(keitai-l) Re: Sharp Zero3 from WillCom

> From: Gerhard Fasol <fasol@eurotechnology.com>
> Subject: Re: Sharp Zero3 from WillCom
> Date: Fri, 5 May 2006 23:02:05 +0900
>
> 1, The W-ZERO Site is here:
> http://www.willcom-inc.com/ja/lineup/ws/003sh/index.html

Thanks, though I've already spent a lot of time there and on other Japanese
pages. While I read Japanese, it's not like when I'm reading in English. In
bandwidth terms, I could describe my Japanese reading as a 300 baud modem
versus my English T1.

>> Related question is why WillCom is excluded from keitai-email-based
>> services. At least I haven't any that will accept a WillCom address.
>
> 2. where do you get this from? Who told you this?
> Of course Willcom has email, you can send email from
> PCs to and from Willcom, from DoCoMo and AU
> to and from Willcom. No problem at all.
>
> Willcom is not excluded at all from any keitai email services

I get it from the registration webpages, which generally use choosers for
the acceptable domains for the email addresses--and which do not accept
WillCom's pdx.ne.jp. I don't know about Tabemo that Curt Sampson mentioned.
Some sort of eating service? In a couple of cases I've even contacted the
service providers to ask them to manually register the WillCom email
address, and they have refused to do so.


> 3. Palm did not commit suicide. Palm is now owned by
> Access.

As far as I know, there are now no Palm-OS-based devices available and
supported in Japanese, though perhaps they will reappear in the future.
However, what I was referring to was the suicidal functional race. The old
Palm's were extremely elegant devices that were not pretending to be general
purpose computers. However, what the Palms did, they did very elegantly,
even beautifully. For example, there was no need for a fancy battery-eating
color display for your contacts.

What Microsoft did was to attack from above with computer-like functionality
that was not at all needed. Even though Microsoft did a terrible job at
first, Palm responded suicidally by trying to match that unneeded
functionality. In a sense, Palm won most of the battles but lost the war
simply because they were fighting on Microsoft's turf. Microsoft has total
control of the market-dominating Windows OS on the computer side and Palm
could never beat them there. This is a natural strategy for Microsoft. They
see the OS as a weapon, and when you're building weapons, of course you want
them to be as powerful and easy to use as possible. When I think of Windows,
the metaphor that comes to my mind is a little old lady with a one-button
trench mortar. Granny doesn't actually need a trench mortar, but it's what
Microsoft sells her.