I forgot to mention the Blackberry in the last podcast, so I talk about it here. Also, a review of my new cell phone, the Palm 680.

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Competition is usually a good thing, especially for consumers, but both these companies are pretty much the same anyway. I have XM now and I love it, but what the hell, give me the best of both worlds. I do think XM is a way better name, so hopefully they keep that one.

Another one of my favorite companies is stumbling again. First is was Tivo and their raising of prices, and now Palm takes a hit for not being able to ship the latest Treo 750 for the US market on time. They also had a mess up that delayed the Treo 680 by a full week, missing “Black Friday” after Thanksgiving rush. Many other phone vendors, like HTC, crank out phones at an alarming rate. I don’t know why Palm is so slow. If Windows Mobile were just better, I’d say forget it and just get one of those.

Companies like Palm and Tivo, they succeed despite themselves. Where is the Linux-based Palm that has taken over two years to develop? Can it be that hard?

Google is going all out in the cell phone space with the release of AdWords for Google mobile search service. In fact, because of increased advertising, Google CEO Eric Schmidt told Reuters “your mobile phone should be free”. Would you want a free phone if it came with lots of advertising? Or do we want to continue to pay and have limited or no ads? It’s a real question because I don’t know that I want my cell phone cluttered with ads and mobile spam.

Google has been making a strong play for the mobile/cell phone market lately. The latest effort is a Java based version of Gmail that will run on any cell phone that supports Java programs. This Gmail app looks and feels a little more like a traditional email application and does not require access via a web browser. I have run it and it’s pretty cool. I just wish Google would come up with a way to view multiple Gmail accounts from one interface.

I am glad to see Google up the ante in the mobile space. I hope it will get folks like Yahoo (they already have a strong mobile effort), Microsoft and others to push innovation for mobile computing. I have always maintained that technology will continue to get more mobile. It’s not so much about the computer on our desks anymore but all the various kind of gadgets we carry around, more of which are becoming connected devices.