The
PDA is a nice idea, but nice ideas that work take a while to turn into
reality
by Alan Zisman (c) 1995 First published
in Business in Vancouver
, Issue #285 April 11, 1995 High Tech Office column
Remember
the PDA? Yet
another computer acronym, this one standing for Personal Digital
Assistant?
In case
you missed them,
PDAs were announced a few years ago with plenty of high-tech fanfare
by Apple's then-president, John Sculley, as the Next
Big Thing-- handheld computers that would recognize your handwriting,
go anywhere, do anything, yet cost less than $1,000.
By July
1993, the first
generation of PDAs was on the market. Apple had the Newton, Tandy/Casio
the Zoomer, AT&TDoonesbury
with
a couple of weeks' worth of jokes. There wasn't much software
available,
and features were limited. the oddly named EO. Every
company seemed to have one, but then a funny thing happened: after
PDAs had their 15 minutes of fame, too many potential customers went
elsewhere. The handwriting recognition didn't seem to work (certainly
not for my handwriting). In fact, it provided
AT&T's
offering,
in many ways the most powerful of the bunch, suffered badly. Its
combination
of a handheld computer with cellular technology gave it an odd
appearance,
highlighted by Mickey Mouse ears. While it had the most features, it
was also significantly heavier and several times as pricey as the other
PDAs. The result: EO went out of business.
Since
then, Micro-soft's
WinPad software has been withdrawn and sent back to the drawing board
for a complete rewrite, and John Sculley is out of Apple. The market
has-- to put it gently --stagnated.
But now Motorola
and Sony are back with their joint entry, Magic Link, which
sports a creative new look and features General Magic's Magic
Cap software. To keep prices low, features have been limited. Magic
Link has a modem, but only a 2400 bps modem, and no fax, either. With
a single PC-Card slot, users are forced to choose between using it
to upgrade the modem or the memory.
The result
is a classic
downward spiral: limited features result in few buyers. Few buyers
mean little software development, keeping the features limited. As
well, with sub-notebooks weighing less than four pounds gaining in
usability while dropping in price, buyers have a real alternative that
offers a keyboard rather than the liability of the present state of
handwriting recognition.
But
handheld computers
more powerful than combination datebooks-and-calculators may still
have a future. Handwriting recognition may never turn out to be of
much use-- often I can't even read my own handwriting, so how can I
expect a computer to do better? And the next generation will need to
do a much better job at connecting to desktop computers, perhaps
through
the rapidly developing infra-red
technology.
But it's
not likely to
happen this year, or even next year. We often think of technology as
providing instant hits, neglecting to notice the long gestation periods
most innovations require. For example, Microsoft sponsored the first
conference on CD-ROMs in 1986. A mere seven years later, this
technology
finally became a serious way to sell software.
Many
companies tried
to market computers for home use in the early '80s, but by 1985, most
of them were out of business, and it wasn't until a year or two ago
that the home market was once again viewed as big
business.
One day, we
probably will
find ourselves unable to imagine getting through the workday without
a Personal Digital Assistant, but not before a generation or two of
hardware and software innovation brings us a much more powerful
product.
Until then, $1,000 will buy you an awfully nice pen and a lot of paper.