Comments on: Palm: What PDA problem?

Executive Paul Blinkhorn talks about a $30 million name change and how to deal with a smart-phone onslaught.

This is what happens...

... when marketing people are left unchecked.

A name change (or logo change) is a sure sign that senior management has no idea what is going on with their product. "I know! Lets change our name! Our products will fly off the shelves then!"

Most marketing people only feel like they are doing something if they are spending money, designing new letterhead, ordering new business cards, etc.

What a total and complete waste of 30 million dollars.

[clicclic99]

Some actual logic in his comments

As a long time Palm fan, I was expecting the worst in this interview. Marketing speak and all that. But some of it does make sense.

Are cell phones pushing out PDA demand? absofrigginlutely, but there is one huge opp for PDAs - as digital camera assistants.

If you have a digi-camera with an SD card, download all your photos to the LifeDrive, then keep shooting. A 320x480 screen and 4 GB is a lot of storage for most 5 MP .JPG shutterbugs.

I've always said (for 2 years!) and will say it again: an iPod-type Palm - with a 20GB hard drive - will sell like mad. An awesome OS, a hard drive for storage, and a big fat screen are all a match made in heaven. The LifeDrive is crazy-ass close to this summit...

[dowright]

Downfall Pending

You should have spent $30 mm fixing that piece of junk you call a Treo 650. That piece of junk and your waste of $30 mm is the beginning of the end. You are a great short! Oh, what arrogance.

[sanjef]

Dilbert

This whole story has "Dilbert" written all over it. I wholeheartedly agree with the first posting here. Marketing can make or break a company image.

Digression: I can't tell you how many times I sat through a rediculous and/or utterly pointless TV commercial only to imagine that this was presented to a group of intelligent human beings (well, intelligent enough to navigate from their homes to the meeting room and arrive fully clothed)... and these people paid money for the result.