Stories about: Palm

For investors, the 2011-2015 era was pure hell when it came to Microsoft. Windows 7 and Office 2010 followed Windows Vista and Office 2007 as duds, gaining minimal adoption, mainly as preinstalled software on new computers. For several years, Microsoft had been working in its server group on desktop and application streaming technologies meant to help datacenters better manage far-flung users. By 2011, it became clear that Microsoft should provide its OS and core apps over the cloud to everyone, not just give that capability to enterprise datacenters, as application streams.

Microsoft's a dinosaur that didn't know its dead yet. The cloud computing meteor was speeding its way, and when pervasive computing in the cloud became a reality in about 2015, Microsoft was all but dead. Why? Because the Windows and Office revenues collapsed as users finally stop buying upgrades they don't need, and cloud offerings via the browser took their place. Poof! Gone was 80 percent of Microsoft's profits. And gone was the money to invest in technologies that took multiple versions to get right -- if they ever got it right -- such as the Xbox, Zune, Microsoft Dynamics, and MSN.

Will Apple iPhone's "greatest show on Earth" sway Research in Motion (RIM) BlackBerry's business faithful? Hint: Bet on the BlackBerry for business.

With the release of Apple's iPhone SDK now come and gone, and the enhanced IT-oriented capabilities planned for the next major iPhone device and software update now unveiled, it's clear that iPhones are going to be corporate mainstays. Still, at its heart, the iPhone is a consumer device, so IT leaders still have to ensure that the iPhones that come in the door fit their data management and security strategies, even with Apple's new enterprise security capabilities.

Imagine how different the computing world would be if IBM had used proprietary chips in the original PC, rather than off-the-shelf components. The PC clone market would never have happened, and IBM, rather than Microsoft, might have emerged as the leading company of the computer revolution.

Palm isn't dead yet! That's the word from Palm CEO Ed Colligan, speaking at the recent media launch of the Palm Centro in Australia. To hear him tell it, the once-pioneering handheld maker is set to come roaring back onto the stage with new products, a new focus, and a brand-new, Linux-based OS, code-named Nova.

A Chinese Bluetooth technology vendor released a new version of its Bluetooth application software for ultra-mobile PC users running the Linux operating system.

We're coming up on the one-year anniversary of the iPhone's release, so people who feel strongly about the popular smart phone have had plenty of time to weigh in with their wallets -- it's been a consistent seller since its US release last June 29 -- or with epithets. (Remember the early description of iPhone fans as "iPhonies?")

What a difference a year makes. This month, the hip iPhone celebrates its first anniversary, following its riotous US launch last June 29 . Its birth followed six months of prerelease hype that was ignited by Apple CEO and industry luminary Steve Jobs.

MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte railed against complexity in mobile phones, recently, and said that "simplicity is the biggest challenge that handset makers face."

Social networking powerhouse Facebook launches in Japan, Solitaire gets an interesting honour and Greenpeace finds hazardous chemicals in popular gaming consoles. All that news and more on this week's World Tech Update.