Comments on: Palm Celebrates 10-year Anniversary of the Pilot

Ten years ago, Palm, captured the imagination of road warriors everywhere with the first Pilot connected organizer, a mighty 5.7-ounce combination of calendar, contacts, to-do lists and notes. Today, having shipped more than 34 million mobile-computing products, the company continues to improve the lives of people and businesses the world over, staying true to one guiding vision: The future of personal computing is mobile computing.
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Open to debate

kfife @ 3/28/2006 10:53:07 AM # Q
>>Something often called the Palm experience. As time went on, Palm stayed true to its design philosophy while continuing to innovate, adding numerous new functions

I am a power user and ardent fan of the Palm OS, but I think that the "Palm experience" was lost long ago.

It started with the Tungsten T, that had a completely useless, slider mechanism that doubtless had "WOW" effect and increased sales at the retailer, but it did so at the expense of usability.

Next nail in the coffin was Graffiti 2. Improvement My A$$. Palm didn't want to pay royalties to Xerox. Period. Otherwise they would have made graffiti 2 characters an extension of the existing graffiti, or allowed the user to toggle. Unless you're a hacker and know how to downgrade your graffiti (like I have) you're stuck having to do maddening things like wait a moment after finishing a word ending in "L" so before you draw a space so that your "L" doesn't become a "T". I’m still stunned at the disregard for their installed base. G2 is not better. It’s worse by far, albeit royalty free.

On to the Tungsten T3! Why can't I adjust the screen brightness by holding down the power button like before? why is it no longer an option to adjust it with a pen stroke. NOW it's VERY COUNTERINTUITIVELY underneath the CLOCK in the taskbar. You can't even find it in the "Preferences" applet where EVERYTHING is controlled. What sense does that make??

On to the Palm Desktop and HotSync. TWICE NOW, I've lost EVERYTING in my palm (had to resort to days-old tape backup) because during an initial HotSync, the software ignored my command, for "DESKTOP OVERWRITES HANDHELD" instead assuming that I wanted the NEWER VERSION OF "EMPTY PALM" instead of OLD VERSION OF EVERYTHING. (This is reproducible by the way). What kind of PIM doesn't protect its user's data first and foremost?? What kind of company would be so out of touch that they could allow this to happen? I had a backup. Do you? Does your dear mother?

I believe palm is quickly losing what makes them valuable. I have only a very faint glimmer of hope that they'll resurrect the spirit of palm it in their new Linux based OS. But my fear is that it will remain as vaporware until dies just like Cobalt.


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10 years old?

EdH @ 3/29/2006 6:59:28 AM # Q
Wow. It sure has aged gracefully. Doesn't look a day over 1 year old. It is like the Dick Clark of operating systems. Looks the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.

RE: 10 years old?
Simony @ 3/29/2006 7:57:16 PM # Q
Well, Mr Hansberry, for a WM cheerleader, you certainly seem to have a lot to say about Palm, such as to following dross:

http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/index.php?action=expand,47470

Why the obsession with a tiny little company like Palm, I wonder? After all, they are doomed to extinction (as you have been predicting for 5 or 6 years now).

Wouldn't it be funny if it happened that your masters at Redmond needed the support of this pathetic little company (as you call them)?

Oh wait, wasn't that Mr Gates himself at that press conference with the Palm and Verizon reps a few weeks ago? And with HP (the biggest WinCE licensee/victim) indicating that it's losing interest in handheld computers, could it be that the mighty M$ might needs the support of that hapless bunch of losers (as you call them) over at Palm?

RE: 10 years old?
EdH @ 3/29/2006 10:29:21 PM # Q
I have been and continue to predict the extinction of PalmOS. Over 80% share in 2000, and what, down around 30% now? Trending like a ski slope.

I have never slammed the hardware side of the company in general. Maybe a particular device (the Lifedrive is laughable) but I think at one time or another, I have slammed just about every Windows Mobile OEM for a boneheaded device release.

But no, Redmond doesn't need Palm, Inc, but I am sure they are making a great OEM partner, and the 700w is a killer device. I would seriously consider getting one if there was a GSM version and I didn't already have another killer device, the K-Jam.

RE: 10 years old?
Simony @ 3/30/2006 12:31:31 AM # Q
> and the 700w is a killer device.

Many of the reviewers thought it did not compare favourably against the old 650. Amazing that an 18 month old unit, which runs a hopelessly deficient and obsolette operating system (as you call it) can compare so well against your 'killer device'.

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