Monday, January 12, 2009

Newness



The CES ball this year featured Palm as a true Cinderella of our time, and Palm Pre as the perfectly fitting lost shoe. The analogy will work if we look at WebOS as the prince. And we'll see just what it will take to make them live happily ever after.

It is hard not to have a take at Palm's presentation at CES this year, because it seems that they nailed it. Let's not talk about what a challenge this was and how much hard work was put into this, because once-a-leader ended in a "live or die" situation. It seems they took all the pressure and used it to create additional creative energy glowing at its best. You can see the results at http://palmone.r3h.net/downloads.palm.com/ces.mov

Being a long time developers for PalmOS, it was really "reassuring" to get this kind of news and to see Palm Pre as an equal competitor in the smartphones market today.

There are many questions around the Pre and even more around WebOS. But we bet or at least hope that Palm will find the best way to answer the demands of dev world. On more than one occasion, they mentioned developers at the presentation saying that just anyone who knows HTML, CSS and JS will be able to develop for the new OS. The remaining question is if the PalmOS apps will be able to run on the new OS.

Another relevant info for dev people was that they will have some kind of on-device app store, and the rumor has it that it might have some restrictions regarding apps submission.

The community objects (still a rumor) $399 price and the fact that it will be available on Sprint only. The math of "one device on one carrier" seems not to be a winner one as the analysts point out Palm needs volume in order to follow this great comeback moment and live up to it.

But in the end, isn't it the spirit of newness and a step forward in smartphones market something we needed? If it is, then Palm delivered. Details yet to be seen and discussed.

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