Pre Plus / Pixi Plus AT&T Launch Date to be May 16 64

This kind of "argument" amazes me again and again.

It makes utterly unrealistic assumptions - like Palm being able to push carriers around as they like.

Exclusivity deals are a 2-way street. The Manufacturer (in this case Palm) exchanges a period of exclusivity for extra efforts being invested by the carrier (special training, placement, marketing campaigns, etc...). Palm is not big enough to dictate terms (as certain other manufacturers can do). The length was probably a requirement by the carriers (who were in a position of strength compared to Palm).

Same is true for almost all other "Palm should have" statements that come up in the forums. Shoulda, coulda, woulda. Bla bla. If Palm were able to sell full metal unibody Pre for reasonable price, 2 years ago, with a gazillion apps on launch, every imaginable feature built in and launched globally from the start, they no doubt would have done exactly that. Who wouldn't?

If something is so obvious then it's safe to assume that the experts working on it thought of it too.
It's not a "bad business decision" if you didn't really have a viable alternative-. Then it's making the best out of what you got.

Does anybody really believe that there was a conference at Palm where people sat and discussed "Hey Ruby, we could totally launch 3 new cool models in February - months before Apple will be able to react", "Nah - let's keep that on the shelf until right before Apple launches Iphone 4"?

The one thing Palm really messed up is advertising. That's something they had influence over and could have really done differently. Most of the ads until very recently (and it's still only half-fixed) did not show what makes webos great. They are all (more or less) cool lifestyle adds. That's something apple can get away with - because they already are established as the coolest thing in town (regardless of whether that's true). By now apple hardly has to bother doing it's own ads at all - the industry publishes 100 articles for every half-rumor that leaks out or is made up.
Palm OTOH has to show potential customers why webos is better than Iphone. And you don't do that with nice graphic and a touchscreen - everybody has that. You have to really show people how having a great interface with simple gestures (the next guy that says webos needs learning gets a Moron Of The Week award from me) and multitasking together with some well integrated features makes for a better smart phone. Not easily done in short TV ads - but that's the challenge. Talking about a juggler in the park wasn't the answer.

Everything else is lack of resources and scrambling to get stuff to market before the money runs out.
That's the cards Palm had and that's what they had to play with. Everything else is wishful thinking.

And as customers we can look at the product, read the reviews, watch the Youtube videos, try it out in the shop and then get what seems to be the best deal for what we need/want (at least that's what I did - so I knew what I was buying and still happy with my decision).

There is almost nothing that Apple might do that this summer that would make me want an Iphone. Having 150k apps available (of which most are crap and duplicates anyway) is not very important to me.
Having a good flexible, open platform is.
Apple in recent years evolved into their own past enemy. Their famous 1984 ad that meant IBM/MS at the time, would now best apply to them. Not even MS (annoying, part time criminal) is as restrictive as Apple.


;-)

Count me in. iPhone 2G early adopter (day 1), upgraded to 3G, said "pass" on 3G S and glad I did, cuz now I can switch to Palm Pre Plus. Sweet.

I don't know about that. I think AT&T might view it more as "We're paying an arm and a leg for the iPhone, so sell that first so we get our money's worth on it. Don't worry about the Pre."

Of course, anyone with logic would think of trying to push something that ISN'T the iPhone so they can find a viable option to make reliance on a single freaking phone not needed. Corporations typically do not run on logic though. :)

Comments like this make me laugh, with respect to the camera. Seriously, for those of us who are more serious about photography, one of the very well known issues with "megapixels" is that the more pixels you pull off the same size sensor, the more noise sensitivity you get. It's why Canon's latest top end actually went down in megapixels, but got a better hardware around it.

What good is an 8 megapixel camera when the lens is the size of a pea? When you are taking pictures it is ALL about the glass. One of the reasons the Pre takes very good pictures is because it has a larger lens aperture. My 8330 Curve's is smaller, and the pictures show it.