Now at Nokia, Peter Skillman dishes on Palm 46
We are still sad that Peter Skillman left Palm and is now designing for Nokia. What we're less sad about is that he's opening up a bit and talking candidly about his time there. Forbes sat in on a presentation Skillman gave in California last week where he dropped some interesting insights.
Skillman had mixed praise for the Palm Pixi. While he has "always loved [the Pixi] and its scale, size, and authenticity," he did note that it didn't have much chance with men, "Guys wouldn't be caught dead using a phone called Pixi." We're a a little more secure in our masculinity than that, Peter, but point taken.
We noted the similarity in Nokia's position as a flagging company in the smartphone space with Palm's position a few years ago, in both cases the companies are/were in dire need of a fresh direction with their mobile operating system. Skillman agrees: "I hope to re-instill some passion about executing at Nokia, the way I did at Palm."
Skillman thinks that there is only room for about 5 players in the US market and that to be one of those players, smartphone makers need to succeed at the "high end" - a message we hope his former employer is hearing loud and clear.
Source: Forbes; thanks to everybody who sent this in!
46 Comments
First! Who's Peter Skillman?
Yes the Pixi is a stupid name but if you look past the name here are key reasons why I use the Pixi instead of the Pre.
1. The Pre detracts from my rather large natural bulge; the Pixi is the thinnest smartphone on the market with a keyboard.
2. The Pixi has a better GPU; Over the past decade GPU's have emerged as much more important, practical, and powerful at common activities. Such as gaming, encoding, decoding, video and photo editing, etc.
3. It is not a slider; seriously f*ck sliders. Portrait QWERTY keyboards are my bread and butter, it truly is the perfect layout for a phone, but adding a slider throws its usefulness into the dumpster.
In conclusion, I do not care about the Pixi's name because I'm not shallow, all I care is it is a good phone that isn't poorly designed like the Pre.
Second! He's the guy in the article above--the one in the photo with the white shirt.
Any other questions?! ;-)
BTW: with the latest tweaks of Advanced Launcher and Ubercalendar and Music Player (Remix) 2.0, who needs a new phone?!
(Just KIDDING!)
@louisoneal,who're you? as (pre in MN) saids,he's the guy in the above picture.First means,you got no constructive sentence to compose,so,u endup saying "NOTHING".
I have met few manly men using pixi, they really dont care about the name, just wanted the phone to be faster and be able to use the phone. told them about overclocking.
Sounds like sour grapes from someone who doesn't really matter anymore....or maybe ever. I just got a Palm Pixi on a Verizon upgrade and after putting up with iPhone's overdoneness and AT&T then a new Blackberry Tour that is so old school software driven it's laughable; I finally have a real smartphone. Sure it doesn't have the the most blazing processor but so what. Good software doesn't need a top end processor to work well. Who cares what the marketing department decides to call a device. The Pixi represents what can be done if all you need is a smartphone and not some handheld Cray computer!
Or maybe he's finally able to speak candidly now that he's no longer working on a project that doesn't really matter anymore...or maybe ever.
One does wonder why he left. Peter worked at Palm for 11 years so he probably was involved in designing Treos and Centros, which you could call snazzy in 2005. But, he was also there when those became long in the tooth. Why didn't he design something better after that? I'm suspicious about how much he was involved designing the Pre. Reading the various articles, implies that Matias was more the driving force behind the Pre, especially since he got to demo it at CES. I wonder if Peter was snubbed because he was holding Palm back and it just took this long for him to leave.
Doesn't matter anymore .... to you, because he left your phanboy company. I love Palm and webOS, but I will never put down someone simply because they are now working for the competition.
Come one, he pretty much designed the entirety of the webOS UI and you are going to say he doesn't matter anymore. How stoopid can you be?
On the whole manliness of owning a Pixi, you're right it is a nice phone and no, I don't think any man who wants one would shy away from it just because of the name, but come on, this is marketing 101. The name means a lot. If you walk into a store not know anything and the salesperson says "Hey, let me show you this Pixi", the first inclination would be to say "Nope, next?" If names don't matter why do companies spend thousands and thousands of dollars coming up with product names?
It must be raining where you are today.
rain makes me horny
Actually, he had almost nothing to do with the user interface of the Pre. He was more involved in the 'riverstone' type design of the hardware, I believe.
Matias Duarte, who is also gone now, was more directly involved with the user interface.
That being said, I hate when articles like this (or any other) make it sound like it's a single person behind the design, when in reality, as in any workplace, it's most likely a small group of people who we've never heard of who were just as much involved as their manager.
I did like Skillman and was sad to see him go, but there's not really any one person who is irreplaceable in 99% of tech companies. (Steve Jobs is pretty much the sole exception I can think of). There's way too many talented individuals out there for that to be the case.
Besides that, in the case of webOS, the groundwork has already been laid out. Palm's employees did a great job with the initial design, and with just subtle evolutions (as seen with stacks) the interface can remain the best out there.
Though... I remember reading that webOS started as a skunkworks project within Palm at a time that the company was planning on going in a different direction. I'm very curious which people were behind that.
@louis
He's a notable player in the wireless industry, not anybady you would know. He doesn't have any direct ties to fart apps and he's never won a gold medal for forum "first" posts at the Wireless Special Olympics".
if he design the whole thing then what jon rubenstein did. Does he has any relevant to webos.
Dunno. People liked to give him sole credit for all things Palm until all the people who really worked on different components of the Pre and WebOS slowly started jumping ship.
This just in: HP/Palm release the names of their next generation smartphones:
1.The Fairy
2.The Daisey
3.The Tutu
4.Flaming
5.The Pansy
Dude you totally for got #6: the "Jack Rollin' Dandy 4G"
Honestly, I wouldnt want a pixi. Mainly because the pre IS better. But you know, If the pixi was the only choice and the Pre didnt exist, every one of us would have the pixi. Its good for Palm to give us choices.
ya know, I have all the great patches and overclocking. The size and fit of my pre is perfect, so waiting on a new hardware choice is not that compelling to me. Plus, after experiencing homebrew and preware, why would I go to a phone that's locked essentially. Love you Palm, don't rush perfection!
I love the Pixi keyboard, much better than the Pre, but the lack of wifi (Sprint) is so short sighted that it renders the device uncompetitive the day it shipped.
Personally I don't care about the name of the device but He's got a strong point from a marketing perspective.
I think all non technical people that want a smart phone care about is reputation and looks. So these men that are not technical but want a smart phone have all heard of blackberry and iphone. When they go phone shopping they most likely don't want to go up to their buddies saying "I got a pixi" (Yes it's just a name and i agree it's a stupid reason to not buy a product but again, we are talking about non-technical people)
People that don't know SH$T about technology will not know how awesome WebOS is since the pixi name can defer some customers.
Since we are on the topic of device names. Where does "Pre" even come from? can we expect the next device to be called the Palm Post?
I know it's been bantered around before, but if HPalm wants a winning name and successful smartphone this next time, I personally think it should be called the Palm Pro. Such a name would do several things for them. First, it would stay inline with the PP naming convention. Second, it shows progressive improvement (PRE >>PRO). Third, unlike Pixi, such a name is gender neutral, yet brings to mind a solid "professional" kind of a device worthy of the affluent and discriminating buyer as well as the young turk wannabes. And finally, it should be some good ad agency's wet dream for any number of good ad campaign(s) that could have all the (now old name) Droids and iPhone owners wanting something new and better. What a great way of introducing and showcasing the combined collaborative efforts of HP and Palm! Assuming there is some sort of collaborating going on and that the phone would have the latest and greatest hardware along with some substantial and rock solid OS improvements! Not to mention the spinoffs (ProCentral! What kind of phone do you have or recommend? Why a Palm Pro of course! Maybe instead of cards they could call them, wait for it, "Pro~Panes". Smaller subsets of "Windows" analogy.)
Propane you say?
Well in the U.S. Palm is still sorta relevant as they have a whopping 5% of marketshare and 0% mindshare apart from this site. Lets hope they don't fade away into obscurity (rolls eyes).
Pixi was/is an unfortunate name. Some guys didn't care, but some certainly did. I saw one of each, myself. It cost Palm, at least, some sales.
What happened to the name, Eos?
pre was an equally dumb name. If he was so influential, why didn't he stop them from using those names.
and if he was so amazing, why did he produce a plastic oreo?
just saying
+1 i have to agree, when i heard about webos i wasnt impressed with the hardware at all.. the whole plastic and the overall bill quality was shite... every one slates the hardware however they love the OS... i hope the new guy in silvermans position trashes the river stone idea..
I could swear I've seen Cantaffordit defend the design of the Pre on the forums. Of course, that was before the man who designed it left Palm...
for my needs, the Pre is just fine. But it isn't a commercial home run - so I am in the minority... and 'just fine' isn't equal to 'awesome', and awesome is what the market needs.
...and mine broke off a corner sliding from my desk to a carpeted floor - so they clearly didmt stress test this.
yes, I defend the Pre, and I like my Pre. No, I don't think skilman is a genius if he thought making a plastic oreo with a 5 hour battery would hurt apple or android.
is that more clear?
Having listened to the whole presentation, my feelings about the failure of Palm and webOS have been reinforced.
The whole thing reeks of overdesign.
Take the Palm V, which he says was used as a reference. The thing is drop dead simple, and very utilitarian. The Pre's design is WAY too stylized for the average bloke. The presentation, while never getting in the way of the device's utility, gives people the impression that the device is all about looks and style. The feminity of the Pre and Pixi is also evident. When you're alienating half the population, it's hard to strike a homerun.
The way the guy speaks shows an obvious "artsy elitism", making fun of Nascar while on the other hand comparing BMWs and Audis. This guy is cut from the general population. I'm pretty sure Nascar is more popular in the US than zen gardens and river stones.
Palm was highjacked by designers, and also by the Treo guys. What was needed was an evolution of the Palm V and Palm TX.
Hopefully HP will take Palm back to its utilitarian roots, and force them to produce a REAL Palm device, i.e a SLATE. If they make the devices with larger screens, and gender neutral, and take away the weird flower pictures, then they might have a hit eventually.
But the webOS 2.0 pictures are not making me confident about the future of Palm. The new interface looks considerably messier than it used to. The JustType bar, while extremely useful, adds clutter, while the new launcher screen, with the category names, arrows, and separate pages, looks messy.
I'm forced to replace my Palm TX with an iPod Touch 4G this week. Won't get an iPhone because I am still hopeful to get a real Palm device someday. (That is, a slate.)
Oh, and I'm glad to hear him say handwriting will be important again. I want a Palm slate with a 4" screen and a stylus with some modern graffiti input.
Forget the Treos, forget the iPhone. Just make a darn PALM, for crying out loud!
Funny how it's never alienating half the population when a phone is masculine in design - or rather it is, if Android's 29% female user base is to be believed, but guys never whine about it.
I somewhat agree with tk 421. Guys will shy away, women couldn't care less about the name or if it is a more industrial design. Everyone wants the same thing, awesome hardware. I am not sure about stacks being messy yet, however, the first thing I thought about Just Type was "I hope they make a patch to not show that".
And with Skillman gone maybe we can have the good hardware, think he can make Nokia replace Aluminum with plastic? Glad he is gone...
Oh, stacks are not messy at all, if anything they will reduce clutter. But the Just Type bar just BEGS for a patch to hide it away.
The arrows on the new launcher are just silly, as is the idea to make the separate pages. Naming the pages could be helpful, yet the way it is made is not efficient.
Notheless, Palm has amazing software. WebOS is the most elegant and amazing os, mobile or desktop, I have ever used. But it is nonetheless overly stylized. (Little molesking task application? Make it like the Caledndar and contacts!)
The hardware? Just terrible. Fantastic in a museum, but for the average Sprint audience? Completely out of place.
I agree with Skillman that Palm had lost its way. If I could ever catch the pickpocket who stole my TX, I would just send it back to Palm with a note saying: "remember when Palm made Palms?"
The Treo should have been a placeholder. The real deal was not the Handspring stuff, it was the Palm V and TX.
It shocks me that some people here don't want Palm to make a slate, saying they would be copying Apple and HTC, when it's the opposite that is happening. I've never owned a Palm that was not a slate, and I never will, period.
The last real Palm was the TX. Just slap a cell radio and webOS and that basic design, make it pretty yet masculine, and watch the money flow in your direction.
All the original Palmists from 1src are now iPhone owners. I wish I could be proud to say that I'm holding out for a real killer Palm device. But now I'll be stuck with an iPod Touch. (Which I am actually quite excited to get, even though it wasn't my first choice.)
Skillman was very smart to come up with the basic webOS interface. For everything else, he was proven wrong by the market.
Doubled... Sorry!
OMG, it tripled! Can't we get a Delete option like we do in the Forums?
stop hitting the refresh button.
Last I checked symbian still held top spot on the smartphone. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartphone?wasRedirected=true they are doing just fine.
Not in the United States. It sells world wide. The problem is it is currently declining and it's estimated that android will catch it by 2014. So the issue is in recent years they've been losing market share. And in a country that buys a ton of cell phones, the U.S., they've tanked. The momentum is clearly in the wrong direction. They like Greg Norman at the Masters, in mid collapse and losing their lead.
Yep, they still lead, despite being long in the tooth. Its been an enduring platform. If they can parlee their experience, resources and user loyalty, they should be a major player for years to come. No reason to believe they wont hit another homerun with Meego. Five years ago, none of the other players existed. I'm excited to see what they bring.
In the U.S. you can't buy a Nokia smartphone on contract from any carrier. They dont' offer it. RIMM may be looking at similar issue too of being ok but on the decline.
I agree with the above poster, we shouldn't be bagging on Skillman. The guy is being honest and telling us what we already know. The name 'Pixi' sucks as did the marketing for it and the Pre. Palm.....its so frustrating.
really i don't think it matters that much. me and my brother both have a pixi. its just a name why should any guy even care its just a phone
the Pixi is just a Centro with new guts and name. Not necessarily bad that it is as Centro wasn't a bad phone. But calling Pixi something from my daughter's Disney collection was about as bright as the creepy woman ads. Having the marketing lady leave may have been 2nd best ting to happen to Palm, (after being bought by HP)
Nokia + Symbian OS = EPIC FAILURE !!!
Shower than a dead snail !!!!
zzzzzzz........
Yeah, I'm a man, and love my Pixi Plus. It fit my criteria:
- Keyboard
- No moving parts
- VZW
- Not a crackberry
Yeah, it's slow, but not for the stuff I need it to be fast with: Phone & Text. The rest is icing. I can be patient for that.
Plus, I love The Pixies. ;-)
With all due respect, the Palm Pre Design was an epic FAIL. Too small for really anybody other than small handed women or teens to type on (IMHO). WebOS rocks, no doubt about it. But the hardware was simply not enough to get the majority of people excited.
Nokia can have him.
Can't wait for the new hardware from HP!!!