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Apple and Palm Computing: Take 2?
ChronosX writes "A news.com article provides a hint that Apple is thinking about relaunching a branded handheld product, but isn't interested in developing their own. Who's the only company making an all around solid handheld that fits Apple's easy to use computing philosophy? Why that would be the Pilot, of course. " At the shareholders meeting, Jobs has left open the possibilty of Apple relaunching a handhold, and confirmed that they have talked to 3Com about the Palm division. ApplePilot anyone?
When Cartoon Maker Steve Jobs took over at Apple, and canceled the Newton Inc Spinoff, within 2 weeks 32 members of the Newton development group up an left Apple for Palm computing.
So Palm has almost all of the Newton Engineers. So expect to see Newton features make it into the Palm...as soon as 3com can work out the licencing/clean room code as needed.
Okay, palmOS is great, and I wouldn't trade in my PalmIII (or my PalmPro before that which my g/f now has) for anything. However, PalmOS could be better or be extended.
I'd love to see a PalmOS device the size of a newton with real handwriting recognition. I like the PalmOS application launcher and feel better than newton's. There are times I'd really like to have a fuller sized screen, though, not all the time, however.
Okay, how about a Palm docking station, which adds a bigger screen and maybe a PC Card slot? That would be *COOL*.
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The article states that Jobs confirmed "discussions" with 3com about buying the Palm division. It also said that there was no comment about licensing the palm technology and issuing an apple-branded Palm, like the IBM Workpad.
These rumors are a little too sparse for me, and the two different possibilies outlined would have very different implications.
A sale would be a little unlike Apple-- they've historicly had an acute case of the old NIH syndrome, though this is changing.
A straight licensing deal would be neat, though-- the masses would really dig an iPalm in 5 fruity flavours.
If Apple's write anywhere in normal handwriting HWR makes it in, and some of the Newton UI breakthroughs make it in, I would buy for sure. I've looked at the recent pilots, and I think they're getting close. I'll still use my MP2k for now, but someday it'll need replacing. The best situation would be if 3Com licensed some of the core Apple technologies that made the Newton as good as it was - remember, there was something like $1B invested in that platform.
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The real Paul Vallee is slashdot userid 2192, and, what do you mean it's not cool to point out your low userid?
- biomass - more sales
- funky pilot colors - who wants a green one?
- more apps & s/w dev - conduits and apps to iMac?
- marketing muscle - create demand for biomass
- r&d - faster ways get data from iMac palm to iMac and vicky versa
apples good a grabbing an idea and running with it and marketing it, to 'hell'. If this rumour is true, lets see if they can hook the palm into more yummy consumer products they keep saying they are concentrating onpeterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
we have known about this for a while... supposedly in the rainbow of iMac colors... and based on the Palm Pilot... hence the reason apple pushed so har for the recent MacPak 2 and helped serve it off their FTP servers!
-- Steal Me --
If Jobs does that, only months after cancelling the Newton, I shall beat him to death will my MP2000.
...from this point of view: I've always felt that my PalmPilot bears a kind of spiritual kinship to the old Macs. To start with both are Insanely Great. Then there's the Motorola CPU, the small monochrome display, the cool GUI with its menus and oval buttons. When I dug into the database that the PalmOS uses to store information, it felt a lot like the resource database stored in the System and resource forks of files in MacOS.
So the Pilot has always had a Mac-like feel to me, so the suggestion that Apple might put their logo on it just seems to "fit".
A friend of mine, a fellow who loves the Pilot but hates Macintosh with a passion, was extremely distressed when I pointed out the similarities. I thought the poor fellow was going to be ill.
--JT
I've always felt the PalmPilot succeeded and the Newton failed because the Pilot was originally very focused on just doing what was really needed and not too much else. Not that Newton was a mess or anything, but I thought it was a bit too ambitious and consequently, too expensive.
With all the changes and the growth of the Palm platform lately, I hope Palm and Apple remember that the Pilot was great because it was primarily focused on needs instead of technology.
-- John Truong
I think this is extremely cool news. The newton was a great device then, and now. I have a PalmIII and i totally love it, and I saw the newton many times, great functionallity...plus, there was a Web Server written for the Newton. Wireless modem connection, and the webserver on a newton...host some pages in a subway
I think it makes a lot of sense for Apple to license the Palm and issue an 'enhanced' Pilot.
The problem that Palm has is that it is squarely in the sights of MS, who is working hard to squeeze it out of the market much like the have done with every other competitor. I don't like the signs already - look at the Magazine rack, and what you seen in the way of marketting in the Palm computing arena.
// On a clear disk you can seek forever