I do not remember a day, at least in recent history, in which there were so many game-changing tech announcements.

• AOL sells ICQ, the first ever instant messaging technology.
• Apple enters search to compete with Google.
• HP buys Palm to compete with Google, Apple, BlackBerry, and any other mobile giant you can think of.

All that happened yesterday, and people (myself mainly) do not know which piece of news is most worthy of their attention. So, after conducting a short Twitter survey (screen shot below), I decided to blog about all three… Now, my only challenge is to do it in a blog post that is not something you can bind and sell as a 500 page book, since there is just so much to say about each one of these developments.

So here goes:

• AOL sells ICQ: This story has particular significance for me. ICQ is one of the most successful Israeli startup companies in history. They were the pioneers of instant messaging, from which AIM, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Gtalk, Facebook Chat, and many more services originated. It was huge news in the “mini-Silicon Valley” Israel tech community when ICQ was sold to AOL. Since then, ICQ has lost some popularity and currently stands at approximately 32 million monthly uniques, out of which 25% are in Russia. It is therefore very appropriate that DST, the Russian investor that has money in Facebook and other tech giants, have acquired ICQ for $187 million. To put things in perspective, AOL originally bought ICQ for $400 million. Bottom line? AOL got rid of something that has been weighing them down for some time, and ICQ is officially no longer such a huge Israeli success story. Well, they still made a nice bundle from AOL but the end of the story kinda leaves a bad taste in the mouth of most Israeli geeks.
• HP buys Palm: According to most of the responses I got from my tweet, this is yesterday’s most significant development. HP has acquired Palm for $1.2 billion. Those of us over 25 remember when Palm was the cool thing to have. That day is long gone. The company who came out with their wildly popular Palm Pilot (I actually needed my mom to remind me of that name, I could not for the life of me remember it. That HAS to be the first time I called my mom for information about technology) is no longer selling handsets. Though they did recently debut  WebOS, an intuitive and impressive mobile operating system. This acquisition is huge from a consumer’s perspective, and also has a huge impact on the business side of the mobile industry, specifically in regard to Palm and HP.The big question on everyone’s mind is will HP leverage Palm’s reputation as a very innovative company with what can be a winning mobile OS, or will HP force their boring and unsuccessful branding at least in the mobile space, on Palm? I want to believe it is the former, and that is why they bought Palm, but you never know. On the flip side, HP may leverage their money, business and marketing power and use it to advance Palm’s OS, for example having the HP Slate running WebOS. Now there’s a thought that excites me. Mashable points out that there is one more interesting variable in this equation, Windows 7. HP has already committed to using Windows 7 on their devices, and this acquisition begs the obvious question “If HP now has their own in-house mobile OS, are they really going to offer devices with a competing OS?” Doubtful, but only time will tell. Whatever the case may be, huge news for the mobile industry!
  
• Apple Buys Siri: If you ask me, this is yesterday’s biggest news. Maybe it is just my obsession with mobile, or my love of iPhone OS and Android (will explain that), but Apple buying Siri for, according to Scoble’s estimate (he was actually the one that broke this news, on Twitter) around $200 million, an iPhone app (or more like a technology) that enables you to search effectively via voice, now that is huge. Why? For starters, just a few weeks ago, I was playing around with a friend’s Nexus One, and more specifically with its Voice Search capabilities. Four out of five results were incorrect (it did not pick up my voice accurately), but to be fair, I was in somewhat of a noisy outdoor environment. As I played with this technology and attempted to show it off to my non-geek brother (unsuccessfully since it kept failing), I could not help think to myself, “Apple could and should do this better”.


Scoble interviewed the Siri guys a few months back, and rightfully predicted that they have a bright future ahead. Apple buying this voice search technology is just another new battle in the epic and ongoing war between Apple and Google. Siri is supposedly more of a personal organizer that allows you to add events or activities via voice, but you can ask any question and the technology uses search to find you relevant answers. I can go on and on about this technology and this acquisition, but the best is to watch the videos below. Watch the first if you want to learn more about Siri, and the second if you’re a hardcore geek with the patience to watch an entire Scoble interview and demo (worth a watch, but a little long).

I am very much looking forward to seeing what Apple and HP’s acquisitions mean for the mobile industry. The entire space is going to change drastically.

So, what is you opinion? Which of the above announcements will impact the market the most? Please explain in the comments.

-Hillel

Engadget Mobile just reported that an employee of Australia’s Telstra let us all know that HTC will soon be releasing a device that will be better than the Pre. Now, the big news is not that HTC is announcing a new device, or that it will be a good one. The amazing thing about this report is that manufacturers like HTC are now looking to create Pre-killers.

No more of yesterday’s iPhone killers. The iPhone is somewhat already part of the past, and the company responsible for this is no other than Palm. I don’t think anyone would have believed this scenario to be possible even a month ago. The truth is though, that Palm deserves the credit and a lot of it for their new Pre. It really is an amazing device that includes all the characteristics necessary to make what can be considered the best handset on the planet.

Like I said in the fourth episode of Likemob (the best podcast on mobile news), it is not the hardware that is getting everyone excited. Although,  the hardware is definitely worth mentioning. They did manage to get a full QWERTY (even though it is a portrait one) into a 17 mm package along with a beautiful 3.1 inch multitouch touch screen display. But the OS is what makes this phone number one.

Palm really went all out with Web OS. I guess the two factors that make this OS a huge winner are the “card” interface and Synergy. The card interface allows the user to easily switch between tasks, such as viewing pictures, listening to music, and writing an email. All you do is press the Home button and the device zooms out for you to see all the tasks that are currently open. The coolest part, I think, is the ability to simply swipe one of the open tasks right off the display and by that, close the application. So unlike Symbian for example, in which closing a running app is a whole huge deal, this is completely seamless and could not be easier.

The other big thing that Palm introduced us to with the Pre, is Synergy. It is as it sounds. It basically combines all the different social circles of your life into one easy and basic interface. This includes a layered contact list with contact information from your Outlook, Web email account, Facebook account, and any other place the specific contact has info stored. This also includes a joined calendar and a combined email interface. It just makes things simpler.

What remains to be seen with the Pre is of course how well it will works in reality. Another huge question mark is the usability of the Palm App Catalogue. What will the installation process be like? Will it be similar to the Apple App Store or perhaps something closer to the hellish Symbian experience? We also do not know the pricing yet, although there is a rumor circulating that it will go for $399 with a contract.

Whatever the case may be, Palm has already succeeded in doing what no company has done in a long time.  They have managed to finally give Apple something to worry about. There has been talk about various iPhone killers, but correct me if I am wrong, I have never seen anyone use the term “HD Killer” or “Omnia Killer” before. The mobile world has now moved on from the iPhone due to Palm, and the new goal of the cellular giants should be to create what is now called a Pre-Killer.  Sounds better than iPhone killer anyway, doesn’t it?

-Hillel

We do not know all that much about Web OS, so I will wait for more details before expressing my opinion on that matter. As for the Pre, I have an opinion, and it is a strong one. Palm might be the first company that I know of that went from being a total nobody to becoming a major player and threat to the biggest names in the industry, and this change took place over night. This new device is not only going to compete with phones like the iPhone and the G1, as far as I can tell, it has them beat, by a long shot.

Let me just run down the specs here for you. The Palm Pre has a 3.1 inch touch screen with multitouch, accelerometer for landscape browsing, Wifi, GPS, 3mp camera with LED flash, 8GB memory, a2dp, replaceable battery, Micro SD expansion slot, USB 2.0, portrait slide out keyboard, 3.5mm headphone jack, and a blazing fast processor and CPU. For an exact list of all the specs, see here.

The form factor is impressive and innovative (kinda looks like a mixture between a PEBL and an HTC Touch, do you see that?). The OS from what we have seen seems to be unprecedented in its speed, beauty, and functionality. It really combines the simplicity of the iPhone with the intelligence of the G1.

Just to give one example, the swiping gestures to move between web pages and open apps remind me of the iPhone, but the ability to receive notifications about new email or IMs resemble the G1.

Palm, from what they have told us, are trying to deeply integrate our social networking lives into this phone. I am talking threaded conversations over SMS and all the IM networks. I am talking close collaboration with Facebook and other social networks, bringing, for example, your phone, Google, Outlook, and Facebook calendar and contacts all into one view.

I could really go on for a long time here, so I will just stop here and say that this phone and OS will no doubt bring Palm back to being an industry leader, and I do not think it will take long.

To finish off with a quote from Peter Ha “This is an iPhone, Android, Palm race now, Symbian and WinMo are done”. Sorry Itamar, but I could not agree more.
-Hillel

CES also means that we will finally know whether Palm really has something significant for us or if they’re closing down shop. Those are the only two options as far as I can tell, because if Palm’s announcement is not something absolutely huge, I am talking iPhone or G1 huge, then we can all say goodbye to the maker of the famous Treo.

There is no question that Palm is getting our hopes up and the word on the street is that they will be annoucing a totally new OS with at least one new device but probably more. They are making some huge steps in the right direction, there is no question about that. They just launched their on-device application store for both Windows Mobile and Palm OS devices. They are calling it “The Software Store”, how original.

According to Mobile Crunch, Palm’s new OS will be called Nova, and will try to fall somewhere in the middle of the business oriented RIM and the fun oriented iPhone. I am not sure I agree with that assessment, RIM is not so business oriented, with their Storm, and the iPhone is not only fun oriented, with its push mail and GPS.

There is no question that whatever Palm announces, it will be big, the only question is, will it be big enough? They just replaced their CFO and they are releasing all kinds of teasers to the press so it looks like they are trying to make it REALLY big.

I was never a big fan of Palm, my wife had the Tungsten II, which was pretty lame, and I for one, never really understood the appeal of the popular Treos. If Palm achieves their obvious goal of competing with Apple and RIM, and they introduce a new awesome OS along with a device that has a really large touch display with all the goodies we have grown so accustomed to, I will be the first in line.

-Hillel

What do you think?

-Aryeh