I am sure I am not the only one who experiences the burning
compulsion to regularly purchase new pieces of electronics. For me, the
urge comes about every three to six months and burns white hot. Over
the last year, I have purchased about 7 computers, 8 PDAs, and
countless electronic bits.
I am the ideal market for the services of
eBay, which fortunately keeps me from going broke, as one purchase
becomes a sale, which leads to another purchase. The exciting piece for
me is opening the equipment boxes and the initial work determining how
it fits into my lifestyle.
Few of my acquisitions survive the initial play period. Some notable
products were my Newton 2100, iPaq, Palm VX, and Rio Volt CD/MP3
player. I can only attribute this behavior to my genetic predisposition
as a hunter-gatherer. As I need do very little hunting or gathering to
sustain life, I have to find a way to fill that void.
About three months ago, my year old Rio Volt breathed its last
breath and went to the great broken parts pile in the sky. This was
problematic, as one of my hobbies is listening to Old Time Radio shows
from the 30s-70s, and the Volt allowed me to listen to those shows as I
fell asleep at night.
In the interim, I used my iPaq as a replacement and found I very
much enjoyed using a machine that did not require CD platters. The iPaq
option and a 1 GB microdrive allowed me to more elegantly work
through my 3000-hour playlists. As I looked at my current electronic
gadgets, it became apparent that the iPaq had become an MP3 player and
nothing more.
With my workplace's reliance on Lotus Notes (ugh), I was never able
to replace my aging Palm as my main PDA. I realized that the iPaq
really was underutilized and not the perfect tool for the job. On to
eBay to sell my iPaq and look for new options. The new option was the
small piece of Apple heaven, the iPod.
A few hours before the Superbowl, I drove the Dallas Apple store and
grabbed an iPod. I paid about $20 more than I would have online, but I
was happy to finally drive some revenue through the store (my computers
were online buys). I rushed home, and in a matter of about 30 minutes I
had filled the drive with around 3 GB of radio shows, 1.5 GB of
music, and 500 MB of document backups.
For those of you who have not held one, the iPods are a wonderful
example of the Apple design sense. Simple to use with a stunning,
albeit Spartan, appearance. This machine is a joy to carry and use.
They are built around a 5 GB Toshiba PC Card-sized hard drive, a
32 MB cache, and a third party OS. As I examined the machine more, I
started to think of other applications for this technology.
I am a PDA evangelist, supporting the idea of digital assistant at
every turn. I have used machines from Psion, Palm, Apple, Compaq, HP,
LG Electronics, NEC, and countless others. I have used Newton OS, Palm
OS, Pocket PC, and Psion OS. In each of these machines I found
strengths and flaws. Many of you commented on a previous article I
wrote, The Case for the Apple PDA.
To summarize my main points:
- Apple users want an Apple branded PDA (we want Newton, but that is
a dead horse)
- Apple needs a way to reach business users
- Palm has a huge installed base in the business market
- Palm is hurt by lack of innovation
- Palm is financially strapped
- Apple should buy Palm and innovate the Palm line, thereby
purchasing a market space.
As I rolled the iPod in my hand, I envisioned the current Palm OS
and a screen encompassing the entire face of the unit. The iPod
controls would be replaced by onscreen controls. The user would have a
Palm-based machine with the largest hard drive capacity of any PDA, the
ability to play MP3s, and fast synching via FireWire. I know the
machine would need other connectivity options (maybe USB 2.0) but let
me ignore that for the moment.
Once Apple has reentered the market, they could begin work on the
new OS for the Palm organizer. The current problems at Palm revolve
around a lack of innovation in the OS. Users of three- and
four-year-old machines have no real compelling reason to upgrade, as
the OS has remained virtually identical over the last few years. This
is an issue that Apple dealt with until the release of OS X. How
do we compel users to upgrade when our existing machines were quality
designs and our OS is relatively unchanged over time?
Palm has split its OS division in the hopes of saving its corporate
life and giving them time for an OS X-type innovation. On a side
note, Palm purchased Be Incorporated, so we assume some of the good
things from BeOS will survive in the next Palm OS. The big question is
whether innovation will come too late to save the Palm as we know it.
Apple has the ability to provide a financial cushion and innovative
thinking around a market segment they invented prematurely in the late
90s.
Create a unit similar to the fictitious iWalk with a built in
acceptance in the enterprise markets. Business users who enjoyed the
ubiquity of the Palm OS will begin to buy Palm products from Apple.
Apple will add the features they request, while allowing them to
continue working with the Palm OS they know and love. Business users
owning older Palm-based machines would find themselves working with
Apple support and looking to Cupertino for product announcements and
updates. They would become part of the family - slowly at first before
finally running full stride to the Apple stores.
They will then buy PowerBooks and iMacs, run OS X, and replace Windows
NT and midrange servers with OS X Server and dual-processor Power
Macs. They will quit buying Office and use AppleWorks, delete Access in
favor of FileMaker. Windows sales will drop to all-time lows as users
buy more copies of OS X and learn a bit of Unix at the same time.
We will no longer support lowest common denominator computing
experiences.
Peter Gabriel will reform Genesis, the Texas Rangers will win the
World Series, the Dow will break 25,000, we will land on Mars, world
hunger will end.
Amazing what can grow from one little MP3 player.
It is good to have a dream. 
