From: Jim Witte (jswitte_at_bloomington.in.us)
Date: Wed Sep 29 2004 - 22:21:45 PDT
> Well...many, many years ago when I was activly
> involved with the PDA market (The MP2100 just came
> [..] workstation) Popped your Newton in the phone base
> station which was connected to the terminal (one of
> the first of the thin client distros) and
> authenticated with your Newt! [..] Newt went wireless. There were a
> bunch of wireless access points placed everywhere on
> the floor so you were always within range no matter
> were you went.
Automatic authentication? Wireless throughout the building? This
would be when? 96 or 97? What was the state of wireless then?
> When we went to Apple with the order, Apple refused to sell us
> the Newts saying that only authorized Apple stores and
> Newton stores could sell the Newtons...This was
> frustrating...
This is just (excuse my French, as they say) bone-headed. This is
exactly the kind of shunning and non-development of vertical markets
that I wonder if was a big part of the Newton's failure. (sorry for the
mangled grammar - English doesn't seem to have the construction I
want.. :) The apparent inability to see the Newton as much more than
"just" a personal device for "ordinary" people. And yet, there was
*some* vertical market stuff, with Disney, Pfizer, etc. But maybe that
was just company-grown applications, and not the kind of
hardware/software integration you're talking about here.
> We even got a PO and sent a copy to Apple
> but they refused to even consider such a sale...
They refused a sale of hundreds of units? Incredible. No wonder
Scully couldn't make Apple work!
> All technology associated with the Newt was forgotten
> and the world of "what might have been" ended...Oh
> well...
Could companies (large ones, preferably) be persuaded to take on
risks like this again, if (dare I say it) Einstein showed real promise?
Even thoug Palm is an established market-leader, and PocketPC might be
catching up, in terms of features and price-points? Palm is possibly
inferior, but getting better since they've finally decided to get a
faster processor than the DragonBall.. ('DragonBall' always brought to
mind a cute image of a dragon with a shackle around its leg - a
wonderful metaphor for basically a slow 68x00 processor!). PocketPC is
more powerful than Palm, but still clunky, and possibly hard to
program. Large companies also have large amounts of money, and large
armies of lawyers.. Could help with licensing or.. (I won't say more
until I've talked to a local IP law scholar)
Jim
-- This is the NewtonTalk list - http://www.newtontalk.net/ for all inquiries Official Newton FAQ: http://www.chuma.org/newton/faq/ WikiWikiNewt for all kinds of articles: http://tools.unna.org/wikiwikinewt/
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