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Did you see those great ads pushed out the other day from Palm? It looks like Microsoft, who forgot to borrow copy & paste or multi-tasking, has the same ad team or at least the same great idea. Now it’s time for Palm to creatively borrow a few elements from the Microsoft ad. How about adding a few different demographics and have the people in the ads carrying webOS phones.
Are we off in our assessment or do these commercials look terribly similar?
According to Canaccord Adams analyst Peter Misek, Palm’s oft-rumored launch on AT&T is being pushed back from April until June or July. Analysts are often incorrect, but to his credit, Misek was first to provide warnings about weak sales on Verizon. Misek claims his “recently learned” information regarding the launch “is more than just an ordinary delay, as AT&T cited a long list of technical issues” with the phones. The news gets worse as Misek reports AT&T has decreased their initial order size and “decided to sharply reduce its marketing budget for the launch“.
Palm, nor AT&T have indicated a release date for any webOS phones. For all we know, June or July has always been the timeline for release. If so, this timeline falls right in line with what is normally Apple’s yearly update of the iPhone.
via PalmInfoCenter
Palm has dropped a new ad that you’re likely be seeing in heavy rotation on the major networks. In short, it’s good and really showcases the multi-tasking functionality of the Pre. It’s more about the webOS and in fact, no phones are to be seen at all in the ad.
Love it? Hate it? Let us know in the comments.
via PreCentral
Palm has seen a steady increase in the number of applications in the App Catalog. While customers raved about the addition of PDK created 3D games, we haven’t seen much in the way of success stories. Today, the Wall Street Journal brings us news of Self Aware Games, a company that chose webOS development over the iPhone and how it’s paying off for them. Self Aware Games decided to bring Word Ace and Card Ace: Blackjack to webOS first, before creating versions for iPhone and Facebook. The result? The company is bringing in $50,000 a month.
The games themselves are free, but Self Aware Games offers an option to purchase “virtual goods”. These include virtual drinks , chips and other items. The social networking aspect of the game, combined with it’s price of free has had a positive impact on downloads.
The company sites overcrowding and difficulty getting noticed as reasons why they chose webOS development. Colin Liotta, co-founder of Self Aware Games, believes webOS devices have an advantage over the iPhone by offering keyboard-input and multi-tasking.
via WSJ
Palm has just let us (via Twitter) know that a new Palm Developer Purchase Program is online. If you are a webOS developer or considering it, you can know purchase phones directly from Palm. We won’t lie, the prices are still a bit high even with the 20% discount, but the alternative is a 2 year contract with your favorite wireless provider. The Palm Pre Plus compatible with Verizon Wireless runs $479.99 minus 20% or roughly $384.
In any event, you can hit Palm up here and receive free 2-day shipping.
Palm this week will be demonstrating 3D gaming at GDC (Game Developer’s Conference) in San Francisco. As perfect timing would have it, the company has announce the public beta release of webOS PDK or plug-in development kit. For those of you who have checked out Need for Speed or any of the App Catalog 3D games, they were developed using the PDK. With this now available, this should allow for expanded App Catalog offerings. Full press release after the break. Developers can find more information and download the PDK by hitting up developer.palm.com.
Next week brings the Game Developer’s Conference and Palm is expected to chat about their PDK (Plug-in Developer Kit). In an interesting twist, word comes from John Paczkowski (via Dieter Bohn) that Palm’s PDK will allow easy porting of iPhone apps to Palm’s webOS.
Perhaps more importantly, the PDK will allow devs to rewrite mobile apps that they’ve built for other platforms to run on webOS with minimal modifications. iPhone apps can be ported over in a matter of days, sources close to the company tell me, and they don’t really suffer any degradation in performance.
When we spoke with Palm reps at CES 2010, they indicated to us that the PDK was mainly a tool used for developing games. So we’re not sure what to expect next week and if this will actually impact apps for webOS. Palm’s mantra has been quality and not necessarily quantity. Trailing in the Apps Numbers race, that’s a convenient argument. The PDK developed games are certainly on par with other platforms, so perhaps this news will bring ports of better apps for the platform. We’re all for the quality over quantity, but outside of PDK developed games, the current crop of webOS apps does not best apps available on the iPhone. If the PDK can be used to port actual apps over to webOS, this would be great news for the webOS community and for developers. If it only takes days, we’re hoping Atebits will jump in and give us Tweetie 2 for webOS.
You can question Verizon’s lackluster launch and marketing campaign, but you cannot fault them when it comes to pricing. They have offered BOGO (buy one, get one free) and now they’ve removed the pesky mail-in rebate. As many of you know, you can always bypass the mail-in rebate by shopping phones at Best Buy. Starting today, you visit any Verizon Wireless retail location or online and purchase the Palm Pre Plus for $149.99 or the Palm Pixi for $79.99. Additionally, these are still eligible for BOGO.
If you are looking for just one, Amazon has got the Palm Pre Plus for $69.99. UPDATE: The Palm Pre Plus is now an incredibly low $39.99. No mail-in rebate required. The Palm Pixi Plus will run you a penny. Yes, the Palm Pixi Plus on Verizon Wireless is available for a shiny penny.
In case you haven’t heard, there is no lack of buzz regarding webOS 1.4. Palm has now released the update to our friends up north on Bell in Canada. Good news eh! So hit up the Update box if you haven’t already and celebrate webOS 1.4 along with that gold medal for men’s hockey.
Not content with all the updates in webOS 1.4, Palm has just released a major update to their Facebook application. It’s available in the App Catalog now and it’s compatible with all webOS phones. It’s free, it’s Facebook, so go get it and let us know what you think.
According to Palm, you’ll find the following enhancements:
Stay current: You can keep up to date with your Facebook inbox, latest Facebook events, friends’ birthdays, and your news feed. You can now view your friends’ Walls, Information, and Photos, and keep tabs on your own Wall.
Stay in touch: Reply to messages in your Facebook inbox or compose new messages, Like and Comment on items in your News Feed, and find friends (old and new) with new Search functionality.
Share photos: You can show off your photo albums to friends, as well as view, like, and comment on photos and albums. You can also quickly upload photos directly from the Facebook application.