Comments on: Palm Computing and the Promise of Real Convergence

I felt like I was reading a promo for "Paranoia". I'm left wondering what the actual intent of the article was supposed to be: telling me how a game works, trying to muster support for yet another 'standard', a pitch for a game show, all of the above. (Now I have the urge to day:"D, and that's my final answer...")

I do like the idea of a FREE wireless communications device for my Palm IIIc.

Forget AIM, ICQ has had a version out for the Palm for a while now.

I am compelled to give some more information in regard to my article about "convergence."

Between 1980-1986, I was touting BBSes (Bulletin-Board Systems) as the wave of the future. No one would listen. CompuServe was the prominent provider of online services back then and no one wanted to know about individuals who used their home computers as online systems. Some ten years after my struggle, lo, everyone was suddenly talking about this thing called the "Internet." Which, as it has since evolved, is truly nothing more than BBSes writ large.

What no one wanted to hear back in the eighties was that it would *individuals* and not sprawling conglomerates such as Time Inc. (now Time Warner), Times-Mirror, and Gannett and their like that would drive online communications. It would be individuals who have a passion and wish to communicate with others who also share that passion. Where do *you* go for information about your interests today? Do you http: over to a corporate site such as Palm Computing -- or to Palm Infocenter and other such non-corporate sites? And if Palm Computing tried to do a site like Palm Infocenter, would you trust it to be honest or disinterested? Former subscribers of AOL will tell you of their mistreatment and banishment at the hands of that corporation (see articles at news.com and at probably many other websites from AOL victims) -- and I doubt that an entity such as Palm would do much better at letting users have their freedom.

What I see as the missed point of my "convergence" article is something that bothers two distinct camps: TV game show afficionados can't see the relevance to their current games, and PalmOS users can't see the point of getting excited over TV game shows. This is my "BBSes are the future!" rallying cry of some fifteen years back. Back then, computer companies had no interest in online services (Commodore Computers was a notable exception, and even Atari, for a time -- although too late -- began to show interest), and online services showed very little interest in harnessing the power of their users (just how myopic were they? A marketing manager at CompuServe pleaded with them not to waste time with their CB Simulator -- a forerunner of today's *globally*-popular ICQ and AOL's Instant Messenger and Chat Rooms!). Computer companies = TV game show fans. Online services = current PDA users.

And yet it took a game show -- "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" -- to shatter the long-held Top Ten List of the Nielsen ratings. I'm shocked myself. I am not a "game show fan" -- I don't care for much of what is on TV at all, be it drama or comedy -- but it is the promise of that million dollars for just fifteen questions answered that delivers a kind of excitement I would never find in say, a $10,000 win on "Wheel of Fortune" or -- to get even less exciting -- "Jeopardy." I came late to "Millionaire." I didn't even know it was on until I happened to come across John Carpenter winning his million (the first million won in the show's global history at that time!).

Palm Computing offers an ease of use that even, yes, a Macintosh cannot deliver. You have to be virtually a complete and utter moron not to be able to use a PalmOS device. And yet, compared to our national population, penetration of Palms have not reached the level of even difficult-to-use PCs (and, yes, even Macs!). What is it that would compel people to *want* to have a Palm? What I point to in the article: the possibility of getting something *from* it. There are those who have already speculated on PDAs of different varieties being so cheap a few years from now that they'll be given away for free. Why wait until then? Palms exist now, OmniSky exists now, the Palm VII wireless network exists now -- why wait for Bill Gates to get WinCE out front first? I concentrated on "Paranoia" because it is the first -- and only -- *national live game show ever*. This is not insignificant. Just recently we had a movie called "The Truman Show." Well, in a few short months, some of you might be tuning into upcoming TV programs such as "Survivor" and "Big Brother," which are "The Truman Show" in reduced form. Fiction turns into fact pretty fast these days.

A good reality check would be to take a quick poll of the tens of millions of people lining up in several states this weekend for a chance at the three hundred million dollar-plus jackpot of "The Big Game" lottery. Find out how many of them are carrying Palms (or *any* PDA). Then ask how many of them would rather be sitting *at home* -- or sitting *anywhere else*, for that matter -- and be able to enter the lottery *wirelessly* via a PalmOS device. My bet is that given the choice, they'd rather skip the lines. That's a huge untapped market for Palm (and any PDA maker) and they're the ones who will supply the missing critical mass for "convergence," not the ongoing failed schemes of the shiny and over-groomed corporateers. mc

If Palm doesn't do it, perhaps we will be using devices from *Nintendo* or *Sony* -- two behemoths in the current world of video games (and each of which have penetrations into the national population that exceed PalmOS devices!). Perhaps this is an underlying reason for Sony licensing the Symbian EPOC OS, even though they had already publicly gone with Palm's OS. The PalmOS is not very robust for gaming -- especially when compared to EPOC. EPOC also has a huge edge in that plenty of cellphone companies have a say in it, which gives them a vested interest in the idea of such wireless "convergence." Perhaps, very unfortunately, we'll wind up using devices from the Japanese with an OS from the Europeans -- while we Americans are once again cast in the global role of jesters (viz, Hollywood)! (And even there we won't be certain of our lead -- "Millionaire," "Survivor" and "Big Brother" are all based on British/European originals! -- as is the upcoming Comedy Central game, "Don't Forget Your Toothbrush".) mc

Tuesday, May 9, 2000, at about 8:45AM, I was channel hopping on CATV and came across an extraordinary CNN report.

When I said in my Addendum, "Fiction turns into fact pretty fast these days," I didn't expect it to be *this* fast.

A site at http://www.goldpocket.com" CLASS=NEWS>http://www.goldpocket.com is going to -- what is the term? netcast? -- offer a *live* global trivia game in which Net players can win $1,000,000. I will spare everyone the details of how this will work; just click on their link to see their site. All I will say is that this is just one step away from the points I was trying to bring across in my piece. mc