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Apple to Buy out Palm?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the i-can't-imagine-why dept.

JFlex writes "According to a story over at Personal Computer World 'Speculation that Apple plans to buy handheld maker Palm has been revived by a call from two leading Palm investors for the company to be put up for sale, according to the local paper of both companies.'"

83 of 331 comments (clear)

  1. In other news... by daveschroeder · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...the Infinium Phantom will be released next month!

    (Seriously...this "Apple to buy Palm" rumor has been going on forever...)

    1. Re:In other news... by cabjf · · Score: 5, Insightful

      But then again, so has the "Apple to switch to Intel" rumor.

    2. Re:In other news... by kisrael · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Palm had a decent run. 1996-200...3? 4?

      Around 2001 I was still amazed at how much more usable it was than the winCE alternatives.

      It's still my favorite PIM UI, much more elegant than Outlook. I use a Sony Clie regularly. I guess Palm just slipped up in the behind the scenes technology, as well as some of the integration w/ the Outlook Hegemony.

      Newton was cooler in many ways, but didn't understand the criticial formfactor issue, and then became a political target.

      --
      SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
    3. Re:In other news... by kisrael · · Score: 2

      I don't think any of the Newtons hit the "shirt pocket" formfactor that Palm nailed, even the MessagePad 2100. And that was a very important size to get down to.

      The Palm was in an interesting space, complexity wise; somewhere between the Newton and, say, those Rolodex or Radio Shack brand organizers with little rubber screens and 40x3 or 4 character LCD screens. The touch sensitive screens allowed GUIs to work, rather than the DOS-like interaction of those cheaper models, and it was powerful enough to run 3rd party software (and had a reasonable path to that kind of software install), but everything else was a compromise for formfactor and battery life.

      --
      SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
    4. Re:In other news... by soft_guy · · Score: 2, Informative

      No, the later newtons were not smaller than the original newtons.

      The 110 was actually longer than the 100/OMP. The 120 and 130 were the exact same form factor as the 110.

      The Newton 2000/2100 was larger than the 110 (in width). It also had a much bigger screen (2X as big, 4X as deep).

      The eMate was the largest Newton of all.

      Unless you are comparing the 2000 form factor with the Motorola Marco or something...

      Palm had three critical advantages over other PDAs at the time: size, speed, and connectivity.

      Size: The Palm fits in a shirt pocket. The Newton doesn't. No other PDA at the time was as small as Palm (I'm not talking about the iPaq or other much later PDAs - I'm talking EO, Newton, General Magic and that group.)

      Speed: Not necessarily the hardware speed, but in the responsiveness of the system. Palm felt fast. Newton felt slow - at least until the 2000 came out. Get an OMP or MP 100 and try to scroll through the Notepad - sometimes you are waiting many seconds for the system to scroll.

      Connectivity: Palm's Conduit API wasn't perfect, but in the day it was better than anything else out there (again, pre-WinCE). You could write a Palm app and a desktop app and get syncing to work pretty well. Newton, the APIs never got out of alpha stage. There was not a good synchronization solution. The synchronization apps from Apple were OK for loading packages, but that was about it. Dan Rowley's X-Port was the best product in its class and he made use of connectivity APIs that were very flaky, were still in alpha stage, and were not generally available to all developers. Also, they were non-trivial to use for a number of reasons. Dan is an extrodinary engineer and got it to work through sheer will and many, many hours of hardcore hacking.

      --
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  2. Newton-Palm Hybrid by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    If Apple could make a Newton / Palm hybrid, it'd be the ultimate PDA.

    1. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by Feneric · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I think there's some truth to the parent post. A single PDA that merged the best features of both the Newton and the Palm could be really slick. While I'll assume that most people reading this are pretty familiar with the Palm and what it has to offer, I recognize that the Newton may be a bit more of a mystery. I blogged a bit about what the Newton has to offer in 2006 elsewhere and won't repeat it all here.

      The Newton has actually been mentioned on various news sites a lot lately, due largely in part to the recent Worldwide Newton Conference but also because of recent advances like the Einstein project and the Newton book reader for Firefox.

      I'm personally hoping that maybe some of its innovative user interface ideas get carried over into other projects. Obviously Apple's current Ink tablet handwriting recognition system is a direct port from the Newton. Less obviously perhaps is that its Dock removal animation is, too.

    2. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by cookiej · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It would certainly be an amazing twist. Jobs "Steved" us Newton users by stopping the spinoff of Newton, Inc. and then killing the platform by reassigning most of the engineering team back to Apple -- several of whom quit and went to work for Palm as they were ramping up for the first real Palm handheld.

      So. If Steve is truly ready to acquire Palm, I guess he's forgiven John Sculley (Newton was Sculley's 'Next Big Thing').

      I'd love to dust of my old NewtonScript manuals. Bring on the Soup!

    3. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by cp.tar · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Newton or no Newton, I feel this is great.

      Palm is - at least from where I'm standing - being pushed out from the market.

      This is therefore probably good for both Palm and Apple... it's just that I probably won't be able to afford one of those.

      *sigh*

      --
      Ignore this signature. By order.
    4. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by Glsai · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I'd rather have a Treo-iPod combination. If I had one of those, my life would be complete. A good robust phone, a simple non-cluttered calendar app, the ease of use and iTunes integration of an iPod, and a full keyboard like the treo has. I'd never need to buy another phone/ipod again.

    5. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by Helios1182 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Palm is in the perfect position to build the device. They have all the tech to do it. Apple has the UI and design people around. With the current love Apple is getting there would be enough hype to get people to give the device a shot.

    6. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by Kadin2048 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Frankly, I don't know what the hype about iPod-phones is...the ability to play MP3s from your phone has been around for several years. My Cingular 2125 (HTC Tornado, rebranded), much like other smartphones/PDA phones, has a MiniSD slot and I can watch videos and listen to music with it.

      The hype about "iPod phones" is that they'd have a MP3-playing phone that's the ease-of-use equivalent of the iPod.

      The iPod, just as a hardware device, is admittedly slick, but it's not that wonderful. It's a hard drive, a funny-shaped battery, a microprocessor, and some controls in a white Lexan box. What gives it most of its value is the integration with iTunes and the automatic syncronization/updating. It's totally brainless -- you never have to worry about what music is on your portable versus what is on your computer (assuming you have one of the larger iPods). When the iPod first came out, this was the selling feature for it, compared to other, smaller-capacity players. You plugged it in, it did its thing, and you could grab the player and go.

      I don't know of a cellphone that offers that. You have to add or copy the songs manually, and that's a drag; geeks might be okay with it, but a whole lot of mainstream consumers won't, especially if they use iTunes as their jukebox/music-manager already. People have come to expect total integration from a music player, and anything that offers less just isn't going to fly.

      I owned a pre-iPod, flash-based music player. It was called the Pontis, and it was pretty forward-thinking when it was released. It used MMC cards, so the capacity was virtually unlimted, it had great battery life, and it was rugged as hell. But it sucked. It sucked because any time you wanted to add more music to it, you had to fire up a separate program and move the files to it. Later I think they achieved some jukebox integration, but it was with programs that were clunky (Musicmatch) and generally less elegant than iTunes. This is about where cellphones are now; nobody has figured out how to really integrate a cellular phone with the computer, in the same way that Apple integrated the MP3 player.

      IMO, it's relentlessly stupid to involve a cable in this integration. A cellphone's integration should be even more transparent than the iPod's, because it ought to do it all wirelessly. Make a playlist in iTunes, and the next time you bring your phone within Bluetooth range of the computer, it gets updated (along with your Address Book, Calendar, etc.). When you have that kind of seamlessness, you will have an iPod equivalent. Otherwise, all you have is a Pontis equivalent.

      --
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    7. Re:Newton-Palm Hybrid by David+Rolfe · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I'm personally hoping that maybe some of its innovative user interface ideas get carried over into other projects. Obviously Apple's current Ink tablet handwriting recognition system is a direct port from the Newton. Less obviously perhaps is that its Dock removal animation is, too.

      I've made this comment before (to jcr in fact). If Ink is a direct port from the Newton, they broke it along the way. I have bugs filed (if you could search them) the describe this. I'll give you the short version first: Pull out your tablet on your Mac, write the word 'Rosetta' in cursive (and as typical for most writers, cross both Ts at once). On a Newton MP 2100 it will correctly translate this to 'Rosetta' 100% of the time for me. With Ink it gets translated to 'RoseHa' 100% of the time. Somewhere between Newton's 'Rosetta' handwriting recognition and OS X's 'Ink' recognition, they forgot how to 1) understand cursive, 2) learn user handwriting, 3) allow training of the recognizer, 4) allow the insertion caret to be used for punctuation, 5) correctly understand editing gestures in (almost) all cases -- ever try to join a broken word with Ink?.

      For completeness sake, let me include that old bug report (which includes a snippet from a thread jcr and I had going about Ink's flaws compared to the Newton): https://bugreport.apple.com/ Problem ID: 3828160 (this bug is still marked "Open")

      06-Oct-2004 02:53 AM David Rolfe:
      Steps to reproduce:

      Write the word "Rosetta" crossing both Ts at once.

      Expecteed Results:

      As opposed to the expected "Rosetta" appearing in the Ink Window (or current text field, instead a result similar to "RoseHa" will appear.

      Workaround:

      Write slowly, and unnaturally. Avoid mixed-printing. Never use cursive.

      For more information, I provide this summary from a conversation with an non-Apple (third party) OS X developer. I outline other bugs and missing features below. Especially, THE LACK OF A PUNCTUATION POP-UP ATTACHED TO THE INSERTION CARET IN THE INK WINDOW. Would it be appropriate to file that as another bug/feature?

      ----
      I certainly have not spent as much time training Ink [compared to the time spent using the Newton MP2100, which I use as a baseline for comparison]. For one, it doesn't have the quick interface to teach a misrecognized word (you know: double tap, select correct guess) even in the 'Ink Window' where they try to emulate the Newton environment. Second, clicking on the caret in the Ink Window doesn't give a punctuation pop-up like the Newton, which makes punctuating things written in Ink a CHORE; good thing Apple doesn't make computers without keyboards these days... Otherwise your punctuation would he half-assed as it tries to guess whether something is a period or an accidental tap. Finally, Ink in 10.3 doesn't supply some training app like the Newton's prefs, the closest option is specifically adding words to a list that it frequently gets wrong, or that it can't dictionary guess. This list doesn't even learn (i.e. it doesn't automatically populate with a list of words that the recognizer knows it had a low confidence score on).

      I know Ink is an afterthought -- Apple can't seriously consider Ink to be a 'solution' as it stands today. I'll give it two things though - the scribble sound it plays while you write sure is cute and it's fun to be able to include doodles right into iChat. However, you could not use an iBook, feasibly, without a keyboard, and get the same range of functionality as a heavy, 10 year old MP 2100.

      I know again I'm coming off like some kind of freak -- but really, the Newton could tell when you crossed two Ts at once, and that chokes Ink in OS X -- so whatever changes they made since its [Rosetta's?] implementation on the ARM and the PPC they broke it.

      I mean seriously JCR -- do you have both [an MP and a tablet equipped Mac]? Can you

      --
      Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
  3. BeOS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    So does this mean that the BeOS will be under the ownership of Apple as well?

    1. Re:BeOS by firewood · · Score: 4, Informative
      So does this mean that the BeOS will be under the ownership of Apple as well?

      Mod down. BeOS was formerly purchased by PalmSource (not Palm) which was recently purchased by Access of Japan.

  4. No. by Tweekster · · Score: 2, Insightful

    well the headline asked a question, I answered it. because my answer has just as much authority as the wild speculation in the article... I honestly think the writers of these "xyz is gonna buy out abc" articles have a big dartboard with the names of various companies and they play madlibs to come up with "content"

    --
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  5. Translation: We want to make money with hype by denis-The-menace · · Score: 5, Insightful

    According to a story over at Personal Computer World [two leading Palm investors have created the]Speculation that Apple plans to buy handheld maker Palm [in order to drive up the stock price before they dump it and make loads of $$$.]

    --
    Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
    1. Re:Translation: We want to make money with hype by galdur · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Right on.

      How does Palm investors want to sell Palm to Apple become speculation that "Apple plans to buy handheld maker Palm"...?

      I don't see Apple having any desire to acquire Palm. Steve Jobs' obsession with style and the holistic approach of complete solutions doesn't seem compatible with the nuisance of acquiring a new platform and having to dilute its efforts in the audio/video market.

      Sure, the Palm investors would love to sell the company to Apple; after all, the PDA market share has been decreasing. I think we would sooner see some hybrid device with a concise set of features from Apple than a company sale.

  6. If this happens by sg3000 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Too bad the article isn't working for me.

    Considering the previous technology leading position of the Newton MessagePad back in the late 1990s, and the fact that Steve Jobs killed it (calling it a "damn scribble pad"), coupled with changing demographics due dramatic shifts in the paradigm of handheld computing, if this actually happens I believe I speak for all former Newton owners, when I say WTF??

    --
    Insert simplistic political, ideological, or personal proselytization here.
    1. Re:If this happens by stubear · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Steve Jobs also said no one wanted to watch video on iPods. Lo and behold we now have the video iPod. Take what Steve jobs says with a grain of salt. I'm amazed Steve has held out for so long releasing a tablet mac.

    2. Re:If this happens by Yahweh+Doesn't+Exist · · Score: 2, Funny

      >now have the video iPod

      no, we have an iPod with video. there's a difference.

  7. Why /. Why? by mythz · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This was already on digg a while ago, has no factual basis, and is the result of reporters that have nothing to write about resorting to these 'what if' articles.

    I thought the /. difference is that it wouldn't expose its readers to these higly vapourous 'fairy articles'.

    1. Re:Why /. Why? by Golias · · Score: 2, Informative

      I thought the /. difference is that it wouldn't expose its readers to these higly vapourous 'fairy articles'.

      Have we reached the point where "you must be new here" comments can be shorthanded as "YMBNH"?

      Slashdot is a news digest and discussion forum which the editors prefer to run like it's a cute little personal blog, rather than one of the most popular news sites on the Internet. There is no formal criteria for what does and does not get selected.

      --

      Information wants to be anthropomorphized.

  8. Good idea by ZachPruckowski · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Apple could jump back into the market with the Blackberry struggling/in limbo, and offer the sort of solution they're famous for - one which somehow integrates all parts of the product's chain. They could stick Safari on it, and have it synchonize histories and emails with the home iMac/mini, as well as having some sort of iDisk related fun (which will have to drop in price).

  9. Palm has access to interesting IP on their hands by Coutal · · Score: 4, Insightful

    These come to mind:

    * BeOS/BeIA code: no idea how relevant it is today, but could still prove worthwhile.

    * Palm-sized device expertise: maybe some of the knowledge and technologies palm has could go to make an even-better iPod. (can't wait to see that).

    * Application Base: maybe we're going to see an app translator?

    * Synchronization software: maybe newer iPods will need to sync apps and documents too. might want to have access to well-established code for that.

  10. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by guildsolutions · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Actually Apple will probably put some sort of a mobile OS X on it. In my oppinion, palm os is dead, dying and burried. The most usefull products they give are their windows based toys. *gasp* I voted for windows.

    Apple will do it correctly if they bring in a pocket PC product. They are not the leading seller of MP3 players for no reason, they did it right when others didnt.

  11. Re:The iPalm? by RingDev · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know... If people start downloading pron from iTunes straight to the iPalm things could get iHairy.

    -Rick

    --
    "Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
  12. Buying palm, or buying BeOS? by AVee · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I must admit to not being completely up to date with the whole BeOS saga. But afaik the last company to own BeOS was Palm. And yes, I know about yellowTAB's ZETA, but they never claimed to actually own any of the BeOS code.

    So it might just be it's not palm, but BeOS they are after. Which might fit into the whole Apple X86 thing.

    1. Re:Buying palm, or buying BeOS? by Gogo+Dodo · · Score: 2, Informative

      I'm not sure that Palm owns any of the BeOS code anymore. Palm is surviving hardware part of the Palm, Inc. Formerly known as PalmOne. The software part became PalmSource, which was bought by ACCESS.

      So Apple being Palm would get them a bunch of hardware. I don't think Apple needs their hardware.

    2. Re:Buying palm, or buying BeOS? by anothy · · Score: 2, Informative

      aside from the fact that Palm doesn't own PalmOS or BeOS any more, what the heck would Apple want with BeOS? Apple specifically went with NeXT instead because it was a more mature, developed technology. BeOS was pretty slick when compared with the Mac OS and Win32 systems of the time, but it's been stagnant for most of this century. i used BeOS for a long time, on three platforms, and there's nothing i miss from it now.

      --

      i speak for myself and those who like what i say.
    3. Re:Buying palm, or buying BeOS? by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 2, Insightful

      What exactly do you think Apple would do with BeOS if they had them? I mean, seriously... OS X is already better than BeOS was in its heyday and even if it weren't, it would probably be a ton quicker to re-implement BeOS technologies rather than somehow backport them.

      --
      Comment of the year
    4. Re:Buying palm, or buying BeOS? by multimed · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Well even more so because Jean-Louis Gassee wanted more money than Apple was willing to pay. From what I remember, it was very close to a done deal, Apple offered $120 and later $200 million, while Gassee wanted $400 million. Had he said yes to the lower offers, the computer world would be a very different place.

      --
      Vote Quimby.
  13. I don't see much value by AKAImBatman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm rather suspicious of this story, in part because I don't see Palm adding much value to Apple. When the Palm Pilot was popular, the fact that so much could be fit in such a small device was nothing short of amazing. It was also a useful little tool for all kinds of data organization. But now? Palm's OS is older than the hills, designed for hardware limits that no longer matter. Palm has been using bits of trickery to extend the limits of their OS, but at the end of the day they just need something new that takes advantage of modern, low-power hardware.

    Another problem is that Palm has been about as phlegmatic as you can get when it comes to promoting their market. If they were like Apple, they could have sewn up the electronic book market years ago. Instead, they seem content to allow the rest of the market to make half-hearted attempts at producing solutions. That just isn't going to work. If Palm wants to grab the e-reader market (a market for which they are extremely well suited), they need to follow Apple's lead and grab the bull by the horns. Since they show no signs of doing this, I see nothing but signs of decline for Palm.

    If Apple wants to enter the handheld market (again), I see them developing a new device with a high-resolution, high-pixel density screen. They would then try to add the ability to show documents are precisely as possible, utilizing scaling algorithms. (Many books and documents suffer if their layout is changed a la Acrobat Pocket.) These features could be easily built into a new device OS by Apple engineers rather than trying to overhaul the aging Palm OS.

    They would then market it with a new "catchy" Apple brand like "iHand" or "iBooklet", and either integrate it into a new eBook/Portable App section of iTunes, or develop a new iTunes-like app.

    So given this scenario, where does the Palm value come in? The name? Nope. Apple would want consistent branding. The OS? No way. Palm is so full of cruft I swear that the developers are ready to shoot it. The device designs? Never. They're way too far behind the curve.

    So I think I'm going to go with "rumor" on this one.

    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
    1. Re:I don't see much value by Cujo · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You're probably right. The current market cap of PALM is just under $2G, si figure Apple would pay around $3G to buy it up, for a company expected to make about $100M in profit over the next year. That's easily affordable for AAPL, but a 3% annual ROI isn't worth the trouble unless they have some IP AAPL, really, really wants. The Treo? Maybe, but I don't see it.

      --

      Helium balloons want to be free.

    2. Re:I don't see much value by GigsVT · · Score: 2, Funny

      Maybe they want BeOS? :)

      --
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    3. Re:I don't see much value by wrfelts · · Score: 2, Insightful
      I do see a value in the depth of expertise at the company and in the current user base. Apple could buy Palm and 1) add product integration expertise to the Palm brand to up the technology, 2) use Palm expertise, combined with Apples iPod expertise to develop a new "iDevice" that is Comm compatible with Palm and iPod as well as phone integration.

      Imagine handheld organizer/music player that could connect and use the cell networks as well as utilize a local WiFi for VOIP or even the cell network for high-speed net connections...

      Now, imagine this device being as sleek and as simple to use as an iPod, able to download email and work with documents like a Palm...

      I have never been interested in a PDA, a portable music player, or an overstuffed cell phone, but I would be interested if Apple was to engineer a full combo with their typical high standards and emphasis on sleek and easy design.

    4. Re:I don't see much value by MountainLogic · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Palm, the hardware folks (not the PalmSource OS company) do have something that Apple needs. Relationships with the cell companies. Making a phone is not that big of a deal for a large consumer electronics company. Managing the relationship with Verizon, T-Mobile or ATT is something that take lots of time to get right. Don't expect to see an Apple branded Treo. Paml Inc makes nothing, it is all outcourced. Marketing hannels and relationships can have a higher resale value that physical plant. Expect to see an Apple branded iPod/phone. If you want to read tee leaves, look at that Jobbs has or had on his belt.

    5. Re:I don't see much value by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 2, Interesting

      So given this scenario, where does the Palm value come in?

      Strong existing relationships with all the US wireless telephone companies.

      I think that about covers it.

      (ok, Treo-related know-how and patents too)

      --
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  14. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by Zigg · · Score: 3, Informative

    Palm is already working a new version of Palm OS with Linux as the kernel, effectively creating their own "OS X" story. Whether they'll be as successful as OS X is remains to be seen.

  15. Favorite Newton Joke by MrFlibbs · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is perhaps the most elegant summary of the Newton's limitations I ever read:

    Q: What's 2 + 2?
    A: Farm

    1. Re:Favorite Newton Joke by hcdejong · · Score: 2, Funny

      Q: How many Newton users does it take to change a lightbulb?

      A: Foux! There to eat lemons, axe gravy soup.

  16. Not good new for Palm by Kefaa · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Other than a full license to Graffiti, there is little for Palm to offer. Don't get me wrong, I own a Palm Pilot and am probably one of the few left who love it.

    However, I can easily see Apple producing a product of superior technology with as good an interface, based on the iPod. In fact, my iPod supports full motion video, gigs of data, and a simple interface. Start adding features and you face the Palm conundrum: How do you change the interface to a vastly successful product, and keep your customer base?

    Part of Palm's other dilemma was its success. I have had the same Palm Pilot since it came out five years ago. It does everything I need, it syncs to my desktop, keeps outlook happy (oops that may be an Apple issue), and allows me to handle the things I want to. It will be interesting to see if iPod suffers the same issues.

    If you want to make me a happy camper - make an iPod version with a nice 4" screen, support for palm like applications (notebook, address book, calendar, etc.) and support Ebook formats. Then provide a truly open development environment. One of the great things about palm was how many 3rd part applications were available because Palm wined and dined independent developers. But that means you (the platform owner) do not control everything on your platform.

    Such a tool would allow me to hold my videos, books, and all the last things my palm does today. But none of these require palm to provide.

    But wait -- what about the phone? Forget it. While some people do use the phone to replace the palm, most never do much but store phone numbers. Further, people are used to a phone being replaced every two years - for free. That is a market that pays for itself in the marketing of minutes. Not a good place to play.

  17. Re:Why now? by Pope · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Been there, done that: Apple jump-started the PDA revolution with the Newton. Jobs and Co. must not see a market for them. Besides, this rumour of Apple buying Palm has been around for YEARS...

    --
    It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
  18. Not news by Kohath · · Score: 2

    This is not news. "Apple buys Palm" is news. Speculation that Apple might buy Palm in the future is not.

    The news business used to be about reporting things that actually happened.

    1. Re:Not news by TubeSteak · · Score: 2, Interesting
      This is not news. "The U.S. bombs Iran" is news. Speculation that the U.S. might bomb Iran in the future is not.

      The news business used to be about reporting things that actually happened.

      /You see how rediculous your statement is?

      --
      [Fuck Beta]
      o0t!
  19. Re:so what will happen to the treo by Anonymous+Monkey · · Score: 2, Funny

    I think the click wheal would be cool on a phone. Just think, a "rotary" cell phone!

    --
    We are the Borg...
  20. Why buy a loser? by tknn · · Score: 2, Interesting

    That would be stupid purchase. Palm is a loser company with barely anything to save. PDA sales are relatively flat and if Apple wants to enter the market they could license Symbian or develop their own smartphone OS.

    I agree that phones will eventually own the music player market, and probably even the P&S camera market also. Apple would be foolish not to evaluate its choices, but I would choose a platform that is more focused than Palm on smartphones over PDAs.

    The phone market is super-intense and super-competitive, especially for global competition. Once 3G rolls out, the market should probably consolidate some as one network standard will prevent as much fragmentation, so it is a bit early to enter the market.

  21. And PALM stock if off a little this morning by Cujo · · Score: 3, Interesting

    So, the market doesn't believe the rumor either

    --

    Helium balloons want to be free.

  22. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by AKAImBatman · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Palm is already working a new version of Palm OS with Linux as the kernel, effectively creating their own "OS X" story.

    I don't see that as being a very good idea. Linux (the kernel) is a fast-moving target with constantly changing abilities, features, and APIs. (No comment on the moving ABIs.) For something like a new Palm OS, Palm really needs a stable base that won't require them to redo a lot of work, or suddenly and unexpectedly shift directions because of a major kernel change.

    Palm could always fork Linux to keep things more predictable, but then they'd only be criticized for not keeping up to date. Thus the best solution is to do what Apple did: Find a more stable base.

    What amazes me is that Palm is sitting with the BeOS technologies in its lap and has done practically nothing with them. BeOS was designed for systems that are pretty much on par with what a modern PDA could offer. (Catchy new slogan: "Just imagine, all the power of your BeBox in the Palm(TM) of your hand!") They obviously can't use it directly due to differences in desktop vs. PDA hardware, but they could easily mine it for technologies and strip the OS down to its core before rebuilding around the PDA technology.

    Then again, I don't know what the BeOS core looks like. Perhaps it's all too integrated to be useful. Either way, I think Palm would be chosing poorly by going the Linux route.

    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
  23. Re:The iPalm? by brasten · · Score: 4, Funny

    I've always thought they'd name their next PDA the "iSaac"

  24. BUT... by frankcow · · Score: 2, Funny

    will it run windows mobile???

    --
    My tech blog
  25. Re:competition goes both ways by BewireNomali · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I don't think that Apple can continue to add features to the ipod without diluting the brand. It's why you don't call the music phone an ipod phone - so if it fails, you don't hurt your bread and butter.

    Apple needs a completely new line. Product diversification.

    --
    un burrito me trampeó.
  26. Not sure I buy it... at least not yet by cmj · · Score: 2, Interesting
    The fact of the matter is that a Treo is a very expensive phone no matter how you look at it. The cheapest one is around the same price as a high end iPod even with a new cell contract and carrier subsidy. On the surface that would mean a substantial revenue source for Apple if this were to come to pass. BUT every single person I know that has a Treo or other smartphone of some sort (BB, Windows Mobile, Nokia Communicator, etc) already has an iPod. For current customers that's not a big deal and for the most part has no discernable effect on iPod sales - after all most of those people don't tend to go through the trouble of selling their old phones or iPods on ebay.

    For FUTURE sales it's a different story though... If Apple were to buy Palm and/or introduce the iPhone then a measurable number of people that have neither iPod nor smart phone would buy the iPhone instead of two separate devices, and that means less iPods sold. Thus there would be an impact on future revenues.

    I don't believe that Apple will be buying Palm. Remember that Palm no longer owns PalmOS, so all I can think of that Palm brings to the table is the Palm and Treo brands, domain knowledge around smart phones, and existing relationships with contract manufacturers and carriers.

    It is my belief that Apple will introduce the iPhone, and that it's just a matter of time. When they do they will probably contract with someone like HTC to make a custom phone, exclusively for Apple, then load it with Apple's own software. Further, it will either be appropriately crippled to not undercut the Nano, tied to an MVNO so they get ongoing revenue from the monthly subscription, all you can eat subscription iTunes downloads service, or will coincide with some other clever strategy to drive additional revenue growth.

    1. Re:Not sure I buy it... at least not yet by bigpat · · Score: 2, Interesting

      domain knowledge around smart phones, and existing relationships with contract manufacturers and carriers.

      Don't discount this. The area of cell phone manufacturing seems very closed to entry by new players. You need licenses and such to even start playing with prototypes and you need to work with each of the spectrum holders that you want your device to be comaptible with. Clearly it is in Apple's interest to begin making some devices that can natively work with the existing wireless telephone networks which are increasingly being used for data. Palm has already done this with their Treo smartphones, which would mean an aquisition would give Apple a big headstart down this path and would complete its product offerings in this area.

      With their ipod flywheel, they could really make a simple easy to use cell phone, where calling a number was as easy as scrolling to it with the flywheel just as you would scroll to a song. I could see them even getting rid of a number pad altogether or combining a flywheel with a graffiti pad.

  27. Does this mean that BEOS is coming back? :) by stoicio · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Wow! Great news.
    Maybe they will dump OSX and make a 64 bit version of BEOS!!!!
    YAY!!!!
    We all knew Jobs couldn't keep his hands off BEOS. ;)

    (I'm being levitous)

  28. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by Archibald+Buttle · · Score: 5, Informative

    Palm Source is working on Palm OS.

    Palm Source isn't owned by Palm. It's owned by a Japanese company whose name I can't remember.

    Palm don't own their own OS these days.

  29. Re:Something, Anything by hunterx11 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Apple is dying again, huh? Clearly it was a mistake to switch to an operating system based on BSD :)

    --
    English is easier said than done.
  30. Idiotic by coinreturn · · Score: 3, Informative

    AAPL is down 20 percent and looks like it is on its way to the mid-50s support level.

    You obviously got modded "insightful" by an Apple-basher. Yes, Apple is down 20% from its peak, but it's still up 600% in the last two years, up 80% in the last year, up 50% in the last six months, and up 10% in the last three months. That performance whoops ass on just about any other investment out there.

  31. This is just one of those rumors.. by Dutchmaan · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It's comes up from time to time, "Apple is going to buy Palm!" "Apple is creating a version of their OS to work with Intel chips!" .. . . err.... uh.... hmmm.

  32. As a pissed off PDA user by hkb · · Score: 2, Interesting

    As an annoyed PDA (and Mac) user, I'd love to see Apple develop a full-fledged PDA -- preferably something along the lines of a Tungsten C with bluetooth and wi-fi.

    I still use my Palm T|C but its definitely showing its age with no other alternative in sight. WM2003SE was crap, and WM5 is still crap. It is neither reliable nor big on usability.

    Give us something, Apple. I believe you're the only hope for something in this arena that "just works".

    --
    /* Moderating all non-anonymous trolls up since 2004 */
  33. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by Sandor+at+the+Zoo · · Score: 2, Informative
    Palm Source isn't owned by Palm. It's owned by a Japanese company whose name I can't remember.

    ACCESS. See the PalmSource site.

  34. The PalmPod by Lockelator · · Score: 2, Funny

    It's a rumor, but wouldn't it be great to have a palmpod? http://www.pdafrance.com/img/pdanews2004/ipod1.jpg

  35. This will happen.. by saboola · · Score: 2, Funny

    After Cisco is done buying out Nintendo AND TiVo. The only problem we will have after this is those pesky flying pigs, and getting the heat turned back on in hell.

  36. Newton + Apple + Palm = NAPalm by Ranger · · Score: 4, Funny

    Cool, they can combine the Newton with the Palm and use Apple's exploding battery technology. Introducing NAPalm. Burn different!

    --
    "You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
    1. Re:Newton + Apple + Palm = NAPalm by Indiana+Joe · · Score: 2, Funny

      Apple could recycle their old slogan. "Rip. Mix. Burn."

      --
      I can't decide if this post is interesting, funny, insightful, or flamebait.
  37. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by AKAImBatman · · Score: 4, Informative
    As for rewriting in Linux - does that mean their current Palm OS is such a dead end that they can't evolve it?

    Yes. I've developed for it before, and it's got cruft coming out of its ears. It was designed around the idea that a device would never have more than 8 Megs of RAM, and that the controls/screen would be fixed in their design. In addition, memory is partitioned into small "databases" with explicit record sizes. These databases are the only thing keeping the data separate. If something goes wrong, one database can easily overwrite another. No MMU exists to prevent this.

    Other issues include:

    • Applications are identified by 4 byte codes.
    • Databases are associated on those same 4 byte codes.
    • Libraries are non-existant, and have to be hacked into the OS.
    • Large memory areas are handled by bank-switching, putting limits on where executable code can run.
    • Large programs or data sets cannot be loaded into memory because of the bank-switching. They usually need to be constantly swapped out.
    • The graphics facilities are primitive, representing the hi-end of portable technology in the mid 90's.
    • Lack of libraries and program designs tend to result in large amounts of duplicated code.
    • Poor acclimation to network facilities, due to its original design as a "satellite" device rather than a wireless portable.


    There's more, but those are just off the top of my head.

    It's hideously expensive to rewrite software from scratch and a lot of companies will fail in the process.

    My best suggestion would be an emulator. Given that a new OS would be able to take advantage of the greater speeds of modern ARM processors, most software could be run under a port of the current desktop emulator that developers use today. Performance critical software would do best to port, but new versions have always been an issue for them anyway.
    --
    Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
  38. How bizarre. by AugstWest · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That's really weird, as I was walking to work this morning I was wishing that someone would take Palm from it's current state of elegant crashiness and do something wonderful with it like apple did going from os9 to osx.

    I doubt it's true, but it would be nice.

  39. Rokr by HaydnH · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Well we all know what a farce the Rokr was - a limited music playing phone to avoid eating in to iPods profits. If Apple buy Palm what will they do with phones like the Treo which can play MP3's? Will they remove the headset jack??

    --
    Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so. - Douglas Adams
    1. Re:Rokr by King_TJ · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Apple won't have to do squat with phones like the Treo.... The MP3 capabilities on one suck, to put it mildly. It has issues playing anything in a high bitrate (like 192bit), and you have to buy a special adapter just to use normal headphones with it. Out of the box, it doesn't have enough memory to store more than a few songs. You have to buy a memory card for it (after forking out all that money for the phone to begin with), and it's very SLOW syncing music into it.

      I have a Treo 650 and I like the phone, overall. Don't get me wrong. But it's no replacement for an iPod - and THAT probably explains why so many Treo owners also have iPods.

  40. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by Dynedain · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Palm One sold off Palm Source (the OS division) to a Chinese company. The newest Palm One product, the Treo 700, runs Windows Mobile.

    As much as I love the Palm product (I've been using Palm devices since the Palm Pilot Pro), they're quickly being edged out by the cell phone market, they still dont have synchronization on 64bit Windows systems, and synchronization on OSX is nowhere near as integrated as everything else that uses iSync and hasn't been progressed for quite a while.

    In short, they aren't in a good position, and don't seem to be making the right business moves to improve it either.

    --
    I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
  41. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by erwin · · Score: 2, Interesting

    fundementally important, given the weaknesses of the old preOSX Mac OS. Protected memory, pre-emptive multitasking, yadda-yadda.

    The BSD layer finally gave Apple a stable (secure? we'll see) foundation upon which to build their compelling UI.

    I don't know if this is such a no-brainer in the embedded/mobile space. I wonder how much of Motorola's Linux-on-phones developer relation challenges are realted to their bad business practices, or technical challenges. Given the number of sucessful embedded linux products there are out there, I'm going to vote for bad business,

    anyway, a main-stream *NIX based PDA/smartphone would be a winner in my book as long as it's hackable

  42. there is a lot of value! by feranick · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Here the situation: Apple is looking (it's not a secret) in penetrating the smartphone market. They experimented with Motorola, but didn't seem to work well. The Treo would be Perfect for Apple (Jobs praised the Treo some time ago).

    Palm on the other end has a great device (the Treo) and some farily good ones (the high end PDAs, such as the Tungsten TX). The weakest link is currently the OS. It seems that they are hanging around using a bit of everything. PalmOS in its current version (5.4) is a dinosaur, patched to make it running modern applications. Palm does NOT own PalmOS, being developed by PalmSource, a separate coumpany own by the Japanese company ACCESS. Palm has no control over PalmOS. THey have the 700w running windows targeting consumers. They would like to use Linux too. basically they have no direction, developing a new OS wouldn't go into a device before 2-3 years. Palm would gain A LOT from Apple. An OS to start with, either a scaled down version of MacOSX, or a scaled up version of whatever OS inside an iPod.

    It's a win-win deal, that should have been done long ago!

  43. Re:Apple, show Palm some ARM goodness... by dgatwood · · Score: 2, Insightful
    Am I missing something? Why would anyone buy Palm? They don't own the OS, the OS sucks anyway, the hardware sucks... so basically the rumor is that Apple will buy Palm for the Palm name and a handful of engineers? Does it at least provide some sort of free access to the Palm OS, maybe? Where's the benefit?

    Seems to me that Palm has to innovate or die. I don't see selling the company as all that viable at this point. It has gone downhill way too far already.

    --

    Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

  44. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by iamacat · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Huh? Bank switching? Palm has a flat memory space. You can unprotect all the databases with MemSemaphoreReserve(true), do your dids and do MemSemaphoreRelease(true). The only catch is that blocking system calls like sockets or waiting for user events do not work while the semaphore is locked. If you need memory blocks > 64K, just use FtrNew.

    While the OS is kind of primitive, writing, testing and publishing a small program for the original 68K devices used to be much easier than for WinCE or QTopia PDAs that existed at the same time. There is a nearly-perfect hardware emulator, Metrowerks supports C++ exceptions unlike embedded VC++ and on-device debugger is perfectly usable even over the serial port. It's too bad they decided to go with the hideous Eclipse/cygwin based thingy for native ARM development.

  45. Re:Windows CE by kalbzayn · · Score: 2, Informative

    So far just one Palm, the Treo700W, runs on Windows CE. But, I would imagine more are on the way.

  46. Apple will do the right thing by gone.fishing · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Apple is sitting on a boatload of money and has a couple of hot products that will continue to show amazing growth for the near future at least. Like the Sony Walkman before it, the iPod line is an industry leader that can command a higher price than it's immitators.

    The Palm products look like a good match for Apple. Like the iPod they are personal, portable devices that litterally define the niche they fill. They don't exactly compete with the iPod but are technological cousins that could be combined into a killer product.

    Having said that, I'm not so sure that Apple needs Palm. Why would they? They have a partnership with Motorola where their product is already married to a phone which incorporates many of the most necessary features of the Palm devices! It seems to me that it may be a smarter move to work with Motorola to come up with a product that is one thrid cel phone, one third iPod, and one third PDA. This would cut their risk in half and would be far less expensive than buying another company outright. The only downside would be that they would have to share revenue with another company. I'm not even sure that would be so bad, the Motorola production capability combined with the Apple marketing savy may mean they could sell far more units than if they tried this on their own.

    So, while Palm may look like an attractive pickup, once you got into bed with her, maybe the excitement wouldn't be there (and you would certainly offend your current partner.) Maybe staying in the marriage that you already have is a better option although far less exciting.

    I don't know all the angles to this. What I do know is that the Apple managment has been savy enough in the past to recognize opportunity and also understand their market far better than anyone else. This is the primary reason why they are where they are today. Anyone else who has followed the path they did would have fallen in one too many potholes and been burried. Apple is still in the race. This tells me buy or no-buy, they will make the right decision.

  47. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by timeOday · · Score: 2, Insightful
    But how important are the BSD underpinnings of OS-X for the overall success of OS-X?
    Judging by the relative success of OS-X compared to Copeland, I'd say pretty important.
  48. It comes full circle again by MacDust · · Score: 2, Informative
    If Apple buys Palm, then this will come full circle again.

    Palm was founded by Jeff Hawkins, Ed Colligan, and former Apple employee Donna_Dubinsky. They also brought some programmers from Apple on board. Later they left and formed Handspring, then Handspring was bought by Palm.

    Their histories are similar to Apple's so it would not be out of the question for Apple to buy Palm and use their technologies.

    Steve Jobs and Steve Woz create Apple. Steve Jobs leaves and creates NeXT. Apple buys NeXT. Former Apple employees create Palm. Palm founders leave, create Handspring. Palm buys Handspring. Apple buys Palm? Their histories and people are intertwined.

  49. Re:Apple, show Palm some ARM goodness... by mrchaotica · · Score: 2

    Palm owns BeOS. I don't know how this would particularly benefit Apple at this point, though. BeOS was interesting because of it's database filesystem, threading support, single-user focus, and ease of use -- which sounds a lot like what the Newton was good at (perhaps minus the threading). On one hand, BeOS is probably a bit redundant given that Apple already has the old Newton code and the new OS X code, but on the other hand it would make an excellent base for a modern handheld computer (which is probably why Palm bought it earlier -- it's just too bad they never did anything with it).

    --

    "[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz

  50. Perfect? Like Neck stretched over chopping block? by Gary+W.+Longsine · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Palm is in the perfect position to build the device.
    There really isn't anything obvious that Palm can offer to such an effort that Apple doen't already have a demonstrated ability to do without Palm.

    In fact, stretched out over the chopping block, Palm really isn't in the perfect postion to do much of anything. Consider what has been thought to be their core asset for many years -- PalmOS, a system designed from the ground up to run on light weight mobile devices. The software quality is crap, and had been for years. Phone vendors are giving up on PalmOS. Palm is giving up on PalmOS. What do they have left? A few patents, a few hardware and software engineers and Grafiti. Well, honestly, I preferred the handwriting recognition in Newton (presently in suspended animation known as InkWell). The quality of other Palm software (which runs on the PC systems they connect with) is even worse, and demonstrates a deep lack of concern for the user experience of their customers. This leads me to suspect that if you scratch the surface, Palm is really not very much Apple-like in corporate culture in many ways.

    No offense intended to those of you who might still work there, but the quality of PalmOS doesn't exactly scream, "Hey, buy the company because you'll get a great engineering team!"

    The point is: There are undoubtedly a few good engineers left at Palm, but Apple can simply hire the good ones. They don't need to buy the company and get layers of clearly innefective mangement, legions of pissed off customers, and legacy technology baggage like PalmOS and HotSync as part of the deal.

    --
    If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
  51. Re:Good for Apply Maybe, good for Palm - NO! by hackerjoe · · Score: 4, Informative
    As for rewriting in Linux - does that mean their current Palm OS is such a dead end that they can't evolve it?

    Yes. I've developed for it before, and it's got cruft coming out of its ears.
    That's true for Palm OS 4. Palm OS Garnet (the first version of the ARM OS) lifts a few of those restrictions, but it's still pretty much a hack.

    But PalmSource has been working on Palm OS Cobalt, their next gen OS, for the last few years. They actually had a preview ready at the Palm Developers' Conference I attended in 2004: it has next-gen databases with a built in sql-like query language, next gen PIM applications, threading, real process separation, berkeley socket networking, well-thought-out security model, etc. It is a Real OS.

    You've been able to get an emulator and tool suite since that conference: if you want, you could develop a new Cobalt app today.

    The problem? No hardware. Since PalmSource didn't have a hardware division anymore, they couldn't force anybody to actually use the OS, and Palm opted short-sightedly to stick with Garnet.

    Thus, the move to Linux, to make the platform more attractive to phone manufacturers. But keep in mind it's just the underlying kernel that's Linux: on top, everything is Cobalt, both to the user and the developer. The advantage is that phone makers can reuse more of their existing software infrastructure (drivers, etc.) if they've been developing Linux phones.
  52. Scratched surfaces by pschmied · · Score: 4, Funny
    This leads me to suspect that if you scratch the surface...

    Was this a subtle dig at the iPod Nano's screen? Do I really want to run a stylus across a screen made by Apple? *ducks*

    -Peter
    --
    . Penguins Surely Ca
  53. Re:Apple, show Palm some ARM goodness... by dgatwood · · Score: 2, Insightful
    I'm making the assumption that the hardware sucks from other people's suggestions about taking the Palm OS and emulating it on better hardware.

    As for me personally, my biggest reason for hating the Palm platform involves repeatedly losing data because I didn't care enough to keep replacing batteries on the thing. For me to ever buy another PDA, the data had better be stored in nonvolatile storage---flash, a hard drive, whatever. There's a reason that computers make a distinction between RAM and more permanent data storage.... :-)

    --

    Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.