

Palm apologizes to JWZ - jbellis
http://benzilla.galbraiths.org/2009/09/29/thoughts-on-palm-and-jamie-zawinski/

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chaosmachine
"We are sorry that Jamie feels the way he does..."

Classic non-apology.

~~~
halo
True, but I doubt anyone really gives a damn about the sincerity of the
apology, rather people care about whether Palm will actually fix the issues
raised.

The fact they've acknowledged and responded to jwz's post at all is a good
sign.

~~~
fauigerzigerk
The fact that a company responds when their reputation is at stake is little
more than a confirmation that the company exists :-)

I fail to see what's so difficult about designing an online store for
software. It appears to me that all the problems arise because they go to
great lengths to take away as many freedoms and responsibilities from users
and developers as they possibly can.

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swilliams
That's great and all, but Palm _really_ can't afford situations like this. If
they want to be a viable alternative to the iPhone, then they need to not
behave like Apple when it comes to App Store crappiness.

Rather than trying to emulate Apple, they need to have a clear difference and
pound on it: "Oh, you think the Apple App Store sucks? Check out Palm, we
treat you right!"

~~~
jbellis
I imagine that's why they just hired two directors of developer relations.

~~~
masklinn
Except "relation managers" are irrelevant when actions blow goats.

Sending a PR director to a guy whose family you just shot isn't going to help
much.

~~~
jbellis
I used to work with the new directors, and they're not the sorts to take a
powerless figurehead kind of job, so I'm betting they have the authority to
Fix Stuff That Sucks. Time will tell.

------
cousin_it
_Lundin Crast said, "And where is the analysis?"_

 _"That," replied Hardin, "is the interesting thing. The analysis was the most
difficult of the three by all odds. When Holk, after two days of steady work,
succeeded in eliminating meaningless statements, vague gibberish, useless
qualifications - in short, all the goo and dribble - he found he had nothing
left. Everything canceled out."_

 _"Lord Dorwin, gentlemen, in five days of discussion didn’t say one damned
thing, and said it so you never noticed. There are the assurances you had from
your precious Empire."_

\- Isaac Asimov, "Foundation"

~~~
DrJokepu
I really like that quote! Ever since I first read that book I always think of
that quote when I read similar press releases. I didn't realize that I wasn't
the only one!

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artsrc
So did they say - here is how we are going to be:

1\. 10 times more open than google in terms of empowering independent
developers and the owners of phones.

2\. 10 times better in terms of user experience than Apple.

Or did they just say "we are seriously second rate".

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mcantelon
So... why should I invest in a platform whose app store is "beta" (which seems
to be synonymous with unaccountable in this context) and haven't said when it
will be out of "beta"?

~~~
angusgr
Yeah, I was wondering about this too.

Palm seem to have decided they can ape Apple with this - launch the awesome
new phone first, come out with a third party developer platform second.

The problems are, of course:

* Apple had Mobile Safari, so you could build iPhone-specific content (with restrictions, but still "iPhone" specific) from day one.

* Apple was there first. They got to take their time to find their strategy. Today, both iPhone & Android platforms have App Stores. Palm needs to compete with that up-front (for both developers & for users.)

... and "brand new platform", "ironing out bugs", "great user experience",
yadayadayada. Someone high up decided it wasn't a launch day (or launch
quarter, maybe even launch year) priority.

~~~
eli
Given the choice between launch without an app store or wait and fall even
farther behind, whaddya gonna do.

~~~
angusgr
Sure. My question is, what led to that situation happening in the first place?

~~~
eli
Hey, this is the same company that was bragging about their growing
marketshare in the PDA market in _2006_. That's PDAs, not smartphones.

I'm impressed they made it this far.

~~~
jmtulloss
Palm of 2006 and Palm of 2009 have hardly more than the name in common.

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epall
...poorly

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callahad
How long before these app store policies start making their way into primary
computing devices? It seems like a small jump from an iPhone to an Apple
Tablet, and from there the subnotebook space is not too far out of reach.

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jsz0
Now if only Palm could figure out how to offer an option to change your
default notification sound to something loud enough to actually hear. It's
great the Pre can do e-mail, SMS, multi-task, etc but when it's in my pocket
and I can't hear any of the notification sounds so it's useless. It might as
well be a late 90's style dumb flip phone at that point.

------
chanux
Don't believe till things really happen.

