back to article Fanbois will abandon iPhone for Palm, says Wikisugardaddy

Once their current wireless contracts are up, each and every iPhone owner will switch to the Palm Pre. Or so says the ever-entertaining top-secret Wikicult sugar-daddy Roger McNamee. McNamee's U2-powered private equity firm, Elevation Partners, owns 39 per cent of a certain non-Apple handheld-device company. Bloomberg …

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  1. Ed

    Apps

    If people switch to Palm (or any other non-apple) phone, they've lost all their apps they've bought. That seems like a substantial disincentive...

  2. Nicholas Ettel
    Linux

    iPhone vs Pre

    I'm taking bets right now on who wins this show down. I'm not voting for Palm - it might be a stellar product, but it's two years too late. I highly doubt Apple's market share will be greatly affected.

    (PS I don't even like the iPhone; I rather enjoy my G1.)

  3. Seán

    U2 are wankers

    I hope they lose every red cent.

  4. Mick F
    Thumb Down

    Apps

    most people don't "buy" apps. They download rubbish and then never use it.

    I am sure as contracts come up a lot of people will switch to pay-as-you-go for the next few years or move on to the next fad.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    True, true? (Well at least partly?)

    I have an iPhone and I am also looking for a Windows Mobile 6+ device partly because of:

    (a) Windows 7

    (b) Office mobile

    (c) syncing between iDisk and Entourage/Outlook (it's stll iffy if experience is anything to go by)

    and mostly

    (d) Wot! No iWorks or full iDisk ir iLife on the iPhone?

    Interim conclusion: no iWorks on the iPhone = need Windows mobile device for Office Mobile > a lot of faffing about.

    No Number, Pages, Keynote (heck I'd settle for Numbers and Pages) = not good for me but good for the manufacturers?

  6. jai

    um... 3G?

    not sure this guy has a clue

    of all of us who rushed out and bought the gen1 iphone 18 months ago, how many of us also then queued up last summer to get the 3G? how many more 3Gs have been sold than gen1 iPhones and who's contracts won't be ending in July??

    and also, what are the odds that there'll be a 3rd iPhone out this summer that all us "fanbois" will pick up instead of the Pre?

  7. Anonymous Coward
    IT Angle

    Minded about ...

    a concept dutifully dubbed as "superset proprietary partitioning'

    Note that most ISPs or cloud initiatives will give one a calendar, to do listings, contact list, ... yet all of these proprietary things are caged in and will not talk or share well across the proprietary division.

    So, one wonders, how many of us end users are really over enthralled and thralled at the prospect of having to re-enter contact or calendar info umpteen times?

    Or perhaps we are superbly enthused at seeing a contact list of 170 contact details suddenly increased to 400+ with duplicates, triplicates and a few fandangoes thrown in to boot?

    Maybe another, perhaps an end user centric?, marketing model will be a pleasant evolution in the 21st C?

    No major hit on Apple intended (their stuff tends in the main to integrate pretty well if one overlooks iWork and iPhone things) but a jolly good rethink on proprietary-ness of superset functionality might be advantageous to those that wish to use the stuff in a daily and meaningful way?

  8. Julian Cook
    Jobs Halo

    no

    no i will not

  9. Pete "oranges" B.
    Unhappy

    A pity really...

    Palm was one of the only companies to really take the idea of the independent handheld platform anywhere commercially. While I'll take a good long look at Palm's Pre in the weeks following release day, it's sad to see their product line go totally web centric and cloudy.

    Is it so unreasonable to ask for a good handheld that's useful when it's on its own?

  10. ceedee
    Happy

    Valuable insight

    My E65 contract finished last month so I'm actively researching non-Apple phones, have a small pile of worthless currency to spend and am conditioned to a £30/18mth contract.

    I'd been seriously considering hanging on for the Pre to make it's appearance rsn but on the basis of this prat's complete cluelessness, I'm much more likely to opt for the HTC Magic next month instead.

    Nice one, wanker!

    Bet Palm are *delighted* by his claims...

  11. Valan Chan

    SO?

    How many people still have a Edge iPhone?

    Wasn't there an upgrade deal?

    As I remember people were not sure 2 yrs ago if the iPhone would be a success.

    Great marketing but little to do with reality.

    Valan

  12. John

    As an iPhone developer

    I have a lot of stake in the success of the iPhone but the Pre is the only one that's really had that same wow feeling the first time I saw it. I don't know, I don't think he'll be completely right as the Pre isn't THAT much better (it's also hard to tell how good the touch screen is) but I think it will be a big success.

    Either way we're making our apps cross-platform with these competitors now as best we can.

  13. Bod

    Unlikely

    As much as I'm not raving fan of Apple, there's no way there will be mass desertion. Apple fans will just buy the next new Apple product, no matter what it is. So long as it looks cool on the coffee table or office desk.

    Palm may have a good device though. We'll have to see. Problem is the market is going to be flooded with similar devices by then, making the iPhone and the Palm fairly average. The Apple fans will be looking for something else rather than a sexy phone.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Go

    we'll see

    I am rooting for Palm Pre, but it's way too early to tell.

    Pre is more of a "social" and "communication" device, but it's bound to have a lot of network chatter and with slow connection speeds it could take a hit. We don't know how often it syncs with the servers etc.

    And there is the application support: will any apps have lower level access? I'm talking about skype and its ilk, games, document handling software, alternate video players etc.

    Will it have desktop sync? If so, how successful will it be? Will I be able to sync documents and Outlook PIM stuff, without Exchange, and without the hit-and-miss-and-bang-head-on-table problems of iphone or the S60?

    I totally love the form factor and the sliding keyboard. No microSD support may suck for some, but 8gigs is enough for me.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I hope McNamee likes humble pie

    specifically Ballmer iPhone Prediction flavor

  16. Matthew Sinclair
    Thumb Down

    Palm is a very old person

    That needs to have its plug pulled..and taken off life support.

  17. Graham Lockley

    Shame

    I really fancied a Pre then along comes a tosser like this making dumb statements that will make anything less than stellar sales seem like a failure. Lets hope a little common sense prevails when it launches.

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    What?

    But...... THe Pre is not a WIndows Device. Pundits have long since ruled that MS will take over the mobile market. No wait -- Android is supposed to "take over". Or was it the iPhone that was going to conquer all?

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    give up my iPhone and play with my Palm

    Am I the only one that gets the dirt little comment Wikisugardaddy just made about his Palm? I guess without apps and no iPhone and just sitting there with my Palm I might get a bit curious.

    Paris, she likes to watch.

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    ATT Ball and Chain

    Remember the ridiculous and inescapable ATT phone plan fees for the iPhone. If Sprint offers a cheaper plan (and Sprint data network is apparently not bad), many will drop the ATT chained iPhone for the Palm Pre.

  21. shoong
    Alien

    3g is meaningless

    3G is just a name, it's no different from the previous gen. also, the phone haptic is at least 5 times better than iphone -_- you americans are so deprived

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Halo

    Bleh

    None of the many iPhone-using friends even consider dropping the iPhone. They are all happy, and I am just waiting until my carrier decides to deliver it as well.

    Only that stupid biased investor and the good ol' anti-Apple nerdish fanboys here at The Reg think that the Palm is gonna supersede Apple anyhow...the iPhone is here to stay and lead, as did the iPod. Back at ya, suckers!

  23. David Kairns

    Good, I hope Palm cranks

    Get rid of some of the shoddy, cheap, **overpriced** hardware Apple likes to spread around like rancid butter.

  24. Bad Beaver
    Paris Hilton

    Who cares?

    I did not get an iPhone. You know why? Because I live in Germany and T-Mobile's iPhone plans are a substantial rip-off. That, combined with the many shortcomings of the phone, makes it a no-go (and while I am too old to still be a fanboy I am a longtime Mac user, I *wanted* to like it). Now the Pre fixes A LOT of the shortcomings of the iPhone. A lot. But if it is tied to absurd plans that curtail my choice, I will not get it.

    If Palm manages to avoid this snare, I might even be willing to look over the fact that the Pre is encased in glossy plastic. Yet in the same way as I am too much of a rational person to opt for a funky THENUSHIT! device that doesn't do a lot of what I actually need, I am not willing to pay many times the price of the device over the four years I usually get out of a phone.

    Palm needs to realize that they will neither outsell Apple on features (most folks don't care. Look at them, they bought iPhones) nor on Cool (they don't have any outside of geek-circles). They need to combine a compelling device with the ability to get it at a good price — without strings attached.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Nope...

    I've seen "...the Pre is a good phone." a couple of times. How do you know? It's not on general release. Ah. It's not Apple, ergo it's good. I admit it look's to be a good phone, a rip off perhaps, but name an IT products company that doesn't these days. Then there are the "ATT suck" brigade. AFAIK ALL mobile phone operators suck, generally though these guys tend to be the "if I own it/use it, it's the best" kind of people. Not worth paying too much attention. As for the haptics chap; you've heard/seen someone say that and not fully grasped it's meaning. Haptics (sometimes said as haptic feedback) are a physical sensation - applied forces, vibration or motion - think rumble pack on a games console. RIM tried it with the Storm and it's 'clickable' screen. That went down well, didn't it?! I personally think that the Pre will take some of the "I've got to have the latest device" crowd, but I think it'll hit the Nokia/Win Mobile/Android market harder.

  26. TeeCee Gold badge
    Coat

    The PR those quotes came from.

    Did it come in a package marked "Warning, contains nuts"?

  27. Matt Taylor
    Go

    hmmmm

    I Love the fact that all the manufactures say how awful the iPhone is, but yet everyone wants to copy what it has achived so far. Good touch screen phone and an app store. Show me one phone company not trying to copy this?

    Remeber this is still Apple's first phone (ish) and the other big boys have been at it for years.....Also palm pre looks gay.

  28. Matt Bradley
    Flame

    @Pete B

    "Is it so unreasonable to ask for a good handheld that's useful when it's on its own?"

    No, it's not unreasonable: rather, it's just plain daft. A phone is PORTABLE COMMUNICATIONS DEVICE. Surely a portable communications device should be designed to operate on a mobile communication network. This being the case, it it really so far out for it to synchronise data and apps via the network?

    in fact, a portable communications device which isn't connected and is "on its own" is, by definition, already useless.

    That not to say, of course that you *can't* use the phone without connectivity or access to the cloud - but why on earth would you want to?

  29. Gary F

    Pre? Palm? Who the hell are they??

    So Palm think another copycat, iphone wannabe is going to make all the iPhone users just chuck their devices in the bin.

    These people are seriously deluded.

    Famous brands like Google and Blackberry have failed in their attempts to win the market with "me too" phones.

    The general buying public don't even know who Palm is, and the sensible tech savvy who have heard of them have long since walked away from their outdated hardware and operating system.

    This is not even taking into account that Apple will no doubt release a new iteration of the iPhone which will totally eclipse the Pre.

    It will generate huge publicity and then huges queues at mobile phone shops. The iPhone is STILL the only phone to generate enough excitement for that.

    Woohoo, the Google phone is out. Look at the queues and excitement...... Oh, there isn't any.

    As much as it rankles the nerdcore, people actually LIKE and want the iPhone. Go ahead and talk about the crap camera, lack of MMS, lack of copy and paste etc. Then go look up comparative sales and marketshare whilst you cry onto your crappy, wannabe google phone.

    Only now are the competition even coming close to the usabilty and user friendliness of the iPhone.

    If the next iPhone launched with a 10mp camera, video recording, MMS, copy and Paste and a free beer cooler, it would be interesting to see all the haters scramble around to desperately find reasons to despise it again.

    Look at me. I'm a geek, I hate Apple and I've got a Pre. Nobody else has, and the OS is clumsy and old, but at least it isn't an iPhone, Aren't I cool?

    No, you're not.

    And you never will be.

    No matter what languages you can code in or how many MP3s you've downloaded from bit torrents.

    And hating things just because they are popular definitely does NOT make you cool, just as liking them doesn't either.

  30. John Chadwick

    Dream on.

    Why would I actually want to move to a Palm. Why would you want to change, Palm were good devices for their time, I have two old ones that lie unused in my draw. My iPhone does everything they did, and nearly everything I want it too. I like it far more than my old Windows mobile (XDA & XDA Exec), but they aren't the same, apart from the fact that neither of them have a bluetooth modems. I would have thought thought, that they are really aimed at different markets, how may people actually use Windows Office mobile in anger.

    Why would I want a palm, what does it actually give me that my iPhone doesn't, I'll bet it won't have a bluetooth modem either.

    I think I can cope with swapping my sim chip back and forwards betweeen my 6310i and iPhone. Why the latter, ah well, I go places that don't allow camera phones, and I also have a TomTom.

  31. Matt
    Jobs Halo

    Fail...

    well, looks like hes speaking out of his arse and his plain has be twarted in london, a friend of mine has just come to the end of her 3g i-phone contract and she will now be the proud owner of 2 3g i-phones... (well sort of, im getting the old one!)

    Yes there is no upgrade over the original 3g i-phone, but a shiny new one without any scratches will suit her Jimmy Choos and Prada bag much better than a Palm...

  32. Alexis Vallance

    What an oddball

    He seems to under the notion that people don't like the iPhone and will be only too happy to get rid of it once their contract is up.

    Which is so far off the truth it's bizarre.

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Palm who?

    In other news, flying pig spotted at 11 o'clock.

  34. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Anyone with an iPhone after 18 months or 2 years

    Will either replace it with another iPhone or buy whatever shiny new Apple device is released when their contract ends.

    What people who are trying to compete with Apple products need to remember is quite simply:

    Apple products are not devices. They are lifestyles.

    Whereas you could possibly compete in the MP3 player market, you need to do so either with another strong brand like Microsoft or Sony Walkman or you need to compete on cost (to get the pressie market or the eternally cash strapped).

    People who would go for another strong phone brand will have already done so and won't own an iPhone and no-one who signs up for an iPhone for 18 months or 2 years @£35 pcm (about $3.12 pcm at today's sterling exchange rates) + £160 for the phone itself is going to be that bothered about cash.

    And anyone who bought an iPhone and hated it won't keep it that long anyway.

  35. Dave

    Previous Ownership

    I would guess that a good few iPhone owners previously had a Palm device. So, given that Palm are now rather less than a one-trick-pony, why would any of them migrate back? With Palm as close to the ropes as it is, the Pre is going to have to be twice as good (either technically or in marketing) as the iPhone to even compete.

    The Newton may not have been a Palm-killer, but the iPhone didn't need to be, and has pretty much done so anyway.

  36. I R David
    IT Angle

    Unfashionable Choice

    I didn't really jump on the Apple rollercoaster though they seem a nice to use and was also aesthetically pleasing product. I needed the mail functionality though.

    I might back the outsider today and say I think Blackberry may become more mainstream now they are targetting the consumer market. I'd never tried before but I'm sold on the Blackberry Bold 9000. Does everything well and is very easy to use or add apps too. Mail and sync with Office is reliable and easy. Documents, spreadsheets etc... are easy to read and there are plenty of apps that are of use for many other purposes.

    I'm thinking with the new Windows mobile, Apple and RIM Palm may have an uphill struggle.

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    @Matt Bradley

    "That not to say, of course that you *can't* use the phone without connectivity or access to the cloud - but why on earth would you want to?"

    ...erm because there is no fucking cloud. Unless you know better. As far as I am aware, a phone doesn't really have enough data to make it worthwhile hosting it on an external server. Even if it did, you'd get the problem of trying to phone Dave when the network is down and you can't access the cloud to get the number, so you can't even phone him from the land-line. Bah. I thought we'd moved away from that kind of nonsense long ago.

    There has to be a reason why we all decided not to store our data centrally and keep all our applications on a central server any more... I'm also VERY sure that I wouldn't want to go back to that shitty way of doing things. When I control my own data, no-one else can fuck it up, lose it, get it hacked or prevent me from accessing it.

    So to summarise, there are no cloud applications that are worth using on phones (that I know of). There isn't enough data to be worth storing centrally and it would be a mistake to store it there anyway.

    A phone with *no* connectivity isn't a phone btw. It's a brick. As far as I know, there isn't a single mobile phone manufacturer punting a phone that has no connectivity.

    (...but if you want to buy one that's got no connectivity then I know a man down the market...)

  38. Matt Bradley
    Flame

    @Anonymous Coward "there is no cloud"

    How about synching diary, call logs, contacts and other documents remotely with the office via web services?

    That's not to say that you can't have local copy of the data, just that when the connectivity is available, you got more up to date versions of the data.

    So for example, If I have no connectivity, I can still get Dave's number, but if I'm connected and I ring Dave, it will log my call with the office. Plus. If he's changed his number and rung my office manager to tell him/her, then my mobile phone contacts will be updated immediately.

    If you don't think that this is a cloud application worth having, that's fine: just carry on plugging your phone into your desktop machine and using a desktop sync application. Personally I want rid of the wires and I also like having up-date info on all my devices.

    :)

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    I'll never buy Palm again

    after owning two different PDAs which were left obsoleted by Palm within a few months of their purchase. I'm still waiting for Vista support for the Palm Desktop...

    I don't own an iPhone, but I do own an iPod and one thing you can say about Apple is that hey support their customers.

  40. Goat Jam

    @bod

    "Problem is the market is going to be flooded with similar devices by then, making the iPhone and the Palm fairly average."

    True, except 90% of those "similar devices" will be running Windoze Mobile of some sort or other.

    A nice piece of hardware is just a nice piece of hardware and nothing more when it comes with "The OS with the Start Button" on it

    So, no competition there.

  41. Martin Kelly
    Happy

    Another Banker

    This guy seems to be in the same delusional state of mind as most of the worlds top Bankers.

    I own a iPhone and have no intention of swapping to something different certainly not a Palm.

    This guy really does need To get a Mac, Get a Life.

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