In between interviews, as I waited for for my turn for a real hands-on, a funny thing happened. I found myself itching for a Foleo. I had an hour to kill and my standard MO is to just whip out my Treo and browse some web pages and write some email. But suddenly the screen seemed too small, the way that Pocket IE renders web pages too cumbersome. I could have brought out my laptop, but it's awfully big - I was sitting at the bar while I waited and pulling out a 15" Macbook Pro seemed a bit much. Somehow the Foleo had crept into my subconscious and was quietly whispering to me: "I'm exactly what you want right now."
I'm fairly sure that it's probably just the standard gadget-lust talking - "the [gadget lust] is strong with this one." As I was thinking about whether the Foleo was for me or not I considered the fact that whenever I go to events like these I often need to be able to edit and render video - a task far, far beyond the Foleo's abilities. So not for me. And yet... As I hooked up the camera to my laptop and went to dinner I realized I wanted to type up my notes as I ate, but my laptop was now otherwise disposed. My, wouldn't a Foleo be convenient for such a task?
I'm still not convinced. I'm still not convinced that Hawkins' is right (or even completely honest) in his excitement over the possibilities of the Foleo. I'm still not convinced that there's enough of an "initial market" for this device to foster enough developer interest. I'm still not convinced that the Foleo isn't just the Newton eMate all over again. And yet...
The Foleo seems a bit like it's a solution in search of a problem. It's possible, though, that what's actually happening is there's a problem we didn't even know we had. That's what Hawkins is thinking. Remember music before the iPod? Remember television before TiVo? Remember the internet before Google? What Palm is hoping is that someday soon we'll be saying "Remember smartphones before Foleo?" Truly, though, my gut reaction to the Foleo is that it's unnecessary, it's silly, it's just another gadget to keep track of and charge. And yet...
When the VisorPhone was released I thought "I want something like that, but not the way I see it just this moment." Then came Treo. I could see myself someday thinking the same thing about Foleo. ...just not yet.
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