Treonauts' Year Ahead

Hello Treonauts and a (belated) Very Happy New Year 2005!!!

As many of you will have noticed, over the past two weeks my reporting has been spread thin as I travelled for work and holidays in France and Switzerland visiting family and friends while nursing a cold that has yet to fully pass through my system and also maddeningly struggling to get a decent Internet connection...

Nevertheless, this time spent offline allowed me to take stock of the year gone by and to ponder Treonauts' year ahead.  Below are some of my thoughts on the topics, events and technologies that I believe will come to shape our 2005.

• Customer Centric: this will be one of my central themes for 2005 as I illustrate how many of the companies providing hardware, software, services and content within the Treo Economy are still hopelessly clinging to an antiquated Product Centric business mindset that promotes the sale of 'features' instead of the delivery of 'solutions'.  I will demonstrate the many benefits that can accrue to those companies making the transition.  Principal among these will be palmOne as it (arduously/painlessly) grows out of its PDA skin and (slowly/rapidly) morphs into the mobile phone or consumer electronics company that it must become.
• Treo 650 GSM: while the many previews (official and unofficial), various announcements and commercial release of the CDMA Treo 650 by Sprint grabbed most of the headlines in 2004 it is evident that the wider availability of the GSM version in the US, Europe and the rest of the world will take center stage in the early months of 2005.
• Treo 650 Memory: where the issue of 'only 32MB of memory' dominated negative sentiment towards palmOne in the last months of 2004 we will anxiously await for news of a meaningful fix of one kind or another.  Preferably, we would like to see palmOne upgrade the Treo 650 to 64MB by the time the GSM version is released which would do much to redeem the company and bring much needed goodwill back to its doors.
• Treo Convergence: many are predicting that 2005 will be the year of convergence.  Considering that my professional expertise is in digital entertainment convergence and that my primary motivation to build the Treonauts blog in 2004 was prompted by the fact that I considered the Treo to be the best example of a convergence device, you can rest assured that this theme will continue to feature prominently.  For example, I anticipate that we will see the first streaming television service for our Treo by the summer and also many other developments on the music, radio, audio, pictures, photos, movies, video and games fronts among others.
• Treo Compatibility: while the Treo family is clearly becoming palmOne's single most important product line and has the potential to establish itself as the clear leader in the smartphone space worldwide, many software developers and service providers have been slow to fully adapt and update their offerings to exploit the Treo's unique capabilities so as to deliver a 100% Treo-compatible experience.  We anticipate that this will change dramatically in 2005 as an increasing number of solutions that have been developed from the ground up for the Treo become available.
• Treo Zen: we will continue to push the boundaries in our quest for the 'perfect' Treo of the future and scour the news for examples of advances such as improved battery life, screen resolution, smartphone design, network bandwidth and connectivity, storage capacity and expandability wherever these may be found.
• Treo 700: while we spend the year working and playing with our beloved Treo 650, palmOne will be hard at work developing its next generation product(s) to enhance the Treo family.  If the past is any indication we should be seeing the first 'leaks' of these efforts by the middle of the year.
• Treo Cousins: as we reported in 2004, as many as a dozen new Palm Powered smartphones will hit the market in 2005.  We will eagerly await and report on their previews and release particularly as we expect one or more of these to be keyboard smartphones.
• Treo Killers: contenders eager to steal some of the Treo spotlight and leading position will abound in 2005.  While some of these may prove 'worthy' and we will take the time to report on their strengths and weaknesses we don't anticipate that any will ultimately be able to match (even less exceed) the combined communication, information and entertainment capabilities of our Treo.
• Treonauts Community: from the moment I started the blog I had three overriding concerns for its content.  Namely, the need to bring balance, relevance and honesty to my posts.  Balance: I am clearly stating a personal opinion when I write but I have tried to look at both sides of the coin when taking a position.  Relevance: I did not want the blog to become riddled by triviality and thus I emphasized quality and not quantity.  Honesty: I wanted to be able to tell you what I liked and didn't without any outside pressures of any kind.  I believe that the blog has remained true to all three but naturally you will be the ultimate judges of this.  At the same time, beyond the personal responsibility that I have undertaken with the blog, it is obvious that your participation via comments, emails, votes, etc. carries great weight to change things within the Treo economy and there will undoubtedly be many issues that we will raise together in 2005.
• Treonauts Lifestyle: every day more people are waking up to the joys of being a Treonaut and each and every one will have their own experiences and stories to share.  Whether they're male or female, using their Treo in a corporate, professional or personal environment, travelling at 30,000 feet or hiking at 3,000 feet, at street level or underground, in the boardroom or the bedroom, working or playing there are few instances where the Treonauts lifestyle does not resonate.

I cannot begin to tell you how extraordinary it has been to be the recipient of your kind and generous support throughout 2004.  I greatly look forward to sharing many more stories with you in the coming year and will endeavour to make your blog even better.   Thank you Treonauts!

Separately, very special thanks to contributing writers Peter Arts and Jonathan Greene for their unique and insightful perspectives last year.  Also to Andrew Davis for sharing his views.  To palmOne and PalmSource for their continued encouragement as well as the many software developers and accessories manufacturers for facilitating our reviews.  Finally thanks to Gizmodo, Engadget, Slashdot, GigaOm, Techdirt, TreoCentral, PalmAddict, The Register and I4U among many of the countless websites and blogs that have and continue to reference us on a daily basis.

Treonauts look forward to a brilliant 2005!...