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Why Have PDAs Failed In The iPod Era?
mikejz84 writes "As the owner of a PocketPC PDA I am a very happy camper, with wifi internet access, Skype Voip, video playback, and of course the ubiquitous mp3 playback. In an era were everyone seems to talk about the Video iPod, and the next generation of mobile devices, it leaves me wondering - I already have all those abilities in a PDA that costs about as much as an iPod. My question for Slashdot: Given that modern PDAs have almost all the functionality of these separate devices, how has Palm and Microsoft/PocketPC developers failed in making PDAs a force in this new era of portable media devices? It is the poor marketing, bad media apps, public perception, or do people simply not want an all-in-one for mobile media?"
The last PDA I bought was a Palm T3 to replace my Treo 300 that I was furious at sprint with because the flip top lid thing snapped off after about eight months of use and the prick told me it was misuse. I am 'careful' with my devices and being told I chucked it at a wall in hopes of an upgrade really made my day.
Anyway, a PDA while decent to do lots of stuff, it doesn't do lots of stuff well.
There are things out there to improve the experience, but most of the time they cost money.
A iPod works out of the box, you don't have to jiggle here, tweak there, poke here. That's why the Pocket Windows devices appeal more to geeks but not to the rest of the world. On a lot of things I want them to Just Work (TM) and it seems when there is a device out there that 'does more stuff and costs the same' it doesn't Just Work(TM) you gott a dick with it. I don't get paid to dick with little devices to listen to music or look up my calendar so I'm not gonna waste my time and look for something that just works (TM)
My $0.02
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
just a minor point, Apple's business model is to make money on the iPod not itunes. They just break even on iTunes. Their gross margin on nano is 50% and ipod is around 40%. Itunes is around 10%.