Comments on: palmOne Creates New Mac Resource Center

elo

Yeah, people who use Macs for business are an *even smaller* percentage of the market, meaning PalmSOURCE would have even less concern about dropping support.

PalmOne, however, never ended official support of the Mac platform with their company. Unlike you they seem to realize, however, that the vast majority of the Mac market is what most would call "enthusiasts", as serious business use of Macs is pretty rare unless you are in publication or graphic arts. And even those who do use them for business would find the features they are highlighting useful.

And what's wrong with being enthusiastic about the tools you use for work? Seems to me it would make one like their job even more.

The point is, I think you're reading way too much into the word "enthusiast", and not seeing enough of the positive aspects of this. I don't want to invalidate your feelings or anything, but it seems a bit ridiculous to get all worked up over the use of a fairly innocuous choice of wording.

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Sean

Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.

At this time I think it would be silly for Palmone to give up mac support. Anywhere you turn nowdays it seems that you find another person who left the world of windows and joined the Mac community.

Personally, I blame the iPod I know that's what got me to switch.

If I will have to use Markspace's Missing Sync with a Palm, I might as well buy a PPC with WiFi and BT for less than $250.

BTW, the onus is not on me to know which Palm company dropped the ball and announced no Mac support for OS6. The point is that it did not even have to be mentioned, specially the way it was handled.

Cheers,

It doesn't really make any difference because they
are both hotel companies???

While I agree with the sentiment, the reality isn't that clear. First off, remember that Holiday Inn only very recently split into two separate companies, "Holiday Inn properties" and "Holiday Inn Designs". The latter retains responsibility for the architectural design of hotels based on the traditional Holiday Inn brand; while the former is responsible for actually building and managing the hotels.

Furthermore, Holiday Inn Designs widely and prominently decreed that it would no longer consider the needs of children in their future architectural designs, and this quite reasonably upset many familes with children.

It was only much later, and far more quietly, that Holiday Inn Properties subtly let it be known to insiders that despite this, it would continue to modify Holiday Inn Designs architectural drawings before building them in whatever ways might be necessary to continue to support the needs of children. Now, a month or two later, Holiday Inn Properties fairly widely splashes an announcement of a new web site dedicated to the concerns and needs of families travelling with children, where it states clearly that it still considers children important.

Sure, anyone who was closely following the details of the split would know that Holiday Inn Designs doesn't build or manage hotels and that their dismissal of children didn't NECESSARILY mean anything for travellers, who never stay at Holiday Inn Designs hotels anyway. And those same determined people already know that Holiday Inn Properties has said they'll support children anyway (though they have yet to say exactly HOW or to what extent).

But is it really reasonable to expect all casual travellers to understand the distinctions... or to care?

Probably not. ;-)

Cheers,

I switched to Pocket PC with the Palmuptrade program. I now have a handheld that actually syncs to the Address Book with support for both Work and Home fields, as well as categories on iCal. I have a device that runs BT and supports WiFi through a CF card.

I haven't sold my T3 yet, but although there are some problems with running a Pocket PC (most software companies still do not recommend a PPC if you have are on a Mac), the time is coming close to put it on eBay. Just having a new website for us "enthusiasts" doesn't inspire much confidence.

But everyone who talks Mac seems to think that it should have exactly the same support as Windows. That would imply that the same number of resources should be allocated to produce it. Not a wise payoff half of your resources dedicated for something that represents a third (or less) of your business.

Not to mention that there is a big difference between palmOne and Palmsource. And, most of you don't seem to be paying any attention to that fact that these are two SEPARATE companies.

I would hazard a guess that better support for Macs might come from a third party product that is bundled in a palmOne offering. Look at the number of people who use something other than the boxed product to sync with Windows!

Mike

"Hey, darling, I'm tired and looks like the children too. Look at that Holiday Inn, let's go there and have some sleep. Oops, wait a moment... didn't they say something like 'we don't like children' or something like that? Well, nevermind, there's a Best Western right here and Mike said it was OK."

Huh?

Do you mean our Examplenson family had a terrible night because they didn't go into Holiday Inn?

Do you mean anyone here apart from Holiday Inn suffered a loss?

Do you mean Holiday Inn is not guilty of letting potential customers go away because of a misconception about them?

Do you mean Best Western didn't win customers just by not scaring them?

(Just in case: I don't know either Holiday Inn nor Best Western - I'm supposing they both are similar)

Isn't it reasonable to check out the basics on likely hotels along your vacation route BEFORE leaving the driveway? Yes, it is.

Yes, indeed it is.
But does that mean that companies should not worry about publicity because customers should study them anyway?

Why do I enjoy my vacations? Because I did the basics of research and planning before the vacation began, meaning I have no need to worry about most things for the duration of the trip, including which hotel I'll be staying at (I made reservations), or what their policies are (I checked that out before making reservations).

As we saw, the Exampleson Family were indeed aware of *something* that Holiday Inn had "against children". This could have happened just the same while they were planning their trip at home: "we'll stop at this Holiday Inn - no, wait a moment, remember that thing about children - never mind, in front of it there's a Best Western and Mike said it was OK".
Since Best Western looked like another equally good choice, they just tried it. Would you say that this was irrational behaviour?

And would you say that this kind of behaviour is uncommon?

I go shopping for a keyboard. I want it for my Mac. I find 2 equally good. One of them sports a prominent sticker saying "comes with OS X support"; the other one doesn't. Both are USB. I know that other USB keyboards, even the ones "designed for Windows", will work on a USB mac; I know even of third party drivers, and open source drivers, and could even hack the drivers shipped with OS X. But what should I choose?
Buying the one with OS X support means that I'm supporting the manufacturer that is supporting me. It also means that surely I'll have less problems. And finally it means that if it doesn't work with my Mac, I can send back the keyboard to the shop and ask for a refund; no more problems.
If I got the "designed for Windows" one and at the end of the day (after all the efforts) it didn't work 100%, who could I blame? "Hey, didn't you see that this keyboard is 'designed for Windows'? No OS X mention! Why should it work?" (yes, it's stupid, but we know this happens)

And, finally: let's suppose I'm gonna buy a PDA right now, and I don't know wheter a PPC or a Palm would be better for my mac. PalmSource says "no support for you", PalmOne says "don't worry, we'll do something somehow sometime soon", Palm fans say "PalmOne never dropped Mac support - stop whining, you'll have support, you are not 'second class c...ustomers'". So what happens if I buy a PalmOS PDA and the Mac support never arrives, or is as crappy as is right now? Will Palm fans refund me?

I don't think they will, and I think PalmSource needs some punishment for that Mac-dropping episode, and PalmOne needs to get its act together (have you seen this Mac Resource Center? Sheesh!), and PPCs seem an equal choice since Mac support is also provided by (the same) third parties. So...

Let's take this line of questioning a step further... Second class citizens of what? Neither PalmOne nor PalmSource are a country, republic, city, etc.

Perhaps you are disappointed with PalmSource's decision regarding the Mac platform (I know I am), but realistically, you haven't been wronged in any way, your civil rights have not been violated, and nobody has stolen your firstborn or thrown into prison for your dissenting choice of computer Operating System. In the parts of the world where people truly are treated as second class citizens, such things happen routinely (insert dissenting voice/opinions in place of dissenting OS above).

Let's make the factual part of this very clear.... IT'S A COMPUTER, NOT YOUR LIFE. Put it into perspective and get a grip!

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Sean

Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.

Actually, that IS the point. I wouldn't call Mac or PC users ANY kind of citizens based on their choice of computer.

You however, are finally saying outright what you have proposed all along: "forget that 'no countries, republics, cities'BS...". What that translates into is this: "Forget facts, reality, truth, or anything else I don't want to acknowledge and agree with my fanasy point of view".

Sorry, but you won't find many who are eager to embrace that proposition, even today.

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Sean

Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.

I'll (try to) make you happy and repeat my post, cutting away the offending part and leaving in the important one:

Let's get specific. Imagine we go to some shop where somebody is about to buy a PalmOne device.
Customer: "So what can I do with this?"
Clerk: "Lots of things! Well, erm, which kind of computer do you use?"
Customer: "A mac, why?"
Clerk: "Oh, ah, OK... well, then there are some, erm,
minor issues, but don't worry..."

(see? the taboo word didn't even appear. Now, let's get to the point again: would you please explain how Mac users are "first class" c... er... customers?)

I guess we can take anything and give it a bad spin if we try hard enough.