Tag Archives | Palm

Sometimes threats are angry, blustery, and public. Sometimes they come in the form of…mundane product support notes. Let’s call this one Warning Shot HT3642.

Last month, Palm announced that its Pre phone would sync directly with Apple’s iTunes software on PCs and Macs. It does, rather well, by pretending to be an iPod. It seemed unlikely that Apple would be thrilled with that scenario.

Now Apple has published a support note concerning iTunes that says that it’s aware that some “unsupported third-party media players” (read: the Palm Pre) “claim” to sync with iTunes, but that Apple can’t support or test such compatibility. And “because software changes over time, newer versions of Apple’s iTunes software may no longer provide syncing functionality with non-Apple digital media players.”

It’s conceivable that it’s just sayin’ that you never know what might happen, but virtually everybody is going to assume that the message here is that an iTunes update (possibly the next one) will kill Palm’s Media Sync feature real soon now.

I still feel like we don’t know what’s going on here. If someone sticks his head into a lion’s mouth, he’s either really, really smart or really, really dumb. Offering iTunes syncing through a clever hack is the equivalent of sticking your head into a lion’s mouth. But I don’t think anyone involved with the decision at Palm is dumb.

The thing is, Palm could implement perfectly satisfactory–if slightly less seamless–iTunes syncing by supplying its own utility that talks to an iTunes library and the music and video files on the hard drive. I wonder if it’s already done so, just in case? And if there are already lawyers somewhere drawing up suits claiming that people bought Pres because Palm told them that they’d sync beautifully with iTunes?

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape…
You don’t spit into the wind…
You don’t pull the mask off that old Lone Ranger…
And you don’t use clever workarounds or hacks to do things with Apple products which Apple doesn’t want you to do, because Apple will surely release an update which defeats your clever workaround or hack.

–Jim Croce’s “You Don’t Mess Around With Jim” (minor revision by Harry)  

Among the many interesting features of Palm’s almost-here Pre smartphone is Media Sync, which lets it sync with iTunes on a Windows PC or Mac as if it were an iPod or iPhone. Daring Fireball’s John Gruber and Jon Lech Johsnsen (the uberhacker who reverse-engineered DVD encryption and Apple FairPlay DRM) have been blogging about the new feature. I’m intrigued by their take, and puzzled (so far) by what Palm is up to here.

I think that both John and Jon’s analysis is based on this video from last week’s D conference, in which Palm’s Jon Rubenstein shows the  iTunes synching feature. e specifies that it involves no additional software, and the synching is clearly happening within iTunes, which refers to the Pre as an iPod. Jon (Lech Johansen, not Rubenstein) says that the Pre must be essentially pretending to be some specific iPod model and thereby tricking iTunes into doing the sync, and John agrees, saying it “can’t be legit.”

This analysis is all well-informed and sensible. It’s possible, of course, that it’s wrong–maybe Rubenstein mispoke when he said no additional softwaere was involved, for instance. But for the moment, the Gruber/Johansen take on this is at the very least the most likely scenario.

And if it’s indeed what’s going on, it’s tough to figure out what’s going on in Palm’s head. Reasonable people can debate about whether there’s anything underhanded about one company’s device masquerading as another company’s device to gain access to the second company’s software. Reasonable people can debate about whether Apple has any moral responsibility to permit third-party hardware manufacturers to sync their devices  with iTunes. But it’s all moot: If Apple doesn’t like the Pre’s approach to iTunes synching, and there’s a technical  way for it to stop it, it will, in an upcoming iTunes update. History pretty much proves that. And considering that, it seems pointlessly risky for Palm to do what John and Jon think it’s done: There’s a high chance that anyone who buys a Pre because of this feature will end up disappointed when Apple circumvents it.

(Wild card: Maybe Palm is positive there’s no technical way for Apple to respond to what it’s done. I’m not a USB engineer, but this scenario seems unlikely.)

The odd thing is, it’s possible to write software that peeks int iTunes’ music library and syncs songs back and forth in a way that works quite well: When I owned a Windows Mobile phone, I used The Missing Sync to sync it with iTunes. But such techniques involve the installation of software on a computer, and it’s not iTunes that’s doing the synching. You’re synching with iTunes, not via iTunes. If Palm did this, there’d be no controversy and little chance of Apple striking back, and the Pre would have a neat and useful feature.

Based on the D demo, though, whatever the Pre is doing, it’s something other than that. It’ll be fascinating to get more details once the phone comes out on Saturday, and to see how Apple responds.