleo Make Sense
RE: Build the Device that Makes the Foleo Make Sense
The Foleo is tantamount to Ford announcing that it has developed the tires for its hydogen cell car.
Stop dreaming and start producing.
David
Palm III> Palm IIIx> Palm IIIc> Sony T615> Sony T665> Sony TH55> Palm TX
Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
- The Elevation deal has finally forced Palm to start doing what it needed to do five years ago. Unfortunately, the years of time-wasting have cost the company some of its brightest talent, while the leeches continued to suck Palm dry. Unfortunately, good codemonkeys don't grow on trees (they just live in them - but unfortunately, not Palm trees). Furthermore, developers that have been abused by Palm's/PalmSource's mangling of PalmOS and the travesty known as Cobalt will be taking a wait-and-see approach to supporting PalmLinux and Palm's new server strategies.
Unfortunately, at this point in time, these job cuts may amount to little more than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. Furthermore, the changing importance of Jeff "BRAINIAC" Hawkins, Ed "Rainman" Colligan and Jon "I invented the iPod. I am God. Allah Akbar!" Rubinstein means plans that Palm may have had as recently as a few months ago will be revised. Rubinstein slashed expenses at Apple in 1997; expect the same at Palm in 2007. Will Hawkins' vision be embraced or abandoned by the "New Palm"? Since Palm is incapable of realistically competing feature for feature with other smartphone manufacturers, while at the same time the company purposely killed off its PDA market, it would appear that the Hawkins' game plan will need to be executed to perfection if Palm has any hope of surviving long-term. The hardware to support this game plan will be easy to produce. The question is whether or not Palm will be able to develop the right software - or else leech off of the efforts of others (e.g. Google, open-source, etc.) and cobble together a cheap, effective solution.
2) Get the software right.
- PalmOS used to be about Speed, Simplicity and Stability. Given what it was asked to do in its later years, PalmOS mutated into an abomination that would have disgusted its former self. As impressive as Handspring's hack of PalmOS was back in 2003, all future products from Palm need to demonstrate the speed, simplicity and stability that Palm had in its glory years. And this time around, it's not good enough to lob an SDK over the fence and hope that developers will do all the hard work fleshing out palms bare-bones framework of applications for the PalmLinux platform.
If Palm is serious about staying alive as a legitimate contender in the smartphone arena, PalmOS 5 will have to finally be put to rest. The million-dollar question is whether or not PalmLinux is ready for primetime as a smartphone OS. If Palm ships another buggy PalmOS device to carriers, it might very well be their last. Some rumors suggest that Sprint et. al. are getting fed up with the numerous glitches that have been seen with Palm's various handsets.
If Palm is serious about creating a new idea for mobile computing ("smartphone as the new PC") then they need to make sure that all the software needed to support such a paradigm shift is in place the moment the hardware is rolled out. That means all the syncing software, and complete suites of online applications + on-device applications need to be ready to go from Day 1. First impressions are lasting...
3) Get the message right. And be consistent.
- Palm's management presumably decided now was not the right time to be telling the public that Palm intends for its platform to become a PC replacement. (It's probably a good idea to not float such radical ideas if you don't yet have the hardware or software to even demonstrate the feasibility of this new type of thinking...) But once Palm gets all the pieces together, they need to be consistent in how they push the new platform. As soon as the PalmLinux devices are released, Palm's message should be that PalmLinux is about a new fully-integrated, always-accessible revolution in data management. The schizophrenic repositioning that we saw with Cobalt ("It's a high-end PDA OS/it's a smartphone OS/it's an everything OS/it's a floor wax also a desert topping!") cannot be repeated. Wait a minute - it's already started. Ooops!
4) Get the hardware right.
- If Palm intends to compete with the likes of Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung, etc. then they need to ship hardware that is as well-designed, well priced, functional, RELIABLE and stylish as the competition. Epecially stylish. Palm's stylists need to be reminded of the lessons learned from the success of the Motorola RAZR and also from analysis of the sales figures of the TRGpro and the HandEra 330 compared to the Palm Vx and Palm m505: Even crappy hardware will sell to the masses if people think it looks "cool". Form BEATS functionality. Every time.
5) Get the partners right.
- Life as the carriers' biotch can be harsh, cruel and short. (Remember Siemens?) But until Palm is ready to go it alone with its new strategy, then they need to play the game as skillfully as possible. Apple has chosen the exact opposite strategy as Palm with respect to partnering with the carriers. It will be interesting to see who chose correctly.
6) Never stop innovating.
- Continuing Palm's history of (barely perceptible) incremental upgrades should now be looked on as a fast way to bankrupt the company. The words "Innovate or DIE" should be tattooed into the forehead of every Palm employee...
7) Don't ignore profitable niches.
- If there's a market for a particular device category and Palm is able to sell devices within that niche profitably, the company would be wise to continue exploiting that niche until it is no longer viable. Palm should be aiming to grow their marketshare by adding BRAND NEW users and drawing old customers voluntarily to new product categories. Killing off old (especially successful) product categories like the traditional PDA market in an effort to force long-term customers to "upgrade" to new product categories (like smartphones) is a recipe for disaster. Resentful long-term customers will simply either continue to buy used hardware (e.g. CLIE TH55, Tungsten T3, etc.) that suits their needs or else will simply switch to Palm's competition and never look back. Either way, Palm loses. How hard would it be to produce a tiny PalmOS MP3 player? An updated (glitch-free) T3? An updated CLIE UX50 clone? Those devices are what we should have seen from Palm rather than the odious LifeDrive, T5, etc.
*************************************************
Will Palm be able to regroup and strike gold with yet another revolutionary product category? Only time will tell. I'm willing to give Jeff Hawkins the benefit of the doubt - anyone capable of coming up with the original PalmPilot and the Treo 600 has earned the right to be cut a little slack. But if Palm hasn't delivered on all this tantalizing potential by December 2007, Dr. TVoR will be pronouncing the company's rotting corpse D E A D. Any attempts at reanimation in 2008 would then only be possible zombie-style...
*************************************************
Copyright 2007
TVoR, Inc.
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
PALM JOB VACANCIES:
http://www.palm.com/us/company/jobs/
Job / Title / Category / Location / Date
Account Manager - Mobile Carrier Sales - France Sales France 06/08/2007
Account Manager Mobile Carrier Sales UK Sales UK 12/19/2006
Channel Marketing Manager-Verizon Wireless (VZW) Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 04/04/2007
Channel Sales Manager - Italy Sales Italy 05/23/2007
CRM Business System Analyst Information Technology 12/21/2006
Developer Technical Services Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 05/21/2007
Director, Marketing Strategy & Planning Manufacturing 03/23/2007 (Quick, someone call Jeff Kirvin!)
Director, Product Line Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 06/04/2007
Director, Strategic Planning Business Development USA - Sunnyvale 04/23/2007
Finance Manager, Engineering Finance USA - Sunnyvale 05/30/2007
IT Business Engagement Manager Information Technology USA - Sunnyvale 04/04/2007
Manager of Federal Sales Sales Washington, D.C. 05/25/2007
Marketing Communications Manager - Developer Relations Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 05/03/2007
ODM Business Manager - Taiwan Operations Taiwan 03/16/2007
Platform Design SW Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 12/22/2006
Product Line Manager/Senior Product Manager - TREO Smartphones Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 04/25/2007
Product Manager/Senior Product Manager - WiFi and Bluetooth Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 07/11/2006
Product Manager - Emerging Markets Products Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 10/05/2006
Product Manager - Location Based Services Product Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 04/23/2007
Product Manager - Windows Mobile TREO Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 01/02/2007
Regional Sales Manager Texas 05/17/2007
Regional Sales Manager - Mid Atlantic Sales Washington, D.C. 05/22/2007
Regional Sales Manager - Mountain Sales USA - West Coast 05/08/2007
Responsable des ventes grand public /Sales Manager for Retail in France (English Speaker) Sales France 10/25/2006
Reverse Logistics Materials Manager USA - Sunnyvale 02/20/2007
Senior Director, Consumer Marketing Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 03/23/2007
Senior Director Business Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 11/16/2006
Senior Industrial Designer Product Marketing USA - Sunnyvale 01/31/2007
Senior Manager, Product Data management Operations USA - Sunnyvale 04/25/2007
Senior Telephony SW Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 02/07/2007
Software Quality Assurance Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 05/16/2007 I don't believe Palm has ever had an employee with this title before...
Software Validation Engineer Engineering 04/02/2007
Sr Test Engineer Operations USA - Sunnyvale 05/17/2007
Sr. Product Quality Engineer Operations USA - Sunnyvale 12/21/2006
Sr. Product Quality Engineer Operations USA - Sunnyvale 12/21/2006
Sr. Technical Account Manager 04/05/2007
Systems Engineer - Sprint East Region Sales USA - East Coast 05/31/2007
Tools Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 04/02/2007
Windows Mobile Applications Software Engineer Engineering USA - Sunnyvale 02/09/2007
*********************************************
TVoR
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
Wow.
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
Too many 4K memos have made you mad!
** Given what it was asked to do in its later years, PalmOS mutated into an abomination that would have disgusted its former self. **
That strikes at the heart of the matter folks. The "palm pilot" was magnetic b/c of it's simple efficiency, stability and ease. Those days are history. Foleo better find them again or its feature v feature with the big boys. That is slow death.
** Oh good grief! You're one of those who, in the face of knock-you-upside-the-head blatant evidence, think Hawkins is God! **
SV,
Everybody around here is clamoring for Hawkins head for the Foleo. Many of them posting with Palm OS on a Treo no less. It will either be a great disaster or a great success. No in between. I like that in itself as compared to a slow death trying to outfeature Samsung, Nokia & Moto in the future smartfone arena. VR, has a good point here concerning 2 of the top tech innovs in the past 50 years. Think about it. I'll give him some space too instead of hoping against hope that Palm will bring in a new gang to revolutionize things. BTW, the new board members surely knew of the Foleo concept months in advance before signing on. Therefore, I assume that they wanted to be a part of the concept going forward.
Respecting some legacy is not the equivalent of thinking Hawkins is the God that even he doesn't believe exists.
Pat Horne
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
http://www.vtbsd.net/
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
Wow.
Gosh, hengeem saw right through me. Drat. I'm "one of those who, in the face of knock-you-upside-the-head blatant evidence, think Hawkins is God!"
U R 2 $maR7 4 m3, h3Ng33m.
Wow.
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
Too many 4K memos have made you mad!
That's not a bug - its a feature!
** Given what it was asked to do in its later years, PalmOS mutated into an abomination that would have disgusted its former self. **
That strikes at the heart of the matter folks. The "palm pilot" was magnetic b/c of it's simple efficiency, stability and ease. Those days are history. Foleo better find them again or its feature v feature with the big boys. That is slow death.
A LOT of Palm's problems stem from Cobalt's failure. Cobalt was supposed to be (in 2003) the next-generation OS that blended the stability of previous versions of PalmOS with the flexibility and scalability mandatory for a next-generation smartphone OS. A lot of the problems we found with devices like the T5 onwards relate to the fact that PalmOS 5 was never expected to have had to handle things like NVRAM and advanced telephony. Had Cobalt shipped in stable condition in 2003, Palm's future would have played out a LOT differently than it did.
No one at Palm is dumb enough to think they have what it takes to duke it out toe to toe, feature for feature versus the likes of Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, etc. Palm has always sold less-than-stellar hardware at premium prices, touting its software usability advantage over competing products in order to justify the pricing. That tactic worked when Palm had little competition and had an OS that was functionally "better" than the competition. Nowadays, PalmOS 5 devices are among the least stable products in their respective niches, so the arguments in favor of paying Palm filet mignon prices for second-rate hamburger quickly fall apart.
Hawkins wisely realized that that the company's future would hinge on their next-generation product offering features that no other company on the planet currently has available. By DEFINING a new niche (again) Palm would (again) have a new market essentially all to itself and with the right marketing could potentially become the de facto standard for next-generation mobile computing. And this time they would need to make sure that they don't sit on their fat, lazy a$$es and throw away their advantage over the competition the way they have done in the traditional PDA and smartphone markets. (Palm's failure to significantly improve the Treo in the past 4 years is beyond ridiculous. The company actually DESERVES to be decimated by the iPhone...) The only problem is that if Palm is unable to deliver the goods, it will be left behind in the dust, since it no longer has legions of doting fans all waiting patiently to purchase each year's latest incremental upgrade.
** Oh good grief! You're one of those who, in the face of knock-you-upside-the-head blatant evidence, think Hawkins is God! **
SV,
Everybody around here is clamoring for Hawkins head for the Foleo. Many of them posting with Palm OS on a Treo no less. It will either be a great disaster or a great success. No in between.
I agree. The FOOLeo concept (not this particular device though) will either revitalize Palm's fortunes or it will end up as abandonware like its i705 and LifeDrive ancestors.
I like that in itself as compared to a slow death trying to outfeature Samsung, Nokia & Moto in the future smartfone arena.
Palm can't afford to compete on a level playing field with the Big Boys. Companies as small as Palm need to compete in their own backyard. With their own ball. With their own rules. And with their mother acting as the referee.
VR, has a good point here concerning 2 of the top tech innovs in the past 50 years. Think about it. I'll give him some space too instead of hoping against hope that Palm will bring in a new gang to revolutionize things.
In the past 10 years, Hawkins has helped to bring to market two of the most noteworthy pieces of consumer-electronics introduced during that time. Assuming Palm's codemonkeys are up to the task, the FOOLeo concept (the idea of wirelessly syncing data between various mobile devices and online apps/databases) has the potential to dwarf both the original PalmPilot and the Handspring Treo 600 in terms of historical significance within the computing world.
BTW, the new board members surely knew of the Foleo concept months in advance before signing on. Therefore, I assume that they wanted to be a part of the concept going forward.
Palm's position in 2007 with regards to the FOOLeo concept seems to be eerily similar to the position that Handspring was in in 2003 with its Treo 600: revolutionary idea in danger of not getting properly released due to the company running out of time/resources just when the pieces are all starting to fall together. History tells us that it was Palm that swallowed the much-smaller Handspring, but if one looks at Palm's current leadership, Palm's product mix, and what models are generating the bulk of Palm's revenues, it becomes obvious that in fact it was Handspring that devoured Palm (and no doubt got a severe case of indigestion doing so). Companies don't invest hundreds of millions of dollars without doing due diligence (unless the company's name is Access), so Bono's Boys (Elevation) MUST be "down with" Hawkins' vision. There simply wouldn't be time for Palm to change its focus/plans at this stage of the game and have a snowball's chance in He11 of surviving longterm. In typical Palm shell game-style financial manipulations, Palm's potential new part-owners figured out how to acquire 25% of the company for price that should only have netted them around 16% of the company, PLUS they were able to force Palm to blow out most of its cash reserves (and thereby decrease the company's net worth) by paying off shareholders. It's too bad that Palm didn't think about spending a measly $20 million or so out of its half billion-dollar cash reserve on including better specs for its devices (e.g. more memory, better speakers, better microphones, etc.) and licensing a few best-of-breed applications like ChatterEmail (finally purchased by Palm recently), TealLock, Resco Backup, HandyShopper, DiddleBug, Directory Assistant, Resco Viewer, Butler, AeroPlayer, YAUC, Graffiti Anywhere, VideoHound, DateBk6, Uninstall Manager, TreoAreaCodes, Resco Explorer, Weatherman, Vexed, etc. for inclusion within every Treo. EVERY Treo should be shipping STUFFED full of the best STABLE PalmOS apps in order to show users what the platform is capable of.
Respecting some legacy is not the equivalent of thinking Hawkins is the God that even he doesn't believe exists.
Pat Horne
Indeed. But if Hawkins can't put all the pieces together by launch time and instead tries to push the FOOLeo as-is, then he deserves to be BLASTED for having the temerity to try and BS the Palm Faithful with a half-baked concept. For now I'll continue to stand by my assertion that Hawkins is attempting to REVOLUTIONIZE mobile computing and that the FOOLeo is just the tip of the iceberg. In the unlikely event that I'm wrong about what he has planned, I'll be first in line to rip Hawkins a new one.
TVoR's predictions about Palm's plans were posted earlier in another thread, but bear repeating:
http://www.palminfocenter.com/comments/9453/#133606
TVoR's Paradigm Shift: Web-Accessible, Smartphone-Centric Applications [The "WASCA Manifesto"]
Okay, so we've now all had time to digest Palm's recent embarrassing announcement of the FOOLeo®. We've heard Jeff Hawkins fumble around trying to explain its raison d'ętre. We've heard the Palm Apologists struggle to avoid admitting that the FOOLeo is something other than a complete disaster for Palm.
Hawkins claims that the FOOLeo is being positioned as a Treo companion, a veritable physical expander of the Treo's tiny screen and keyboard. The Treo remains the "brains" of the operation, while the FOOLeo acts as a portable equivalent of a laptop's docking station, complete with keyboard and bigger screen. The argument for such a setup is that everyone always carries around a cell phone, and as cell phones get smarter and acquire larger on-device storage, eventually these phones have the potential to become our primary computing devices. The only limitation in that case becomes the physical size of the cellphone, which both limits ease the entering data (via keyboard) and also makes it difficult to view the data due to small screen size. As long as the goal for the ideal cellphone remains for it to be as small as possible, cellphone design will always be at cross purposes with ideal methods of entering and viewing data. In the future, voice transcription software, holographic projection displays, screens projected onto eyeglasses etc. may be able to obviate the need for physically larger keyboards and screens, but this type of technology is still several years away. So what do users do now?
[Cue triumphant music] ENTER THE FOOLeo...
But wait a minute! Why would anyone in their right mind want to carry around another 2 1/2 pound device that can't even run regular Windows applications? Especially when dozens of lighter devices that do run Real Windows® are available? Isn't the whole point of convergence devices to avoid carrying extra hardware? If the Treo and other smartphones are supposed to become the personal computers of the future, surely there must be a better solution to the problems of entering data into and viewing data from tiny smartphone devices. Of course there's a better solution, but unfortunately, it's a rather revolutionary paradigm shift. And one other thing: Since it doesn't really require any new hardware, it won't exactly be a big moneymaker for Palm unless it becomes popular and manages to boost Treo sales. Let's just call it "Palm's Dirty Little Secret". The answer is...
Web-Accessible, Smartphone-Centric Applications [The "WASCA Manifesto"] featuring wireless (+/- wired) syncing to smartphones!
This is the first REAL paradigm shift we've seen since the dawn of the "PC Era", but it appears that Palm is too afraid/incompetent/slow to embrace it fully. How far to take this new way of thinking depends on whether a given company makes a lot of money selling desktops/laptops and/or software for desktops/laptops. If the company (e.g. Palm) has no vested interest in desktop/laptops and the software that runs on them, then the smart phone can be completely freed to become the new PC. Purely Web-based applications (available through any Internet-connected dumb terminal/desktop/laptop) would then allow users to have access to personal files with the added bonus of larger screens and keyboards whenever necessary. Taken to the extreme, users would be able to have real-time syncing (through broadband connections) to their smartphone of data being entered into these Web-based applications. A simpler solution would involve entering data into Web-based applications which would then be backed up (either over the air, via WiFi, via Bluetooth or via wired connection) to the smartphone with a user-initiated sync. With online storage available (at a price) for the data generated with Web-based applications, this syncing could occur at the users whim.
Companies selling desktops/laptops and/or software for desktops/laptops would obviously prefer for users to sync data to their more full-featured applications residing on desktops/laptops, while leaving the Web-based applications for more simplistic data entry and viewing.
So where does this leave the FOOLeo? Nowhere. Palm's problem is that it currently lacks the software needed to have PIM, word processing, accounting, database, presentation, music, video and other data syncing with their Treos. A project of this scope would require flawless integration of a complete suite of Web-based applications with counterparts on the Treo. It seems highly unlikely that PalmOS 5 would-be robust enough to handle this type of mobile application. Can you say PalmLinux? I knew you could.
The FOOLeo is simply a beta test mule (donkey?) for the whole concept of a smartphone syncing with a larger device wirelessly. Its (simplistic) email syncing merely amounts to an early proof of concept. Baby steps. For Palm to REALLY succeed, they need to cut out the need for proprietary HARDWARE like the FOOLeo by figuring out how to get the Web-based syncing running smoothly.
Two problems:
1) Palm's code monkey talent is too limited to get this all up and running with the bugs worked out anytime soon.
2) Microsoft (and soon Apple) already have suites of functional desktop applications as well as smartphone applications that could be used to create a competing system fairly quickly. I doubt that Palm will be able to execute quickly enough to have a chance in this impending David versus Goliath death match.
Treo = The new PC. Brilliant. Simply, Palm.
I truly hope Palm is able to pull this off.
TVoR
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
JLM.
RE: Palm's roadmap to success. 7 Golden Rules:
JLM.
I love you too. Biotch.
Why don't you tell everyone where you work, Missy?
TVoR
Who Cares
Palm has sucked for a long time....I love the lists generated in this thread... what do we keep those in a file and insert everytime we feel the need to remind palm what they need to do or should be doing. lol... whatever....
We are all witness... and like labroom, palm is not ready yet... linux holds promise, but so that other palm os that never made it....
Vote for John Kerry... best man for the job.
RE: Who Cares
> care if Palm went out of business today...
That, in a nutshell, IS Palm's problem.
The CEO recently said (a-GAIN) something like:
== Once a customer is ours, he's ours...like...forever!
which is simply SO wrong it boggles the mind. When I heard that comment (at an analyst conference or something - I forget - but fairly recently) I simply couldn't believe he said it. It was AS bad as Palm apparently being blindsided by the Motorola Q - management that was just totally out of it w.r.t. The World.
And then, of course, came the Fooleo. A-MAZ-ing...
TreoCentral, aka TreoFanBoyCentral, if nothing else presents the FanBoy view of The World. We know already that PALM reads those forums. Is there a problem with their reading comprehension, though?
RE: Who Cares
The day some fool at Palm decide to abandon the Tungsten, Zire, LifeDrive lines and focus solely on Treos, and worse, WM, that is when they jumped the shark.
This is all very simple to me. With the world population skyrocketing into the billions, with world trade, with increasing wealth worldwide (more people can afford pocket computers), the future is clearly with market segmentation/specialization; in other words, Palm needs to sell multiple different lines of mobile computing devices AND STICK WITH THEM in order to perfect them. When Palm thinks the Zire sales are too low, keep plowing away like a tank and keep perfecting the software and hardware for that particular line of consumers.
What Palm did in the past was get off on some awesome innovative designs, like the T3 and Zire 72 then they abandon them within a couple of years; or sidegrade them OR WORSE start stripping out stuff e.g., mics, leds, vib alarms, etc. This 1 trick Pony Treo cell phone obsession is a bad approach in the long term. And WM adoption is just plain retarded. Palm is Palm. So sell Palm OS devices. Period. There is tons of work to be done in the Palm OS field, so there is no point in spreading themselves thin. They can't have their cake and eat it too. If Palm is worried about the future of Palm OS, then they should just give up now and go all WM and be done with it. If you don't believe in your product and are not prepared to invest your heart and soul into it (like Steve Jobs) then just be another WM clone and be done with it.
RE: Who Cares
The old philosophy of relying on 3rd party developers for the core functionality is no longer a good one.
Palm should release Palm OS 7 on a Linux (or any other) kernel and get back to work in a very serious and dedicated way to PIM and multimedia development. Palm OS is great but I can see plenty of improvements for it.
Too bad Palm would not buy Cobalt and release it. The Os 6 emulator has been out forever and it seems very good. Anyways, whatever. I know very well that even something as simple as that is way too complicated for Palm to understand. They have a modern new OS right in their face and they don't want it, go figure. Oh wait... Linux is supposed to bring faster driver and reduce time to market.... RIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT.... it has been how many Fn years we've been waiting for decent upgrades? jeez.
RE: Who Cares
Palm should consider selling some lower volume models solely on palm.com if they feel it cannot warrant shelf space in brick and mortar stores.
RE: Who Cares
1. There's a reason that Cobalt was stillborn.
2. PDAs are a waste of Palm's limited time and resources.
now stop being silly.
RE: Who Cares
RE: Who Cares
now stop being silly.
As opposed to what, the Foolio?
Sure am tired of people telling me I don't want a PDA.
PDA's Past and Present:
Palm - IIIxe, Vx, M500, M505, Tungsten T, TX
Handspring - Edge, Platinum, Deluxe
Sony - SJ22
Apple - MP110, MP2000, MP2100
RE: The fun continues?
== "...I was interested to know what the powers that be at Palm had
== to say about the 9-8-07 NY Times trashing mention below. I had not
== written Product Manager Steve Sinclair since the Sprint 700p MR was
== released. So I decided to send him an email and see what he thought
== about the article. I received the following automated email reply:
==
== "As of August 3rd, I am no longer employed by Palm. Please remove
== steve.sinclair@palm.com from your address book..."
-- http://discussion.treocentral.com/showpost.php?p=1151605&postcount=1
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Doubt this will help product support