Palm

The common wisdom is that dominant products eventually are replaced by a better competing product. Wordstar eventually gave way to WordPerfect and Microsoft Word. VisiCalc was replaced by Lotus 1-2-3 which itself was eventually replaced by Microsoft Excel. Nokia, RIM, and Microsoft based smartphones have been surpassed by iPhone and Android phones. There are, however, some apparent exceptions to the rule. Microsoft Word and Excel gained dominance in the mid-1990s and are still at the top of their categories. Apple’s iPod appeared in late 2001 and has only recently been challenged by Apple’s own touch screen devices (iPod touch and iPhone).

I once believed that Android and other mobile platforms would give Apple’s iPad a run for its money (literally). But, the only two serious tablet competitors to enter the market so far, Samsung’s Galaxy Tab and Motorola’s Xoom, have not appeared to threaten the iPad or, more importantly, the iPad 2 which was released this past weekend. So, HP’s release date and pricing for their webOS based TouchPad is quite interesting.

TouchPad set for a June release, priced from $499; 7-inch coming in September? (pre|central)

HP’s June release date not only gives the iPad 2 to build up its already considerable head of steam, it also gives the Motorola Xoom (Android) lots of time to establish itself as the main iPad alternative. RIM’s PlayBook still looks like a niche player appealing mostly to BlackBerry users. The $499 pricing for the TouchPad’s 16GB WiFi-only model squares it off directly with Apple’s low-end iPad 2 offering in terms of both price and storage. HP needs to rethink its pricing strategy if it wants to take away some iPad 2 marketshare. It needs to drop its entry level model to $399 or, even better, $299 to make people ask themselves if they would like to save $200 to get a product with fewer apps and no siginificant peripheral ecosystem.

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My unplanned topic theme for this fine March 10 morning appears to be mobile platforms beyond the smartphone. RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook and the disappearance (in name only) of Ubuntu Netbook Remix came up first. Next? HP’s webOS – which started out in life as Palm’s next generation smartphone platform. Here’s what Engadget reported:

WebOS will be on ‘every HP PC’ shipping next year, says CEO

If webOS is actually placed on every HP PC shipped in 2012 (mostly like as a parallel installation with Microsoft Windows), it will still be a blow to Microsoft from one its oldest and largest hardware partners.

The appearance of a mobile device platform like webOS on a desktop PC presents an interesting counterpoint to Microsoft’s current strategy of using their desktop Windows 7 platform on tablets. Apple’s iOS, Google’s Android, and HP/Palm’s webOS are all lightweight mobile operating system migrating to larger hardware. Microsoft is the lone player with the opposite strategy.

BlackBerry will soon find out if their mobile engine switch to QNX for their first tablet (instead of the BlackBerry OS that powers their phones) will pay off next month. BGR reports that the BlackBerry PlayBook launches in a little over a month from now.

BlackBerry PlayBook launching on April 10th

Meanwhile, BGR reports that HP believes that the PlayBook merely copies their own webOS powered Touchpad. HP spent $1.2 billion to buy Palm and their webOS mobile platform.

HP calls BlackBerry PlayBook a webOS ripoff; RIM responds

2011 is shaping up as the year of the tablet. Motorolla launched the first Android OS 3.0 powered tablet just last week. RIM and HP are queuing for their own tablet releases. Microsoft’s Windows 7 tablets have quietly made their way into the market. Meanwhile the 800 pound gorilla in the form of the iPad 2 launches on March 11. Given Apple’s huge successful headstart and rich app library, I predict only ond and perhaps two of the alternative tablet platforms will be around two years from now.

When we first learned about HP’s webOS (Palm) based TouchPad tablet a few weeks ago, we did not have a price or firm release date. The soft availability date was sometime this summer.

HP Palm TouchPad: Dual-core, Webcam, webOS, Inductive Charging – No Price

DigiTimes reports an availability date quite a bit before summer 2011, however.

HP to start selling WebOS 3.0-based TouchPad in April

Does a webOS tablet stand a chance against Apple’s iPad and the coming deluge of Android OS 3.0 based tablets? And, what about RIM’s QNX based PlayBook? As for Microsoft’s Windows 7 as a tablet platform? Hmm.

Palm launched the original Palm Pre line in 2009. It developed a small but loyal group of admirers but not enough to save Palm. Palm is now part of HP and relaunched its webOS powered line with the Palm Pre 2 this month. Mobile web developer Peter-Paul Koch bought a Pre 2 to take a closer look at its WebKit powered interface. However, if his initial start-up process experience is a typical one, the Pre 2′s future might not be very bright. He write about this experience on his blog Quirksmode.org:

Palm’s amazingly user-hostile sign-up process

There are really two main complaints:

1. Initial phone use is gated by a sign-up process.
2. Using an existing account (and old one) with a forgotten password leads to more difficulty than should exist.

Check out his blog for the full detailed description of the sign-up process. Can any other new Pre 2 owners confirm Peter-Paul Koch’s report?

The HP TouchPad webOS-based tablet received most of the buzz yesterday. However, HP also announced two other webOS products.

HP Veer

HP Pre³

The Veer is a tiny phone (3.5-inches tall) with a 2.6-inch display (320×400 pixels) and a pull-down QWERTY keyboard. It has a 5 megapixel camera (but no front-facing webcam), 8GB memory (6.5 available for use) and can be used as a mobile hotspot. The word “veer” means a change in direction. I’m not sure I see much of a change of direction in this product aside from its small size. It will be available sometime this Spring for an unspecified price.

The Pre3 (I’m not going to bother superscripting the “3″) is essentially a bigger version of the Veer. The Pre3 has a larger but not huge display by today’s standards: 3.58-inch with a 480×800 pixel resolution. It has a 5 megapixel rear camera and, unlike the Veer, a 640×480 pixel front facing webcam. Neither the Veer nor the Pre3 provides NFC (Near Field Communications) support. Models with 8 or 16GB storage will be available. Its availability is listed as sometime this summer. No price information is available.

Given the lack of “wow” hardware features, the Veer and Pre3 need to be in the $75 to $125 price tiers in order to draw attention to themselves. And, given their launch schedule, they will be competing with Apple’s next generation iPhone 5. This does not paint a pretty picture for their futures.

The Palm (when it was still and independent company and not part of HP) caused quite a buzz at CES 2009 when it introduced the Palm Pre, its webOS operating system, and the TouchStone inductive charging system. The buzz had largely fizzled out by the time the Palm Pre launched mere weeks before the iPhone 3GS. As sales failed to meet expectations, Palm itself started to fade away and was eventually scooped up by HP.

That leads us to this week when HP announced a new form factor (tablet) for webOS.

HP TouchPad (HP Palm product site)

Like the Pre, it features a unique graphical interface and connector-less inductive charging. It has a 9.7-inch capacitive multitouch display like the iPad with a 1024×768 pixel resolution. It features the usual assortment of sensors (Light sensor, accelerometer, compass (magnetometer), and gyroscope) but does not provide NFC (Near Field Communications). This is not a big gap issue for a tablet, however. It has a front-facing camera for video calling but does not have a rear camera. This eliminates it as a vehicle for Augmented Reality apps. It does, however, feature a dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor which should provide zippy performance. It looks like HP has given up on the iTunes compatibility fight that Palm fought with Apple. HP promotes their HP Movie Store for movie downloads.

The TouchPad announcement was missing two critical pieces of information: A firm launch date (“this summer”) and a price. It also has one more problem: If the iPad 2 launches before it does, the TouchPad will be competing with the first generation iPad and not whatever “wow factor” Apple throws into the iPad 2.

Imagine this bit of fiction: Nokia sees Symbian fading into the sunset with MeeGo a distant platform replacement. So, they turn to Microsoft, buys the intellectual property for the failed Kin and launch a new line of phones in 2011: Nokia Kin. This is clearly ridiculous, right? So, how should we receive this news from Reuters:

HP to launch new webOS phones in early 2011

Palm’s webOS showed more market strength than Microsoft’s Kin. But, only a bit more. And, eventually, Palm had to find someone to rescue them. HP has already driven two great mobile brands, their own Jornada and Compaq’s iPaq, from market leaders to non-entities. So, will the third time be the charm? Or, will it be three strikes and you’re out.

Images courtesy of Disqus

If you manage a blog (and who doesn’t these days?), you’ve probably had to deal with comment-spam as well as moderating the comment stream. Disqus (pronounced “discuss”) provides a free web comment management service that not only makes these tasks much easier but also lets you move your comments if you ever change your blog platform.

Disqus released apps for Android, iPhone, and Palm webOS that lets users of those mobile platforms manage blog comments.

Disqus Mobile: Moderate on the go

I do not see the Disqus iPhone app in the iTunes App Store (not to be confused with the $2.99 DisqusPro for Disqus). However, the Disqus app is available (and free) in the Android Market. The app lets you approve, delete, mark as spam, or reply to a blog comment. It also lets you look at the blog item in a browser to see a comment in context.

Fellow blogger Frank McPherson, like me, is not a heavy duty game player. But, he gave mobile game phenomenon Angry Bird a try on his iPad and his Android-based Nexus One (beta release on that platform).

Slinging Angry Birds

How much of a phenomenon is this addictive puzzle game? Check out this item I wrote earlier this month.

Wow! The $6+ Million Dollar Bird: Angry Bird for iPhone/iPad’s Amazing Sales

Those of you with some model of Palm Pre can now join the rest of us (yes, I plunked down 99 cents for Angry Birds on my iPhone 4). Palm announced that Angry Birds can be found in their App Catalog after you update webOS to 1.4.5.

1.4.5 x 2 = another flock of Angry Birds