Research Reports PDA Penetration only 7% in USA

I agree! ALL companies that sell PDA have done a TERRIBLE job of advertising their products and what they can do for people. Without exception, everyone person I know uses some form of a date book, address book, and a memo or note pad. When I come into contact with people and I need to retrieve info from my Zodiac 2, they are amazed that this little 'gizmo' will do all of the basic things they need, and 10,000 other things they never dreamed of. I am partial to Palm OS products, so the now 5 people I've convinced they need a PDA have chosen a Palm OS product, are always asking me 'Hey, did you know it does this or that?'. THIS IS THE JOB OF THE MANUFACTURERS!!!!

Oh well, I guess they let us sell their products 'by word of mouth', and call it a day.

"Saving the world, one Palm user at a time"

All good things...

Bugger Word of Mouth.

I hate being someone's Help Line!

While many people are amazed at how I can use a Palm to do 70% of my computing, it does NOT follow that an average consumer can, or wants to, use that versatility themself.

I gave a friend of mine a Zire for Christmas (yep, the original Zire) and she loves it. She has a masters degree and is a busy person, but she also does not enjoy or have any interest in computing. For her, gadgets are a bore.

But she has found that because she could learn the basic functions so quickly, she actually uses the Zire every day. However, there is no way she could (or wants to) learn how to do word processing, web browsing, wireless etc.

Market share will only take off when ORDINARY consumers (not the evangelists who read this site) can see good reason to change their personal habits and CARRY a computer with them. Hawkins was right - it's about people, not the computer.

Vx->m500->m505->m515->TT->T2->T3/TC

iJITSU is right. It's almost too late in the game for the PDA market to start touting how cool their stuff is, because the cell phone market has already given a lot of this to folks and it has a bigger foothold. *Everybody* HAS to have a cell phone in the '2000s!

Every yahoo has PIM capabilities on their cell phones which will evolve to rival PDAs (some already do). Then, while the target users will finally be capable of using these utilities, they sure won't need them in a standalone PDA anymore.

My SO has a crappy large old Nokia phone, but the alarms, calculator, and phone list are all he cares about where PIMs are concerned. And he already has them right there. Plus some lame games.

I often show interested people in the grocery store my shopping apps, or my checkbook app, and tell them the list of things my PDA can do. They seem intrigued, but none of them thinks they 'have the time' to use a PDA. If only they knew of the time they'd save! But in reality, they'd need someone else to set up their apps in order to gain that saved time, because they just wouldn't do it on their own.

I disagree with most of you. I think there's plenty of room for the lowend Zire's for the general public. The public is shown that they are willing to carry increasing numbers of electronics on their person, such as cell phones and cameras. I think most people understand what a PDA can do in theory, but what they need is the simplest, easiest to use PDA they can find. Most people don't want to install new apps on their PDA's or even hotsync them. They just what something that they can turn on, and immediately it's useful. That's why the Zire's are such great sellers.

I don't think smartphones will ever catch on strongly, either. People want small phones with only a couple bells and whistles. Most people I know go through a few phones a year. These things are in conflict with what a good PDA should be. The features of a PDA and a phone simply just don't overlap that much. Most of the people I know who actually use their phones as PDA's own the more "PDA with a phone in it" kind of devices, like the Kyocera's and stuff.

Peace Out
Alan