Jon Rubinstein takes over as Palm CEO
By Nilay Patel 
posted June 10th 2009 5:34PM
posted June 10th 2009 5:34PM
[Via Brighthand]
posted June 10th 2009 5:34PM
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Let the comparisons to Steve Jobs begin now...
shaved his head and he'll look like that bald dude from star trek.
Awesome! Now they can both hangout at the CEO's club!
Hope they gave him a free pre on his way out.
What, that they're both CEO's?
This traitorous ex-Apple dude couldn't carry Steve Jobs jockstrap. They had to kick him out of Apple because he wanted to stick a damn keyboard on an iPhone. I'd have kicked him in his ass and fired him on the spot. Dude doesn't get the point of having a virtual keyboard until international users need type Turkish, Hebrew, Arabic, Russian or Hangul and they start scratching their heads when they see some near useless QWERTY keyboard on gummy chicklet keys. This guy is a bit shortsighted.
Apple has been trying to standardize hardware around the world and a virtual keyboard doesn't need a localized physical keyboard. Apple should have had a contract that wouldn't allow Rube to go to competitors, but maybe they thought this dude would just do more harm to the competitors than good, anyway. I hope the Rube is good enough to keep Palm running at least a couple of more years so their employees won't be out on the streets like those Motorola bastard executives caused.
Colligan should have been fired when he started to let the PalmOS wither and die as loyal Palmists waited for updates to the OS. Colligan and MacNamee, two of a kind. Vocal and always underestimating the competition.
Turkish is written in the Latin alphabet...
iphonerulez, why the antagonism toward Rubinstein? Sure he may be the head of a rival company and creator of what's arguably the best iPhone competitor thus far but let us not forget the good he did. He was instrumental in creating the revitalized Apple we have today.
Rubinstein hasn't attacked Apple or Steve Jobs. He's had nothing but kind words and admiration for his old employer. He's the same old guy, likely an enthusiastic Mac and iPod user. So why attack him?
Don't let the lame fanboy battles on Engadget get to you so much.
"This traitorous ex-Apple dude couldn't carry Steve Jobs jockstrap. They had to kick him out of Apple because he wanted to stick...blah blah blah"
Even when you are the guy that was responsible for th products that help create these punk Apple fanatics, if you dont adhere to the cult, you will become a target too.
I swear these people are mentally deranged.
dissing one of your former gods, iphonerulez?
rubinstein designed the phone and the computers that made apple what it is today.
"Colligan should have been fired when he started to let the PalmOS wither and die as loyal Palmists waited for updates to the OS"
Thats the only sensible thing you said....
@iphonerulez,
I know you are a troll, but you make a point that is interesting. What you say would be mostly true, until you look at a market like the Japan. The iPhone struggles to sell there as the Japanese purchase more cell phones with a keypad to tap out their utterances. It's not like Apple has poor Japanese support either. iPhone's Japanese input support is some of the best I've ever seen. However, the Japanese are rushed people, always on tight schedules from the office to the subway train. Therefore they have no time to deal with an arguably superior virtual keyboard and prefer the accuracy of a physical keypad.
This also holds true for other Asian markets like China, Taiwan, and South Korea.
@ iphonerulez even though I am a big Apple fan I do honestly hope the best for Rub. He has a great history of being part of Apple's "Dream Team" or the one. Even though he moved on to Palm it will only benefit us. Rub will step up the competition Apple responds and Palm responds and Motorola responds etc. Anyways don't mock someone just because he moved to another company. It's people like you who think people with Macs and Apple products as nothing but trolls. Please iphonerulez I am a fellow Apple Fanboy and willing to defend Apple but damn people like you should praise competition and hope that this guy can keep all of the workers alright?
FACT CHECK PLEASE!
..
>>> Ed Colligan as CEO for 16 years?!?
Ed Colligan has only been CEO for a few years, before that he was a marketing / product guy at the company since its inception.
He was the one who actually knew there was a problem and brought Elevation Partners into the picture.
@Jeff
I wondered why the iPhone hasn't made much of an impression in Japan, but thinking about it, a lot of popular foreign smartphones are equally marginalized. It's probably because the domestic market, free-with-contract models do so much anyway (TV, news, weather, train schedules, mobile internet, internet, email...) that there isn't a huge incentive.
And typing in Japanese on a numeric keypad makes a whole lot more sense than typing in English on a numeric keypad. Those of you with Japanese phones will know what I mean.
There's no comparison at all. He doesn't wear a black turtleneck shirt.
@Jeff
You have it all wrong. The reason the iphone doesn't sell well in Japan, is because the technology is decades behind in relation to hardware and such. The tech in Japan puts the iphone to shame, hell the tech in most standard phones in the Western world also puts it to shame, the only difference are the apple sheep in the Western world.
@tails2,
I have to politely disagree. Japanese phones have been largely the same since shortly after the turn of the century. Sure, they have 1seg and are bordering on insane when it comes to the megapixels their cameras push. But, phones outside of Japan have become far more advanced in processing speed, battery life (use one of DoCoMo's new 1seg, 8 megapixel, rotating display monsters for a day and see what I mean), and visuals. Both Japan and rest of the world use UMTS, so Japan's networks aren't any faster currently.
I have asked Japanese people why they haven't considered an iPhone, and the reasons are mostly UI usability and personalization. Touch screen phones are much too fiddly compared to a keypad. On the personalization front you have to take a look at most Japanese cell phone users. Their phones are usually decked out, in the color of their choice, with a cell phone charm of their choice, with a background of their choice, and with a screensaver of their choice. None of this is available on the iPhone (the unlock screen doesn't count :).
In the end, I feel the iPhone is a superior phone to nearly all, if not all, of the Japanese market phones. However, even with Softbank offering the phone for practically free with contract, because of the cultural drawbacks, iPhone will remain unpopular.
Comparisons to Steve Jobs? Steve-o wouldn't release a phone with battery as bad as that of the Pre's. I know everyone thinks that this device is just dandy, because the first impression is nice, but I'm not sure how this thing is going to hold up over time. I wrote up some thoughts on the Pre after 100 hours here: http://www.crazyhawt.com/2009/06/10/100-hours-with-the-palm-pre-the-bad/
Troll stupidity aside, it's actually far faster to enter many Asian languages on a hard keypad, or even a qwerty than a virtual screen. Some entry systems require rapidly hitting the different strokes for a particular character in the same order you would write them, which can be done even on an older cell phone since there are only so many strokes. There's even entry systems for computers that specifically require a qwerty keyboard since they require simultaneous key presses.
No matter where you go, everyone's computers use a regular old qwerty keyboard, with only slight differences between countries and continents. Sometimes you get different symbols, but all the keyboards work just fine as qwerty keyboards so clearly the layout is fine, and it's not like you can't print other symbols on hard keys...they do it for keyboards everywhere.
And a qwerty layout also lets you use phonetic entry systems like pinyin-which is relatively slow and painful, but it'd be even worse with a virtual keyboard.
Colligan failed soo hard with the Foleo, shame he has to go though.
Actually, I'm kind of relieved to see him go. Foleo trying to make a comeback is one of the Palm nightmare scenario.
Looks like the Pre launch is a failure - you don't can a successful CEO.
The next earnings call will be interesting.
Yay?
And so it begins...
" in stewie griffin voice "
It makes me feel a little dirty as a Palm fanboy to have to idolize an Apple guy like Rubinstein, but damn did he rock out with the Pre.
I know how you feel. But at least he saw the error of his ways and left Apple.
He'll probably provide better competition to the industry equaling better products and services for everyone.
It's interesting, though, because now netbooks are all the rage.
Foleo was going to fail. It was overpriced, and had weak features. Netbooks were going to eat Palm's lunch.
The Foleo wasn't a netbook. It was an external screen and keyboard for a Treo. It would require a complete software replacement to compete with netbooks - and if you have to do that, then what is it's competitive advantage?
whaa?
Very good news for Palm.
wow! what a time to leave!
Good god is he ugly. Hes looks like the offspring of Ron Pearlman and Murderface's mother.
At least he doesn't look as feminine as Stebe Jo
I disagree. He actually looks pretty smart. More like young Joseph Stalin. Strikingly similar, in fact.
200,000 Pre sales is a success. 10,000,000 iphone sales is a statistic.
Apple 2: With a vengeance!!!
ALL HAIL JON RUBINSTEIN!! Pre-Father!
"PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They're not going to just walk in."
Ed Colligan was right. Mac guys did it.
Amen brotha!!
On this photo he looks strikingly similar to young Joseph Stalin...
I was angling for an angry James Marsters.
Cyclops? Ummm, no.
Looks like a preacher to me.
No. Cyclops was played by James Marsden. James Marsters played Spike on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, as well as Brainiac on Smallville and John in P.S. I Love You.
Picture gallery from his official page: http://www.jamesmarsters.com/multimedia.shtml
This is big.... ex-head of iPod and Mac becomes CEO of Palm. Things are looking good over there...
Sold 50,000 measly pres n now CEO ,.LOL
Pathetic,.,.they think 50k saved pre,.
Wake up to harsh reality,.