On Tue, 9 Jun 2009, Dean.Benjamin at mm.com wrote:

> Having owned or used neither the Palm Pre nor the iPhone, I have no dog 
> in this fight.  I'll just toss in this article that crossed my path the 
> other day:
>
> FIVE REASONS THE PALM PRE WON'T PREVAIL
> By David Coursey | PC World | 2-Jun-2009
> http://www.infoworld.com/d/mobilize/five-reasons-palm-pre-wont-prevail-733
>
>
> 5. Palm is, effectively, a startup.
>
> 4. Multitasking is not yet a must-have feature for the masses.
>
> 3. Palm doesn't have lots of experience with developers.
>
> 2. The Pre's keyboard could be its undoing.
>
> 1. Palm doesn't have the financing to effectively compete.


I don't know about "prevailing" -- does that mean crushing all 
competition?  I don't want that to happen.  If the phone continues to work 
for 2 years, I'll be quite happy.  If it works for one year, that's 
enough.

I just read the article.  I don't expect Palm to overtake Apple, so I 
agree with that idea (did someone think otherwise).  I guess I'm not 
understanding the point about multitasking.  Having two things open at 
once matters because of what?  I don't use them at exactly the same time, 
but I like that the state of the browser is the same when I return to it 
after a phone call and I don't have to my surfing expedition from scratch. 
So if iPhone can't do that, it has a problem, and if that is 
"multitasking" then I think the author is very wrong in thinking that 
people don't need that -- I could give lots of examples.

The idea about developers is kinda weird.  I think the development system 
on this phone will be excellent and it will attract developers in large 
numbers.  I guess that's just my prediction but it is based on the fact 
that development is done using HTML, CSS and JavaScript, and "everyone" 
knows how to code in those systems.

For what it's worth, Palm is using Amazon's music store.  They are 
promoting it.  They told us that the Pre cannot play tunes with Apple's 
DRM and we should just rip our own CDs or use Amazon.  They have a Pandora 
app that they say the Pandora people coded in a week, and it works great.

Anyway, my feeling is that the Pre is just another piece of technology and 
if I weren't currently looking to dump the old Treo, I wouldn't be all 
that interested.  It's like an iPhone, only different, and it isn't a huge 
step forward, at least not yet.  It's a good little device though I've 
already detected some flaws.

It still would be nice to hear more about Blackberrry.

Mike