POSTED BY

Joel Johnson

AT 8:47 AM
Thursday May 28, 2009

Phones and Wireless

boy genius report • palm • pre

Live fire in the coming Palm Pre flamewar

prepre.jpg

The Boy Genius Report put their juvenile mitts on a Palm Pre. And while they've yet to put up a "full review"—they must need to make a trip to the exclamation mark shop—they blithely share just enough criticism to make a few hearts drop into the stomachs of some Palm executives this morning:

Additionally, things aren't looking good for that QWERTY either. And hey, you know we take them keyboards seriously! When you try and type on the top row of keys, your finger hits the bottom part of the front piece and on top of that, you often hit multiple keys at the same time while typing. It's actually really frustrating and doesn't bode well for such a fantastic social communication/personal/business tool.
Whether it's true or not, that little bit of off-the-cuff will be fuel for a thousand fruitless fanboy flameouts.

Oh, and check this out: Apparently the Pre syncs seamlessly with iTunes. Unlike CNN's Philip Elmer-DeWitt, I'm not exactly sure why this would be a "presumably unauthorized invasion of [Apple's] music store." It doesn't crack the DRM.

15 Comments

FatMatt

#1 – 10:32 AM May 28, 2009

My favorite user comment: "Not very impressed thus far." Posted 5 minutes after a 6-sentence review.

4649

#2 – 11:27 AM May 28, 2009

It doesn't crack the [ current ] DRM.

P.S. I'm 49% sure my tags will turn out wrong. Can we have a Preview button next to the Submit one?

yri

#3 – 11:51 AM May 28, 2009

What I want to know is, will it run my old PalmOS apps? I paid good money for some of 'em...

zuzu

#4 – 11:53 AM May 28, 2009

It's going to be all about the SDK and how fast cool software can be written for the platform, since the hardware itself seems to rock.

Will casual app authors embrace the Sash / Widgets "weblications" route of webOS?

There are plenty of JavaScript / DHTML developers out there who are already interested in "Web 2.0"-style programming. That was Apple's line of thought when they proposed this for their iPhone. Of course, the iPhone was quickly jailbroken to allow developers to write "real" apps, which then spawned Apple's "if you can't beat them, join them" and ultimately creating the famous AppStore which is now the crown jewel in the iPhone marketing.

I suspect the make-or-break will be whether the Palm Pre is "jailbroken" to provide users access to the Linux layer of the operating system. Smartphone users are dying to see apps that provide real functionality that carriers often don't want to provide.

Such as 3G data sharing using the built-in WiFi as a standard access point. No more "tethering" with Bluetooth; the Palm Pre could just be a normal WiFi router.

Or providing an "iTunes Music Sharing" functionality with anyone in range of Bluetooth or WiFi, so that you can copy their music and videos and they can copy yours. This can even be done automatically and transparently so that you can discover new music just from the time you spend in the subway or at the airport.

Or providing ZRTP (Zfone) opportunistic voice encryption so that the NSA can't listen in on your phone conversations.

Or providing a "gaydar" application (using Bluetooth as a proximity alert), or something similar for people who enjoy anonymous sex in quasi-public locales.

yri

#6 – 12:35 PM May 28, 2009

@Brandon - Woo hoo! I'm definitely there, then. Want one now!

And the qwerty keyboard doesn't look any less usable than my Centro's, so I don't imagine that will be a problem.

dculberson

#7 – 1:38 PM May 28, 2009

I was notified today that I could pre-order it. It took me a few minutes of consideration, but I decided to go for it. This is direct from Sprint so hopefully I'll get the phone on the 7th. (They usually next day air our phones.)

Crossing my fingers that it wasn't a mistake! There is the return period (30 days for us, I don't know what's standard) so I'm not stuck with it if it turns out to suck right away.

zuzu

#8 – 7:35 PM May 28, 2009

Apparently the Pre syncs seamlessly with iTunes.

I just saw a screenshot of this, and it looks like that the Palm Pre sufficiently spoofs looking like an iPhone to iTunes that it cannot tell the difference.

(As opposed to some trick of modifying iTunes to recognize the Palm Pre.)

I'm guessing that Palm is rolling the dice on that iTunes doesn't have any DRM yet for challenging whether an iPhone or iPod is "genuine" or not. Whether Apple can add this in the future remains to be seen, as not all iPods may be able to support such a retroactive firmware update. Ultimately the Palm Pre can just emulate being the oldest iPod that cannot support a DRM firmware update.

dculberson

#9 – 8:56 PM May 28, 2009

Nice.

Not that I ultimately really care all that much. I just tolerate iTunes as a method of loading MP3s onto my iPod and at this point if I'm playing them on the computer vastly prefer something simpler like VLC.

kaka

#10 – 4:19 AM August 19, 2009

Not that I ultimately really care all that much. I just tolerate iTunes as a method of loading MP3s onto my iPod and at this point if I'm playing them on the computer vastly prefer something simpler like VLC. PhD economics

kaka

#11 – 4:21 AM August 19, 2009

Not that I ultimately really care all that much. I just tolerate iTunes as a method of loading MP3s onto my iPod and at this point if I'm playing them on the computer vastly prefer something simpler like VLC. distance learning degree

kaka

#12 – 4:22 AM August 19, 2009

not. Whether Apple can add this in the future remains to be seen, as not all iPods may be able to support such a retroactive firmware update. Ultimately the Palm Pre can just emulate being the oldest iPod that cannot support a DRM firmware update. associate degree business

kaka

#13 – 4:23 AM August 19, 2009

Not that I ultimately really care all that much. I just tolerate iTunes as a method of loading MP3s onto my iPod and at this point if I'm playing them on the computer vastly prefer something simpler like VLC.BE degree

kaka

#14 – 4:25 AM August 19, 2009

the computer vastly prefer something simpler like VLC.BE degree Master degrees

Bill G

#15 – 2:45 PM October 14, 2009

I have noticed the same thing with many of the newer phones. The spacing of the keys is just terrible. I am constantly hitting the wrong key and often times the button does not register when pressed. You would think they would make it better. I will agree the I tunes application is nice.
Upton MA Real Estate

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