Palm loves buttons!
I was thinking some more about Palm and in particular my Treo. It’s interesting that how despite my quickly increasing dissatisfaction with my 650, there’s still nothing I’m seriously considering replacing it with. Here’s the thing, it does, in general, a mediocre job of a lot of things but it doesn’t really do anything really well. I think because it has a good screen resolution that’s touch sensitive it’s interface is really general and lends itself to a lot of applications that other smartphones, until recently, couldn’t touch. And it’s open development model has brought no shortage of apps to the platform.
As I was thinking about it, I realized that that is why on the official Palm blog, a product manager, the guy who should know everything backwards and forwards and should be able to make you want one of these - yeah, on that blog, when he was posting about what he liked most about the palmos treos it was the buttons. It’s the only thing he could think of because it doesn’t really do anything else especially well - for any feature in PalmOS you can find another phone that does it better (with the possible exception of ssh client, pssh is the bomb!).
At least that’s what I thought at first, but then I realized, that no, that’s not why - actually it seems to be that at Palm they firmly believe that buttons = innovation! That blog post was the first hint, but then Hawkins delivered the proof with the Foleo. It’s the only thing that makes sense - he hyped that thing and pauses to talk about how awesome the extra buttons they added to the Foleo are! Sure it’s underpowered and can’t really do everything a laptop can and isn’t particularly lighter than other laptops - but they’ve added some buttons and a scroll wheel!
And that’s why Palm’s been going down the tubes. We’ve thought they’ve all been sitting on their butts for the past few years not innovating their OS or their hardware. In fact they made a strategic decision long ago, even selling off their own OS to focus on their real vision for the future. More buttons!
June 13th, 2007 at 3:49 pm
I’m sure it isn’t for everyone, but my treo 650 -> Nokia E62 switch has me pretty happy. I’d get an unlocked E61i if I had my way, though.
Nokia:
* true preemptive multitasking OS that uses 100mb of RAM
* Webkit based browser that renders pages like a desktop does (limited AJAXY javascript.) Nice antialiased fonts.
* Profimail ($30) is a very decent mail program.
* Runs a lot of good Java programs: gmail, gmaps. Also runs putty and salling clicker.
* Screen is big and bright (320×240)
* Smaller, thinner & shorter than the Treo (a little wider but more pocketable)
* better, bigger keyboard.
* Is a bit slow, but never really frustratingly so.
Palm
* has a great threaded AIM/SMS client that the Nokia is sorely lacking.
* Is faster overall.
* Has more software, but not really anything that I want, to be honest.
* Supports categories for contacts, tasks and appointments (Symbian does not, which is a big bummer.)
* Snappermail is better than Profimail, but not in any showstopping kind of way.
June 13th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
huh, I’m going to have to check it out next time I see you. I like the wifi, but am not psyched about losing screen resolution and the camera (crappy as it may be on the 650)…. know?
If the iPhone decides to come with an ssh client and the keyboard is actually usable, I may break down. Curse you Colligan!
June 19th, 2007 at 8:28 am
[...] know, I’ve talked a lot of smack about the Foleo. In general, I’ll stand by what I’ve said, but I want to [...]
August 13th, 2007 at 9:33 am
[...] based on the little marketing we’ve seen thus far. It doesn’t seem as though, despite Hawkins’ protestations, that the interface and the device itself are compelling enough on their own. Palm’s got [...]