> I have absolutely no qualms about calling this new regime at Nokia a puppet government. This is far and away the most brilliant move of Ballmer’s tenure. Whether it pays off is another question entirely. > > [UPDATE: [Former Microsoft exec Chris Weber](http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/nokia-appoints-chris-weber-to-president-of-nokia-inc-us-and-head-of-markets-north-america-115904119.html) has just been named President of Nokia Inc. (US). This is a coup, folks.] No doubt this new deal between Microsoft and Nokia is a lot more about saving sinking ships than taking over the world. And it was certainly the cheapest way for Microsoft to get back into the game. So agreed, it was a great move by Ballmer.

I don’t think long term that the fate of either Microsoft or Nokia will change much as a result of this, but it will get interesting for a while.

My thinking is that this deal will do a lot more to stall Android than it will Apple.

Android:phase one was all about killing off Windows Mobile in order to keep Bing Search from doing well. Phase two of Android seems to be about taking on Apple, though with recent events including this one, I’d say Android still has a lot of others to contend with before it can dream of taking iOS down even a notch.

HP made some interesting announcements this week that lead me to think they have as good a chance as anyone of seriously contending for the few people who want a tablet but not an iPad. Microsoft was getting nowhere, predictably, with WIndows Phone 7, but this Nokia deal will change that, particularly in Europe. With the iPhone on Verizon in the US, and Nokia peddling Windows Phone in Europe, and HP taking whatever is left of the tablet market after the iPad, I’d say Android’s “world domination” scenario is looking more and more like a pipe dream.

And RIM is definitely not coming back. I don’t see how.

There’s still a lot of market share to go around for everyone, but that’s my point. There’s plenty for everyone. We’re far from a two pony race here, folks. Google is fighting a war on several fronts, and at least so far in 2011, it’s losing a lot more battles than it’s winning.

This is the perfect scenario for Apple to thrive. In a world with many choices, Apple always does better than in a world with only two.

> **RIM plans to add support for running existing Android 2.x apps on its upcoming PlayBook tablet to narrow its “app gap,” but also fears retribution from Oracle were it to use Android’s Dalvik Virtual Machine to do so.** Letting Android apps run on PlayBook won’t help RIM close the “app gap.” It will only give developers even LESS of a reason to write native RIM apps for it.

Almsot every day that goes by, RIM looks more and more like it’s going downhill right along with Microsoft. They’re basically pinning all their hopes on Apps somehow not being important in the near future. I think Google was planning on the same happening, but seems to have recently seen the light.

This is why I’m a bit more optimistic about HP’s chances, given how good the TouchPad looks. HP has an “app gap” too, but at least they’re trying their hardest to solidify their own platform by running WebOS on PCs, thereby increasing the installed base of users faster, rather than giving up on their own platform altogether like RIM seems to be.

> Dell says its target audience will use the Streak 7 plugged into wall outlets and TVs through an extra-cost dock, but I wouldn’t buy a tablet with battery life this poor. The key part of that quote is “Dell says.” Meaning the company who makes this turd actually considered the battery life problem and decided that users wouldn’t mind PLUGGING IN THEIR TABLET COMPUTER most of the time. You have to be remarkably disorganized as a company to let your engineers run over you like this on any product.

> Now that the iPad is out, though, I don’t expect to see new hardware revisions pre-announced — at least not by more than a handful of weeks. Overall, I think the iPad fits most naturally into the same schedule as the iPods: where new hardware is announced and ships in September. The iPad was [a massive hit](http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2011/01/18results.html) during this past holiday season. > > I don’t think April is a particularly good month for an annual iPad release. I don’t think it’s a particularly bad month, either, but it doesn’t make as much sense as September. April is four months into the new year, but still feels like “early” in the year. That leads to whispers and rumors during the holiday season that people should wait. Shipping new hardware in April adds another milestone to the iOS release schedule, too. > > Thus, my gut feeling is that Apple will move the iPad to a September release schedule, alongside the iPods. But they wouldn’t want to wait over a year and a half from the announcement of the original iPad to announce the second one — not with these stakes, and not with so many serious competitors trying their best to catch up. Guber’s “guess” here makes a lot of sense. Especially when you consider that the non-touch iPods really don’t have a lot of potential to “wow” people anymore. Seems a shame to waste the big fall announcement on new nanos.

Meanwhile, the iPod Touch part of that announcement in September has become mostly about taking the latest iPhone and taking out the phone. So turning the Fall event into an iPod Touch/iPad event to prep for the holiday shopping season makes a LOT of sense to me.

Thanks to the lack of 2-year commitments on iPad ownership, it also makes sense that iPads don’t really need to strictly adhere to a “once-a-year” strategy all the time the same way iPhones do. iPads are more like Macs in this way, and many Mac products used to get updated on a 9-month cycle not so long ago. I think APPLE likes the once-a-year schedule as a rule, but breaking it once to get the iPad on a fall cycle wouldn’t be too far a stretch. Especially during a year like this one, where most people expect iPad 2 to be like the iPhone 3Gs, rather than the 4. (A specs update, rather than a complete redesign, in other words.) If they have some major new feature (hi-res display or who knows what else?) that isn’t quite ready for April but will be by September, an iPad 3 in the fall starts to look even more reasonable.

And imagine how screwed HP, RIM, and all the Android manufacturers will be if Apple has some killer feature up its sleeve for this Fall, rather than next April? Talk about staying out ahead of your competitors.

Having said all that, there’s something about iPad 2 in April and iPad 3 in September that feels a little too close for comfort. Maybe if Apple shipped iPad 2 in MARCH—early in March, even—and then iPad 2 shipped in OCTOBER, that might be a bit less likely to anger iPad 2 adopters. Edy Cue was hinting at an announcement “soon” in regards to iOS subscriptions. Maybe they’ll combine the iPad2 with an iOS5 preview and get that one done in a single event.

The press will slam Apple for sure if Gruber’s “guess” proves to be accurate. Never mind the hypocrisy, considering that no one ever slams Android devices for being released on top of one another all the time. But even if none of this happens this year, I would not be surprised to see Apple shift the iPad to the fall eventually, and sooner rather than later. It certainly makes good business sense.

Update: One thing that puts a monkey wrench into this whole thing is Apple’s big problem of keeping up with demand. If they were to release new iPads and iPod Touches at the same time every year, and both at the beginning of Holiday quarter, what would that do to Apple’s ability to make enough product to sell in time? Tim Cook always chides that it’s a “good problem” to have, but it’s still a problem. There’s only so much Flash RAM available at any given time in the year. And these devices share some other components, as well.

Releasing at least one of these major products in April does give Apple a lot more breathing room on the production side of things. But maybe this big mystery component deal will help alleviate this? I don’t know enough about building such products to know.

> Harry Baals is the runaway favorite in online voting to name the new building in Fort Wayne, about 120 miles northeast of [Indianapolis](http://topics.sfgate.com/topics/Indianapolis). But [Deputy Mayor](http://topics.sfgate.com/topics/Deputy_mayor) Beth Malloy said that probably won’t be enough to put the name of the city’s longest-tenured mayor on the center. > > The issue is pronunciation. The former mayor pronounced his last name “balls.” His descendants have since changed it to “bales.” > > Supporters said it’s unfair that the former mayor can’t be recognized simply because his name makes some people snicker. But opponents fear that naming the center after Baals would make Fort Wayne the target of late-night television jokes. > > “We realize that while Harry Baals was a respected mayor, not everyone outside of Fort Wayne will know that,” Malloy said Tuesday in a statement to The Associated Press. “We wanted to pick something that would reflect our pride in our community beyond the boundaries of Fort Wayne.” These guys are missing the point. If the former mayor’s name sparks late night jokes, that’s tons of free advertising, and a guarantee that the new building will reach a national audience. They’d be stupid NOT to name the building after him.

It never hurts to show the world that you don’t take yourself too seriously, either. I say have a little fun with it.