“The biggest unknown [with the Palm Pre] is price, which went unmentioned during the demo. My assumption is that Palm would try to take market share by coming in significantly lower than the $200 or so Apple wants for its iPhone,” Peter Kafka reports for AllThingsD.
Kafka reports, “But when I ran that theory by Palm CEO Ed Colligan, he looked at me liked I’d peed on his rug. ‘Why would we do that when we have a significantly better product,’ he asked, then walked away.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: More unwarranted hubris from a deluded man who for years has done nothing of note but pilot his company directly into the ground.
We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in. – Ed Colligan, Palm CEO, November 16, 2006, laughing off the idea of Apple entering the smartphone market.
The more we see and hear from Palm, the more we believe they’re angling for a buyout.
Oh, by the way:
We’ve been pushing the state-of-the-art in every facet of design… We’ve been innovating like crazy for the last few years on this and we’ve filed for over 200 patents for all of the inventions in iPhone. And we intend to protect them. – Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiling iPhone, January 9, 2007
The fingernails problem is cause, like most touchscreens they rely on the small electrical charge in your skin, that’s why you cant use it with gloves or a stylus etc. And before anyone says it, I know there are styli and gloves out there for iPhones, but thats the point, they are FOR iPhones, normal ones wont work.
IMO, the Palm people (like CEO Colligan) are damn cocky and arrogant with their dissing of the competition (especially the iPhone) considering they have stolen… oops, “borrowed” so much from the iPhone.
It should be relatively easy to “top” existing devices (apparently not by the failed wannabes out there) when you can see what their positives and negatives are but it’s shameful to see so many so-called ‘iPhone killers” sponge off the work and R&D;of others (ie, Apple) in such a parasitic manner then have the nerve and gall to brag about how great and supposedly superior their “new” product is.
…
If this device is not even on the market yet, all of this talk about price and quality by the CEO is PREmature and PREtentious. And who came up with that name? People will just say it’s a PREdictable iPhone PREtender.
“‘Why would we do that when we have a significantly better product,’ he asked, then walked away.”
Why indeed. It never ceases to amaze me how many people think profits come from volume/market share. The holy grail is profits first, then share because your product is superior.
Colligan responded to the idiot’s question just as he should have, with disdain.
Everybody dismissing Palm’s Pre today, sound just like everybody that dismissed the iPhone 2 years ago. Today all those naysayers look like fools. Two years from now all of today’s “Pre” naysayers are going to look like fools, especially MDN because they can’t report without doing so through Apple colored glasses.
I will say one thing for Palm… there not connected at the hip to AT&T;… and that’s worth something of late!
No one has yet mentioned the one seeming advantage of the Palm — multiple apps open at once.
Not sure what this will do to the security of the device, but being able to cut and paste between apps (or, frankly, to be able to cut and paste) is certainly a plus.
(BTW – very happy iPhone v1.0 owner…)
If Palm is going to pull this off (if) they can’t go low end.
Famous last words!
Still, it does look a fairly well rounded product and puts a little pressure on the iPhone to stay ahead, and oh yeah add: spotlight search, copy & past, having multiple apps open, iChat etc
Suppose we will have to wait until June again!
“Why would we do that when we have a significantly better product?”
Because you may want to sell a few?
My fiancee has long nails and has no trouble at all typing on her iPhone. She can “tick-tick-tick” out a message way faster than I can.
I want to see his face when Pre comes out and at the same time Apple introduces new iPhone na OS 3.0
Oh crap, another 2 years of innovating ahead of us, start your copiers palm people.
Didnt Palm hire John Rubinstein who used to work at Apple? I guess he kicked some butt internally, because Palms webOS looks like it has some smart things.
Many comments sounds like you didnt see Palms video of the presentation. I would strongly go see it. http://www.palm.com/us/products/phones/pre/palm-pre-ces.html
I do not think it is an iPhone killer, because it will take alot of better phone models, and for Apple to stop innovating before the iPhone will die. I dont think Palm intented to make an iPhone killer, i think it is only Microsoft that wants to destroy Apple. I think Palm wants to make great mobile products, and i think the smartphone market is growing and big enough to allow Apple, Palm, and other competitors to live side by side.
While it looks like Palm copied the iPhone, it may very well be that both Palm and Apple copied someone elses HCI research into how to interact with small screens, or interaction by hand.
Remember that it wasnt apple that invented the computer mouse, nor did apple invent touch screens.
I think the Palm webOS seems like a good product, and i fully expect Apple to learn from it and make improvements.
well said Jon….a gem of a comment in a sea of garabage from whiny, crying, fanboys. In short, WebOS looks to be a step ahead of everything on the market (yes, even the mighty iphone). Whether it sells well, will be an entirely different story. Apple makes pretty good products, but their best strength is that they have the best marketing in the business.
@ whistler
Wake up!! I see no whining (other than that snotty little comment from the Palm CEO). Apple has good marketing BECAUSE they have good products and the quality sells itself…..others HAVE to rely on marketing to hopefully disguise the mediocrity of their wanna-be’s. Methinks thou be a troll….begone troll!
Those who laughed at the name Wii are probably the same ones that are laughing at the name Pre.
Will the Pre have the same success as the Wii? I doubt, but I think it has a fine chance of existing in the smartphone ecosystem and stimulating other players to keep on improving.
Rock on Palm! I hope the phone lives up to what was shown.
And hopefully not tied to one carrier.
There’s good and bad in the Pre, but there is also in the iPhone. Choice is good. This one looks like is has a better chance of succeeding in the market than most if not all of the other players.
Greg
So because the name rhymes, you contemplate whether the Pre will dominate the market in the same way the Nintendo Wii has?
Based on that alone, I’m ready to vote: you’re a fucking idiot.
Strangest thing in the world happened today:
The Palm Pre won Best of Show at CES…without really BEING at the show. They did a press conference at the Venetian, and Palm had a little shin-dig in one of the meeting rooms at CES, but the Pre was NEVER ON DISPLAY!
Trust me, I tried to find the stupid thing. It was nowhere to be found. My conclusion? VAPORWARE! They don’t really have a working product right now, or they’d have had it on display. So, Palm’s crap.
It would be great for the WebOS loaded Pre to take sales from the WinMo crap that Palm currently sells.
“no Apps or 3d games.”
True. And it’s very upsetting that the Palm Pre won’t be able to make fart noises.
“No real App store.”
The jury’s out on this one, but I somewhat agree. It’s interesting that they’re using HTML5/JavaScript for the development environment (a la the first generation of iPhone) but it sounds like you’ll be able to download these things into “apps.”
It’s an interesting idea, but I’m not real big on it. And I have my doubts about how well I’ll be able to take advantage of the hardware.
But, then, I’m a Mac developer who had no interest in the iPhone until they came out with an SDK.
“BUT, you are on that crappy network……Sprint.”
Versus being on that crappy network…AT&T?
Palm is yet another stock to eventually short/option put. Make sure to keep your option windows long.
I would not be surprised if Microsoft buys Palm…
Say what you want but if look at any of the numerous photos of the device and read what people have to say who have actually used it, it sounds like it could be an excellent smartphone with a very well designed UI (although it looks like it must be infringing on some of Apple’s patents).
Before you jump to conclusions, please note that I own and use both an iPhone and a Mac and have used Apple products continuously since the Apple II and enjoy them very much. Most of you, including MDN, could stand to be a lot more open minded.
Um, Joe? No one’s used it. It wasn’t at CES, where it was announced, so the only people who have “used it” are Palm and Sprint employees and executives, and personally, I don’t think the stupid thing exists at this point, so I don’t think ANYONE has used it.
PS, pictures don’t mean crap.
I looked at the presentation video, and it looks like a much better phone than Android. But Rubenstein really did copy a lot of iPhone UI conventiontions, like the little bounce when you’re at the end of a scroll, the scrolling with momentum, and the two-finger zooming gesture. I can’t help but think that Jobs is most displeased that Rubenstein took these nice little things that make the great iPhone UI to Palm.
That rug really tied the room together.
Children, please pay attention now!
Some posters confuse ‘there’ and ‘their’, but even more confuse ‘they’re’ and ‘there’.
It’s quite simple really.
*’Their’ is the plural possesive as in: it’s their car, it’s their choice.
*’They’re’ is, of course, the abbreviation of ‘they are”
*And ‘there’ is used for all the rest – it’s used as a pronoun, adverb, adjective, and noun.
Now you can all run along!
But before you go, memorize this sentence:-
They’re happy they’re not there, because their enemies are there.