The first reviews are in and none other than Walt Mossberg gives the iPhone a rather positive thumbs up. I’m not surprised. The iPhone looks rather sleek and has several features that I’d really like to have in a smartphone–namely easier to navigate features, such as the Visual Voicemail and its access to web pages. (I’ve completely given up on surfing the web on my smartphone.)
A big question is whether the general market is going to accept the iPhone’s touchscreen navigation and most importantly, onscreen keyboard. My guess is some will find the keyboard in particular to be frustrating and give up–and others will figure it out. I’m eager to give the iPhone keyboard a try myself. I’m no fan of the onscreen, DialKeys keyboard that comes with some UMPCs and I am hoping the iPhone experience is so much better. Actually, there may be a huge difference due to the digitizing technology. The iPhone uses a capacitive technology whereas the UMPCs (for the most part) use a resistive technology.
Anyway, all this talk of the iPhone and touch technologies has me thinking a lot about the supposed successor to the UMPC: Haiku. Hopefully, Microsoft hasn’t given up on the idea for a smaller, lighter, better UMPC. In fact, now’s the time to get the wheels turning on a device like this. My guess is that there would be much less OEM and retail resistance to a touch-based, multi-use Haiku device now that the iPhone has broken some barriers in the phone market.
Just take a look at the Haiku mockup that Microsoft has shown in the past. Doesn’t it look like it belongs in the iPhone generation?
Here are my thoughts on how Microsoft can avoid being left behind in the next generation technology lineup when it comes to UMPCs:
First, the devices need to be easy to use. No more dialogs that extend beyond the edges of the screen. No more ultra-small UI targets. There has to be quick and easy access to what people want to do. This is going to involve a combination of some clever built-in pan/zoom tools as well as cooperation from the developer community. Leaving it to each OEM to “fix” this problem is a non-starter.
The Origami Experience was Microsoft’s answer to part of this for the first gen UMPCs, but it’s only a beginning. There needs to be a shell developers can really leverage so third-party apps can be first class citizens. Developer support is one of Microsoft’s trump cards. A successful UMPC must have it.
Second, a successful Haiku product needs multi-touch. Single-point touch is like a mouse with a single button. It’s too limiting. Period. Microsoft, Intel and the OEMs need to get their act together here. There are many possibilities to open up here. Microsoft’s Surface concept product experiments with a few of them, but my big message to Microsoft is that there’s no more time for summer research projects, it’s time to push these technologies and concepts that have been around for awhile to market. Let’s get going!
Third, well merged usage scenarios work. I’m a big believer in the economy of general purpose computing devices. However, I’m also a big believer that the devices really work their magic when their form and design matches well with how they are being used. The packaging needs to reflect these realities. Give me a UMPC that can be packaged for photographers, or baseball fans, or grandparents touring the country in their RV, or for kids playing with dueling UMPCs in the backseat of a car, and now you have something. It’s not about taking a generic box and wrapping it with a single, “killer app” and calling it good.
Take the pro-amateur photography market, for instance. Why doesn’t every single photography store have a Haiku/UMPC photography package on its shelves?
Imagine a WiFi camera and a UMPC talking radio-to-radio. The bigger-screened Haiku UMPC provides a remote display for the camera. Makes sense. Every tried to use those tiny, often-hard to see backing displays on a camera outdoors, in the sun? It can be quite frustrating. Ever wanted a remote control of the RAW image data that the camera captures? Why not drive the camera via the UMPC? And what about image storage and auto-synching of photos as they are captured? Images are automatically moved from the camera to the UMPC via WiFi, cached and then uploaded as needed to a remote store via wireless broadband. No more lost photos. Instant sharing of experiences with friends and family. To pull this off, clearly the best solution is not about creating a UMPC device in a vacuum. It’s about getting the cameras and the remote computing devices to work together. That’s when the magic really begins to happen.
Fourth, sharing. Haiku devices need to be able to talk to each other. (Heck, all radio-enabled laptops and Tablets need to have top-notch support for this too.) Support for device-to-device communication needs to be made easier. It’s not right to leave this up to each ISV to evolve for themselves. The time has come to get this capability out of the box. Haiku apps should be everywhere that enable kids in the back seat of a car–each with a UMPC–to play a game against each other. Radio-to-radio. A great Haiku platform will make this easy to do.
I could go on with my Haiku recipe, but that’s enough for now. I’m sure you get the idea. What do you think? You can comment on my other blog here.
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