That fabulous iPhone kicking Palm Pre won't be coming out for several months, but now that Apple has recently been awarded a 358-page patent covering every nuisance of it's multi-touch software, some people are now predicting that any shiny new Palm Pre may just end up - DEAD ON ARRIVAL!
So, could this really be the end of the Palm Pre and, by extension, the very end of Palm Inc. itself?
Palm was, until the Pre came along, already considered to be an irrelevant dinosaur, and headed for extinction . The Pre was seen as the last hope for the company that first defined the very concept of the smart phone, and the news of the Pre was not only the biggest hit of the recent Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, but it was seen also as being it's very savior. Naturally, all that is in now question because of Apple's recent and official multi-touch patent victory, and who knows, according to some, it might just very well be the end of the once high-flying company. If not the end, than at least it will certainly make it a lot harder for the company and end up having a very detrimental effect on it's stock and it's market evaluation.
Responding to Apple's interim CEO, Tim Cook statement that Apple wouldn't allow anyone to rip off their intellectual property, Palm's, Lynn Fox, however, basically responded by saying that they were not worried about Mr. Cook's remarks - remarks that were seen as being pointed directly and squarely at Palm and their new iPhone killer, the Pre.
Lynn Fox responded to any veiled threats by saying:
“Palm has a long history of innovation that is reflected in our products and robust patent portfolio (31 pages of patents in Google Patent Search), and we have long been recognized for our fundamental patents in the mobile space,” she told Digital Daily, and,
“If faced with legal action, we are confident that we have the tools necessary to defend ourselves.”
Well, when I read that my reaction was - what in hell do you expect her and Palm to say? Of course she would say that, and even though it's obvious that Palm has done a lot of research and possibly holds a ton of patents, it doesn't, in any sense, mean that they have anything to do, what-so-ever, with multi-touch, because clearly, if that were the case, it would have effected the U.S. Patent Office decision when issuing Apple their multi-touch patents!
Palm, in other words - is just blustering, plain and simple!
It doesn't take much of a stretch for some people to imagine where Palm first got the idea's behind the Palm Pre either. It's may even seem obvious, to some, that they got them not only directly from Apple's iPhone, but possibly also from one of it's former chief engineer's, John Rubenstein, and the other Apple engineers that he took along with him to work at Palm. Did John Rubenstein and the others work on or have vital iPhone information? No one is saying if they did, nor do we know for sure, but it certainly raises some valid concerns. I personally can't say, because frankly I don't know, but I can't say that I blame anyone for thinking that way.
The Palm Pre, some have pointed out, was the one and only phone that seemed to dare to even tread on ground that other smart phones, such as Google's Android based phones, dared to tread, less they accidentally violated any of the iPhone multi-touch patents.
The Pre is an amazing device, and in some cases, it surpasses even the iPhone itself in certain areas such as it's OS X desktop like touches, it's battery and it's physical keyboard. It's the one phone, other than the iPhone itself, that I personally would love to own, but now - if it looks like what I think it looks like - then either the Palm Pre is about to completely disappear off the face of the earth, or the Pre may legally have to go through a major downgrade, a downgrade that will make it completely unacceptable to those who were expecting what they originally saw demonstrated at CES!
If only Palm would have delivered a phone much closer to Google's excellent Android, or RIM's BlackBerry Storm, which, by the way, is going through a type of storm all of it's own these days, and then, maybe, just maybe the Pre might have had a chance in the market place, but as it stands now, that is beginning to look a little questionable, unless, of course, Palm undertakes drastic action by downgrading the device, stripping it of any or all of it's iPhone like multi-touch capabilities?
Some believe that Apple's failed attempt with it's Newton personal digital assistant is what gave birth to Palm in the first place, but now, the important question is: will Palm's death be because of Apple's success with the iPhone? I'm not sure, but it's certainly possible with Apple's mountains of money and it's now official multi-touch patents, that come this June, it may be that the Pre may either be delivered horribly maimed and hobbled, or worse - it will be delivered dead on arrival!
And that's my 2 cents 4 this Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Palm Pre photo via: Engadget
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