Palm stops flogging its ex-horse

This was a mercy killing.

Technology News Article | Reuters.com: SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (MSFT.O: Quote, Profile, Research) and its longtime rival in the mobile software market, Palm Inc. (PALM.O: Quote, Profile, Research) are set to unveil on Monday a cell phone that will run Microsoft's software, sources said on Friday.

The Palm Platform had great promise once. My Palm III astounded and delighted me; more so even than my iPod. There was genius made real.

The genius passed. Maybe it was the loss of a few unrecognized key contributors. Maybe it was greed. Maybe it was Microsoft. Whatever the cause, after the Vx the Palm Platform careened downhill. SONY introduced PalmOS devices that lost data when the battery died. Palm stopped working on sync problems, and never developed a robust way to sync and home and work. Netscape, Novell and Lotus died, leaving the corporate PIM to Exchange/Outlook. Sync didn't work, and Palm was years late in responding. Executives stopped carrying Palms. Palm never revised their software to fit XP's (or OS X's) multi-user environment. Palm licensees began to fork the desktop application, confounding multi-device households.

The final straw was abandoning Grafitti (Grafitti Two is Jot, it's technically unrelated).

Today's Palm Platform is a shadow of its former self, a shuffling zombie. Farewell Palm, you now join the Newton in the halls of 'hardware that deserved better'.

Apple, the ball is now in your court. Again.