There goes the Palm Foleo

Palm users are a tough bunch to satisfy. You were absolutely right on the money Gari when you dismissed the Palm Foleo.

Palm has decided to cancel its Foleo mini-notebook, according to a note chief executive Ed Colligan posted to the company's blog. The company will instead focus upon the "Foleo II," recording a one-time charge of about $10 million to cancel the first-generation product- Yahoo


The reasons range from tepid market reception (the Palm mafia!) to development difficulties with an entirely new platform.

I don't get it though because I think a sub-notebook between a PDA and a 5 lb. laptop that costs between the $150-220 range is a smart idea. I don't think there's a conflict in having a PDA, a laptop and a "tweener" ( you can even throw in a vibrator- imagine the stress from having all these gadgets???). The thing is, I had to lug my Mac the other day for the better half of an afternoon doing meetings and an ocular inspection of an exhibition venue and it was such a killer (on my back).

A "tweener" would serve the important function of fitting in a situation where there are concerns about weight (if you have to carry it around the whole day) and safety (hell, I'd rather slit my wrists than put my Mac on a wobbly aluminum scaffolding in a dusty construction site).

The problem I believe is that the people at Palm are pitching it to the wrong demographic; techies never liked the middle-ground. They'd rather blind themselves doing spreadsheets on their PDA rather than choose a device such as this one where such operations can be done extensively and easily. But they obviously scoof at anything "easy" which is what makes the Foleo good for the rest of us who do normal computer stuff.

For those who just do word processing, emailing, and surfing, please raise your hand- that's a billion people out there who can't be bothered with stylus pens and all that geeky-sleazy stuff that geeks/techies like to do.

Palm is missing a golden opportunity here to reverse its declining profits and you know what, techies can't save you- intomobile