Re: [NTLK] New Palm Device (flop?)

On May 31, 2007, at 9:05 AM, Martin Joseph wrote:

> Why would anyone want to pay $500 for a mini laptop that is too
> underpowered to play media, and has Linux of some kind only and an
> unknown processor type/speed?
>
> No thanks, and good by to Palm.
>
> I think Palm is history.

Depends on a lot of things, and the last statement may have been true
without the announcement of the Foleo anyway, but if they get UI
right it could be a device I could use. (Yes, that's a huge 'if')

Why do you say it will be too underpowered to play media? You think
they'll put a processor in it that's slower than the ones they put
into handhelds five years ago? I'd agree that wouldn't make for a
good product, but I don't think that Palm is quite *that* stupid.

It's something that we don't like to say out loud because it might be
misunderstood, but an important part of why we love Newton and
handheld computing in general is not what it does do, but what it
does not do. Because we only get to look at one task at a time it
forces us to focus on our work without constant distraction. Most
people, you look at their desktop or laptop computer and it's a
hellacious mess of application windows. We have half-done tasks all
over the place and we're congratulating ourselves on how well we
multitask when the vast majority of us are making ourselves about a
third as effective as we could be. Newton, despite all the times I've
said, "look, I can do anything on Newt that I can do on my desktop,"
is a more limited platform than a desktop computer and it even was in
1993 when most people had to choose between the equally unreliable
and primitive Mac and Windows platforms of the day.

Simplify matters, take away a few of the options, and suddenly work
life gets a lot easier and we can focus on what we're doing.

I'm NOT saying that's the only appeal; just saying that it is one
factor. And it is a factor that applies to all the other handheld
platforms as well, even the ones that are very poorly designed.

I noticed a few years ago that I didn't do any writing at my desktop
computer. I write a lot of emails, maybe do some blogging, write
instant messages, but if I want to write a piece of documentation, or
a newsletter article, or a short story, even my trusty beloved Mac is
a black hole to my creativity. Get me to a coffeeshop with Newt and
the Newt keyboard, or the Palm with it's fold-up keyboard, or even
either of those with just a stylus, and I can pound out 1500 words in
a morning.

It's not just that the OS only gives me one application view at a
time, the applications themselves don't have as many distractions as
their desktop counterparts. NewtWorks, WordSmith, even Documents To
Go, are all cleaner interfaces to write in than MS Word or OpenOffice
or AppleWorks or Pages or KWord. I can focus and actually get some
writing done. People looked at me funny for tapping away on my little
tiny Palm device, but I got a lot more writing done.

This is the reason I recently bought an eMate--I want a device to
write on. After years of push-button document sync, I have to confess
that I'm daunted by the tasks of converting documents and
transferring them individually if I want to move them from the
desktop to the eMate and vice versa. I'm even more daunted by the
task of having to install software on the eMate in order to be able
to install software on it. Not having a Windows box or pre-OS X Mac,
I'm supposed to use a utility whose name escapes me to install
software, and that utility requires that I install a component onto
the eMate. Someone left their lock de-icer in the glove compartment.

I've used Documents To Go before and have been very happy with it.
Its Palm conduit automatically moves and if necessary translates
documents. If Palm hasn't totally b0rked up the interface when they
translated their OS to a Linux-based version of itself, the Foleo
could be a very useful device: yes, more useful than a laptop, and
for many of the same reasons that a Newton is more useful than a laptop.

Sadly, it's entirely possible--even likely--that in trying to make
Foleo do everything that Palm has shot itself in the usefulness foot.
But I'm not quite willing to write it off based on that assumption.

I have to confess to noticing the irony of Newton people sneering at
the idea that someone might put out a product that's a small,
lightweight, portable computer. And that it will "only" come with
256MB of memory. Of anyone, Newton users should know how much you can
do with 256 MB. Never mind the 4GB SD cards and 16GB CF cards the
thing will take. Sheesh!

Personally, I think that a laptop with no hard drive---even if this
thing is nothing more than that---is a step in the right direction. I
wish the thing would have a touchscreen and allow the keyboard to
swivel around for tablet use; maybe we can hope for those things in a
future generation. In any case it's about time someone started
ripping spinning disks out of "portable" devices. It's truly stupid
design decisions like carrying around a spinning disk that makes the
iPods (other than the shuffle or nano) useless.

Steve

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