Worst of the Week: Further proof that life isn't fair

Hello! And welcome to our Friday column, Worst of the Week. There’s a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRWireless.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We hope you enjoy it!
And without further ado:
One of my fondest memories as a young lad is of my older brother telling me right after my older sister had beaten me up for the umpteenth time that life wasn’t fair. (I will have to admit that the same brother did later hold that same sister down while I pulled a fistful of hair out of her head at which point he gave me what I consider the best piece of advice and something I still adhere to today: “Run!”)
I bring this up because this week I witnessed a perfect example of life not being fair in the wireless world. Mere hours after it was reported that Palm had engaged some investment firms to help the company find itself a sugar daddy, Microsoft unveiled a pair of new devices designed to ridicule anyone over the age of 13.
What’s the connection? Let me ‘splain.
Few would argue that over the past 10 years not one device running a Microsoft mobile OS has come close to matching the usability of anything that came out of Palm’s R&D offices. Anything from Windows CE up to Windows 6.5 has paled in comparison to Palm’s original smartphone OS up to the highly underrated WebOS. And yet, it’s Palm that has run out of time and money while Microsoft continues to throw untold gazillions to launch new mobile ventures that underwhelm.
Sure, Microsoft has a side business in personal computer software where it’s apparently pretty successful, but it was not that long ago that Palm was the end-all, be-all when it came to anything related to mobile computing. At one point back in the late ’90s, there were even calls for Microsoft to shelf its own work in the mobile computing space and just buy Palm, which at that point dominated the PDA market. (Remember those? PDAs? They were like the current rash of smartphones, but useless.)
For Palm, the move to find a sugar daddy comes as no surprise and appears to be a case of having the right product and the wrong time. (Somewhat akin to the nerd in every teenage-angst movie that finally gets up the nerve to ask the hot chick out only to show up at her door decked out in his finest powder-blue tuxedo and finds his true love making out with the dumb jock. So sad.) The company made a splash at the Consumer Electronics Show in early 2009 with its WebOS platform and Pre device, but stumbled by announcing an exclusivity agreement with Sprint Nextel (Sprint Nextel?) that seemed to slew-foot any momentum it gained from the CES announcement.
Palm has since found another carrier taker in Verizon Wireless, but even at cut-rate prices it appears Palm’s chance at establishing itself as a legit player in the smartphone space has been Googled.
As for Microsoft, the unveiling this week of the Kin One and Kin Two showed that no matter how asinine an idea may be, if you have enough money to throw at it there is a good chance it may stick. Watching the unveiling Web cast was painful not only in that it was a bunch of middle-aged men trying to “hip-ify” themselves to match the product they were trying to shill, but also in that it made me realize that I am no longer a target demographic for anything. Further adding to the pain threshold was that Microsoft held the unveiling in a bar. At 10 am in the morning.
I guess the true test as to whether life is really fair will be to see how Palm and the Kin fare over the next month or so. If Microsoft comes out with a press release touting it sold a billion devices in the opening weekend while on the same day Palm announces it could not find anyone willing to pump some funds into its operations I think we will know the answer.
OK, enough of that.
Thanks for checking out this week’s Worst of the Week column. And now for some extras:
–France Telecom’s Orange Business Services division this week announced it had renewed its network services partnership agreement with Cirque du Soleil, also known as home to circus acts too freaky for a real circus. Details of the agreement included something about cost benefits the Montreal-based freak show would continue to enjoy as well as how important the deal was for Orange. I tried to gather more specifics from the press release, but my continued fear of all things clown and freak related left me curled up in a fetal position below my desk. If you want more details, you’re on your own.
–Walmart’s plans for world domination dug deeper into the wireless space this week as the mega-hyper-ultra-retailer of all things made in China has started running television ads touting the Straight Talk mobile service it carries exclusively through its retail and online channels. I say it’s only a matter of time before Walmart buys its own wireless carrier (Sprint Nextel?) and starts rolling back prices to a level that can’t be matched.
–Verizon Wireless has thrown down the gauntlet in naming its latest Android-powered device. No, they didn’t go with Bad Mother F***er!, but they did go with calling the latest HTC-produced smartphone the Droid Incredible. While not nearly as cool as Bad Mother F***er!, it’s still a bad-ass name, though would be even badder-assed if they swapped the words. Also, the name once again proves the need for all carriers and handset makers to go with real names for their devices and not just a bunch of letters and numbers.
—Comic-book fonts?
I welcome your comments. Please send me an e-mail at dmeyer@ardenmediaco.com.