Newton was killed by a combination of:
* poor expectations management of the initial product launch
Until the second incremental improvement in HWR, much of the bad
press it got was reasonable. "Grafitti" was a necessity, but once
the HWR was improved, the Grafitti folk decided they could create
their own platform. Which lead to the next issue.
Had Apple chosen not to hype it so much and aim it at vertical
markets before trying to make it a horizontal product, this might
been managable. Apple is, however, a consumer product company and
the CEO at the time (Scully) was a consumer product marketer
(Frito-Lay). Insert the obvious line about hammers and nails here.
* bad price point
The market would tolerate a $800-900 device if and only if it could
demonstrate real gains over a $400 device. The MP was most notibly
larger than the Palm and since it (for most people) didn't actually
replace the "Day Timer" they were carrying around anyway, it didn't
seem to have the gains needed to justify the price.
Microsoft might succeed because they have shown themselves willing to just keep
throwing money at a problem until they get the results they want. The Tablet PC
is the what, fifth incarnation of the Pocket PC? Yes, I know it's not the same
software, but it is the same approach and involves the same interface choices.
And this works well for Microsoft -- they only have to pay the software
development and some of the marketing costs. Who gets screwed on these deals
are the hardware manufacturers -- they have to run the production lines, the
distribution networks, etc. Philips (for example) got very badly burned on the
Nino, and it's problems were the problems of the Pocket PC environment, not the
particular manufacturing of the Nino.
That's my $0.02.
--On Thursday, November 14, 2002 7.44 -0800 Katarina Gubler
<bubbles9413_at_yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> You know, it is very strange to me. There are so many people on this list
> and around the world that love Newtons. There are user groups all over the
> Internet and there are meetings everywhere, Germany, Canada, etc. What
> happened to the Newton? I have seen the new Newtonesque item MS is coming
> out with...do any of us think that this will last? I mean if it will run
> Windows~of course it will~imagine the bugs and the blue screens of death!!
>
> Any insite?
>
> Kat-
-- | Kenton A. Hoover | | | Private Citizen | +1.415.850.5924 | | San Francisco, California USA | shibumi_at_marchordie.org | +================== http://kc6sst.marchordie.org ==================+ | "You leg wound people, you're so sensitive! Can't you just | | get over it?!?" |-- This is the NewtonTalk list - http://www.newtontalk.net/ for all inquiries List FAQ/Etiquette/Terms: http://www.newtontalk.net/faq.html Official Newton FAQ: http://www.chuma.org/newton/faq/
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