Palm Who?

Posted by Nick

 
 

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Last week, Palm was purchased by HP for 1.2 billion <raises pinky finger to corner of mouth> dollars. This, to those who don't care to spend their days toiling over the tasty stew that is the technology world, may not grasp the epic nature of this news. Palm's story could put soap operas to shame... it's been split up, got back together, cheated, been cheated on, and now been snatched up by one of it's first flings, HP. See, in '92, Palm's first attempt at a hand held computing device failed miserably. But to stay afloat, they licensed off two little pieces of technology; Graffiti to Apple's first "iPhone", the Newton, and their solid syncing software to, non-other, than HP.

This early connection ("connection" & "sync"...hah) to HP, I find to be quite ironic. Additionally, the connection to Apple is also interesting. See, after Palm released it's only hope, WebOS (not OB1) Apple had every right to sue the frack'n pants off Palm. WebOS rips off (lovingly so, I'm sure), SO many interface design elements that we all currently take for granted. Like, you know how on your iPhone (I know you have one...) when you scroll to the bottom of a page (web, settings, whatev) you can sort of pull the page past where it stops scrolling? Then when you let go it springs back into place, as if attached to the bottom of the screen with a small rubber band? Yeah, that feels nice, do it again...and again, yeah...spring!...

Now, WebOS does this and many other patented interaction tidbits that Apple currently owns. And, to this day, there has never been any nasty legal leters to Palm. That's cause Palm has been doing this a lot longer than Apple and if they so felt, could counter sue those frak'n pants right back. With HP's purchase, they're not only getting one of (if not) the best mobile operating system (which really needs more apps!), they're getting an awesome legal defense from the most terrified, paranoid, fruit themed, sue happy tech companies out there. Also to note, Palms current CEO, yeah he's a dude who worked at apple to make the first iPhone...crazy I know!

After the acquisition news was announced, I was in a fury. A fury to document Palm's history, and what better way to do so, than to avoid all of my touch screen, hand held OSs, than to write it down on paper, take a picture and put it on the internet? (click to enlarge, naturally)

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Palm, in it's 18 year existence, it has been purchased, purchased again a year later, deserted by founders, spun off, spun off again, merged, purchased, and finally(?) purchased again. It's absolutely incredible the name Palm still exists as a company who makes hand held electronics.

I have high hopes for Palm's future. I've owned quite a few iterations of their impressive linage and I look forward to buying my iPad killing, on HP/Voodoo hardware, running WebOS, Slate of electronic awesome.

But until then, I'll have to make due with my soon to be, Evo 4G. ;)

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Under Construction - iPhone OS

Posted by Nick

 
 

As I type this, Gizmodo's live coverage of the iPhone OS 4.0 is getting started. I'm exceedingly interested in the new features, updated interface design, and how this new OS will affect the design, reputation, and perception of any other mobile device that is released after it. Another question that (might) be answered is how will this OS better integrate with the iPad hardware. I've seen some remarkable new apps (or updates of existing apps) that do a fantastic job of using the tablets larger resolution/size, but the base OS is more akin to Farley's "Fat guy in a little coat" than a proper implementation of a mobile OS on a 10" screen. Just look at the home screen for chirst sake...

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all that unused space. Even if you fill it up with uncategorized icons, it's still inefficient. Good design always needs white space, but this is just a waste of valuable pixels. The mockup below, shows how the space can be used more efficiently while still maintaining breathing room for all the elements. It's got some great data feeds that don't require you to open an app to get a glance at what's going on in your always connected life.

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It's not perfect, but at least it's the right direction. As it stands, OS 3 is sorely behind it's competitors. Not that Apple has ever aimed to be the most feature laden... focusing instead on making fewer things work well. But their competition, like Android;

Web OS;

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Windows Phone 7;

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are all doing far more and still makes doing everyday tasks easy.

As much as I sometimes hate to admit it, I've loved using my iPhone for the past 2-3 years. Its totally changed the our expectations of what a phone should do for us. It set the bar in more ways than can be counted. When I test out a new phone (Droid, Pre, any HTC phone, etc), the first thing I do is test the responsiveness of the screen and how quickly I can access maps, mail, web, ect. The first phone I've touched, since the iPhone came out, that came anywhere near to "feeling right" was the Nexus One. I expect Pinch-to-Zoom (multi touch in general), accurate screen touches, a somewhat consistent UI between Apps, and solid integration of social media...just to name a few. But now, I expect even more than the iPhone can offer, Multitasking, apps that aren't "approved" by one single inconsistent body, better app organization, higher levels of customization. Thank god for Jailbreaking to get me through these couple of years, it's truly made the iPhone, MY phone with much improved functionality (themes, folders, file access, wifi hotspot, NES emulation, info widgets for the lock screen, video recording on my 3G, and the list goes on).

Unless Apple pulls some amazing shit out of their ass today, they're going to start losing people like me to the "underdogs", Google and Microsoft. For years now, I've said "The iPhone is the best phone you can get for any price", but it's not true anymore. Even at their $99-199 prices, it's not. I already know my next phone, it's the HTC Evo 4G, and there's little Apple can do today to convince me to stick with them. But we'll see ;)

 

UPDATE: Apple announced some pretty impressive stuff. We're looking at: "Multitasking, folders, improved Mail, iBooks, enterprise stuff, preview of Game Center and iAd." Check out the full detailed list.

 

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