Two years later, Palm no longer has a share price, having been acquired by Hewlett-Packard, and Rubinstein, no longer its CEO, runs HP’s new mobile devices unit. But with the iconic Silicon Valley company backing it and “doubling down on webOS” and a new tablet based on the OS headed to market, its future is perhaps equally as promising, if not more so.

2:57 pm:
The session kicks off with video of a previous interview with Rubinstein in which he–the “father of the iPod”–claimed never to have used an iPhone.

So, have you touched an iPhone yet? Kara asks.

Rubinstein laughs. “Oh, we’re going to go through this again? Have I used one as my own device? No. Have I touched one? Yes.”

2:58 pm: Rubinstein continues: For me personally, we have lots of people who use iPhones and we have competitive analysis groups who review competing products, but I don’t want to be tainted by another experience. I want to come at this with a fresh perspective and I think what we’re seeing now in this industry is that everyone is copying the iPhone.

3:00 pm: Sorry, we’re having some connectivity issues here….

Moving on now to Palm and its ultimate acquisition by HP.

I think we did have many of the elements to be successful. We had a great team, a great product, a great product pipeline….But I think the market moved too fast and when we looked forward we saw a very clear way to where we could get the company to profitability, but we didn’t see a way to get it to scale….We could have been a small, successful company, but I don’t think that’s long-term sustainable in this business.”

So it was an issue of scale and not the “creepy lady marketing?” Kara asks.

Rubinstein says no, though he concedes the Palm Pre could have been marketed better.

3:04 pm: Ultimately, says, Rubinstein, we just ran out of runway…. We looked at a variety of different alternatives, and at the end of the day we decided that the best thing to do was to hook up with a partner that could get webOS to scale….The most expeditious outcome was to partner with HP.

3:05 pm: What other companies were interested in acquiring you? Kara asks. Rubinstein won’t say. What he will say is that the one that made the most sense was HP. “They didn’t have a great mobile strategy, but they had the means to get webOS to scale….A company like HP needs to be in control of its own strategy….This is not ‘game over.”

3:07 pm: How badly did HP need Palm? “Look,” says Rubinstein, “HP is the largest computer company in the world…it needs a mobile strategy. And it needs a mobile OS of its own….They needed to be in this space, and now they’re very jazzed about webOS.

3:08 pm: How about the Mark Hurd scandal? Was it much of a distraction for Palm? Rubinstein says it wasn’t. Palm was relatively new to the company when it occurred and was thus unaffected. “There was some turmoil for a few days,” he says. “That’s about it.”

3:10 pm: Moving on now to Palm’s role within HP. “What we chose to do as part of the acquistion was to integrate part of Palm into HP and keep part of it separate….The engineering team is essentially separate…things like HR and finance are handled by HP….From my perspective, what we were planning on doing and what HP wanted to do were very well aligned.”

Post acquisition, says Rubinstein, as soon as we aligned our road maps, we were off and running. He notes that internal relationships with divisions like HP Labs have been quite helpful.

Will the Palm name continue? asks Kara.

[Sorry, more connectivity problems.]
Rubinstein: That’s something we’re debating. What do you think we should do?

Kara: Get rid of it.

Rubinstein: Okay [jokingly]….I don’t really have much of a connection to the Palm brand.

3:16 pm: What’s Rubinstein’s view on the competitive environment? “Look, this is a huge market. The growth is phenomenal. If we roll back three years to when I started this Palm adventure, mobile was the place to be. And it still is today. I think we still have the chance to become a major player if we do the right things.”

3:20 pm: What’s the more important device, the phone or the tablet? asks Kara. Rubinstein says he doesn’t think people will have just one device. “It used to be that people shared a device. These days, people have multiple devices. So the new question is how do these devices interact so there’s a seemless user experience across devices….The ability to have a unified experience on all your devices is very important.”

3:21 pm: The conversation moves on to carrier relationships. Rubinstein observes that AT&T is doing pretty well in the Bay Area. “Just for you,” quips Kara.

3:23 pm: And on to the Q&A. First question from Engadget’s Josh Topolsky. What’s the Palm story that’s going to make people buy your phones? How do you convince a consumer to buy your stuff when you’re competing with the likes of Google and Apple?

Rubinstein: We really do have a unique experience compared to everyone else….The other concept around this is the connected device strategy. We’re in this transition now where we’re integrating into HP, so we’re still ramping up.

3:25 pm: Kara circles back, asks about differentiation and how HP can break through all the marketing noise. Where do you think the next radical change in the mobile market is going to come from? she asks.

I think it’s going to be incremental change, not a radical. I think it’s all about bringing this vision of a more connected world to our users.

Kara asks about forthcoming webOS devices.

Rubinstein gives the standard answer: “Stay tuned.” But he added, “This will be a very different conversation next year.”

3:25 pm: And that’s it.

“Palm created the PDA (personal digital assistant) space with the Pilot and the smartphone space after it with the Treo,” Rubinstein said this morning, reflecting on the company’s state when he first came to it. “So by birthright, Palm should have owned the smartphone market, but it just lost its way. It’s a very similar story to what happened with Apple.”

Except, of course, Apple never forfeited its independence to another company in the hopes of reclaiming its birthright, or to execute the broader vision of connected devices that arose from it. But in Palm’s case, its acquisition by HP made perfect sense. “We needed more resources,” Rubinstein said. “We could not compete in a fashion that would allow us to be one of the premier companies in the marketplace. And HP needed a strong mobile strategy around which they could innovate–one that would allow them to control their own furture and not rely on the kindness of strangers.”

In other words, to differentiate and succeed in the mobile device space, you need to own a veritically integrated stack strategy–software, hardware and services–like the one Palm is now building out with the help of HP’s not inconsiderable resources. “We’ve actually pulled a couple hundred people out of HP and made them part of Palm,” Rubinstein explained. “We’re using them to broaden our scope and we’re just cranking away. Our view is we’re going to see people with more and more devices in the future and HP is in the middle of all this. So our focus is to deliver a unified experience for that around webOS.”

So what’s Palm got in the pipeline for next year?

“We’ve got some great products in the works,” Rubinstein said. “Some smartphones, a great tablet coming. I think we have several products that will be hits when they come out….Everyone forgets, we just closed this acquisition in July….This time next year, you’ll see us in a very different position.”

Full text of AdMob boss Omar Hamoui’s response is below. But there’s not a lot more to it than that. What else can he say?

Hamoui notes, correctly, that Apple’s policy will limit the choices of the developers it is trying to woo to its platform: They’ll be able to use Apple’s iAds and ads from independent ad networks, but not from the biggest player in the market.

And since the point of iAds, per Apple (AAPL), is to make money for its developers–Steve Jobs says the ad business won’t be meaningful for his company’s P&L–then you’d think he would want as much choice as possible. But as I’ve noted before, Apple has repeatedly limited choice–and revenue–in pursuit of other goals. So this can’t be a total shock.

Apple’s new policy may also dampen investment in the mobile-ad business, or at least parts of it. Since Apple is allowing only “independent” ad companies to transmit data, it makes it a lot harder for those companies–Greystripe, Millenial, and Medialets, for starters–to sell themselves to big mobile players like Microsoft (MSFT), Research In Motion (RIMM), Palm (PALM)/Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), etc.

But it may be hard for Google (GOOG) and AdMob to get to worked up about Apple’s policy, since Apple has already done them a huge solid. The company’s entry into the ad market helped persuade federal regulators to bless Google’s $750 million purchase of the mobile ad network, a deal that appeared to be in jeopardy for quite some time. Steve Jobs giveth, and Steve Jobs taketh.

Mobile advertising and the iPhone
June 9th, 2010

Apple proposed new developer terms on Monday that, if enforced as written, would prohibit app developers from using AdMob and Google’s advertising solutions on the iPhone. These advertising related terms both target companies with competitive mobile technologies (such as Google), as well as any company whose primary business is not serving mobile ads. This change threatens to decrease–or even eliminate–revenue that helps to support tens of thousands of developers. The terms hurt both large and small developers by severely limiting their choice of how best to make money. And because advertising funds a huge number of free and low cost apps, these terms are bad for consumers as well.

Let’s be clear. This change is not in the best interests of users or developers. In the history of technology and innovation, it’s clear that competition delivers the best outcome. Artificial barriers to competition hurt users and developers and, in the long run, stall technological progress.

Since I started AdMob in 2006, I have watched competition in mobile advertising help drive incredible growth and innovation in the overall ecosystem. We’ve worked to help developers make money, regardless of platform–iPhone, Android, Palm Pre, Blackberry, Windows, and others. In the past four years, AdMob has helped tens of thousands of developers make money and build real businesses across multiple operating systems.

I’ve personally worked with many iPhone app developers around the world, including one who created a fun and simple game in the early days of the App Store. He built the app because he was interested in the challenge. He built this single app into a multi-million dollar advertising revenue stream with AdMob, hired a whole team, and turned a hobby into a real business.

We see these stories all the time.  We want to help make more of them, so we’ll be speaking to Apple to express our concerns about the impact of these terms.

Omar

Turns out, that’s not quite the case: Sprint’s claim was off by a factor of three. In its first day at market, the EVO sold as well as the the Instinct and Pre in their first three days combined, not three times as well.

“We originally reported that the total number of HTC EVO 4G devices sold on launch day was three times the number of Samsung Instinct and Palm Pre devices sold over their first three days on the market combined,” Sprint said in a corrected press release today. “We inadvertently erred in the comparison.”

A bit of an embarrassment for Sprint (S), which has been hyping the EVO and its presales for some time now. That said, the device is selling quite well. In fact, it has reportedly sold out at a number of outlets and is in short supply at others.

Not that that’s good news, as BTIG analyst Walter Piecyk notes. “It should be disappointing to investors that the company was not prepared to sell more phones given the demand,” he wrote in a note to clients today.

“While sales of the HTC EVO were much stronger than the Palm Pre last year,” Piecyk added, “Sprint had been assuring investors that they would be well-stocked with inventory and that the component shortages that Verizon had experienced with the HTC Incredible would not impact their launch of the EVO. We understand the value in just-in-time inventory, but would it have hurt to have an extra 100,000 phones ready even if it meant carrying some inventory through the end of the quarter?”

Given Sprint’s revelation, Piecyk now believes Sprint sold about 150,000 EVOs during its first weekend at market, down significantly from his earlier forecast of 250,000 to 300,000.

Mobile user interface master Matias Duarte has left Palm and evidently hired on at the most obvious of places: Google.

Duarte, who led development of Palm’s webOS UI as the company’s senior director of human interface and user experience, has jumped ship, Palm (PALM) confirms. And while the company refuses to tell me where he’s going, multiple sources say it’s Google (GOOG), where he’ll presumably be working on Android, the company’s open-source platform for mobile devices–noncompete clauses permitting, of course.

Duarte’s departure is a significant loss for Palm and new owner Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), which has said it plans to “double down” on webOS. His prowess with user experience and information design is well known in the industry. Before Duarte landed at Palm in 2007, he was design chief at Helio. And prior to that, he led the team that created the Danger Hiptop mobile device. When Palm announced the Pre at the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2009, it was Duarte who introduced the design of webOS.

So, as I said, a real loss for Palm as it heads to its new home at HP. And a bittersweet moment for Duarte, who had great hopes for Palm’s reinvention. As he wrote in a 2009 blog post: “When I started in this field, the Palm V was the unquestioned leader in mobile devices. To this day I believe it represents one of the best consumer electronic products ever created. I always aspired to match Palm in simplicity, usability and design–so now that I’m here, I feel like a kid who’s just been handed the keys to Daddy’s convertible.”

Looks like you’ve got the keys to the Segway now, my friend.

Google and Duarte have not yet responded to requests for comment. I will update here if they do.

UPDATE: Google confirms that Duarte has joined Google as User Experience Director for Android. The company declined further comment.

Piecyk’s advice went unheeded–until recently. Now with Palm’s fate settled after its acquisition by Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) last week, the handset maker’s smartphones have become bargain-bin fare.

Last week also saw Sprint giving away the diminutive Pixi free to anyone willing to sign a two-year contract. This week, Verizon (VZ) is following suit with steep discounts of its own. The carrier has begun offering the Pre Plus and the Pixi Plus for just $29 with a new two-year contract. That’s $120 less and $60 less than the prices at which the devices debuted in January.

It’s also $28.99 more than Amazon’s price.

That’s right, the next-generation versions of the phone former Palm CEO Ed Colligan once described as a “significantly better product” deserving of a higher price than Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone is selling for a penny at Amazon (AMZN). Which is a great deal, particularly since both devices are being offered with free 3G Mobile Hotspot service. Sadly, the offer comes a bit too late to make much of a difference for Palm.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Palm Wouldn’t Have Lasted the Year
• HP “Doubling Down” on Palm’s webOS
• Who Will Buy Palm? If Not HTC, How About HP?
• Palm CEO: Can’t Read My, Can’t Read My Poker Face…

After an All Things Digital report last week on Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) being the most likely suitor for Palm (PALM)–despite multiple reports of intense interest from HTC and Lenovo from China–CEO Jon Rubinstein jokingly asked how we knew about the deal.

We didn’t! It was a complete guess, Ruby!

Actually it was a very informed one by Digital Daily’s John Paczkowski, but his cogent analysis of the synergies between Palm and HP is pretty much what Rubinstein said drove the action.

“We’ve got great intellectual property with webOS and a great team assembled,” he said, in an interview with BoomTown this afternoon after the $1.2 billion acquisition was announced. “HP is the largest tech company in the world and they are now going to invest in driving it to scale, which we could not do at Palm.”

Getting its innovative webOS mobile operating system software to scale–or, more precisely not being able to at its size–was one of the major issues that Rubinstein pointed to in doing the deal (and, it goes without saying, Palm’s struggles).

“This industry became much more competitive very quickly than we had hoped or could have predicted,” he said, referring to the giant investments in the space by Google (GOOG) with Android, Apple (AAPL) with the iPhone and even Microsoft (MSFT) with its new Windows Phone 7. “We did predict the right marketplace and thought the smartphone market was going to explode, so it was the right direction.”

Now it will be up to HP to drive Web OS, although Rubinstein said he expects most of the team at Palm–including himself–to move over intact.

Rubinstein, who once worked at HP, said more details over who the rivals to nab Palm were will be revealed when regulatory documents are released, although he declined to comment specifically now. Now, it is up to him and HP to sell it to Wall Street.

He said he expected the deal “should not attract significant” government scrutiny, given the high amount of competition in the space.

Which he predicted would be heightened now that HP is backing Palm as its new owner, rather than struggling on its own, as it has been.

“Certainly from a tech point of view, the ability to compete is now profound,” he said. “I think this is a logical and natural match and the synergies are obvious.”

As to missteps, such as its creepy lady advertising and questionable marketing, Rubinstein said no CEO likes to focus on those.

Which is why when I asked him about the silly exchange I had with Silicon Valley VC and Palm backer Roger McNamee about last year’s D: All Things Digital conference about the mirror on the back of the Palm Pre that the “ladies” would love, he joked that—even though McNamee was now out–the overly loquacious Elevation Partners investor would be brought back from time to time to liven things up.

As to Rubinstein’s own controversial quote to me in an onstage interview at a D event at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January, where the former Apple exec said he had never used an iPhone, he quipped: “I still haven’t touched one.”

In truth, Palm never really did.

Here is that video, as well as highlights of the appearance by Rubinstein and McNamee at last year’s D7:

Video clip: Jon Rubinstein says he’s never used an iPhone.

Video clip: Mirror, mirror, on the smartphone…

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100428/palm-ceo-jon-ruby-rubinstein-talks-about-hp-deal-hes-staying-will-always-love-the-pre-mirror-and-still-will-not-be-touching-any-iphones/feed/ 5 http://allthingsd.com/20100419/radio-shack-dumping-palm/ http://allthingsd.com/20100419/radio-shack-dumping-palm/#comments Mon, 19 Apr 2010 13:15:33 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=38612 For Palm, April is indeed proving to be the cruelest month. It began with reports that the company is for sale and continued with news of the departure of software chief Michael Abbott. Now comes another ugly development: RadioShack appears to be dumping the company’s smartphone line. The Palm Pre and Pixi have disappeared from the retailer’s Web site and from the shelves of many of its stores.

As of this writing, RadioShack’s Palm Store is entirely empty (“What are you shopping for in our Palm Store?” “Nothing!”). And CL King analyst Lawrence Harris reports that a number of RadioShack locations are no longer stocking the Sprint (S) version of the Pre and Pixi.

“Over the weekend we visited multiple RadioShack locations in the New York metro area,” Harris writes. “Most were no longer carrying the Palm Pre or Pixi. One location still had some Pixi’s, but no Pre’s in stock. The store manager told us that sales of the Pixi would be limited to the stock on hand, with no further shipments expected. Historically, RadioShack has been an important sales channel for Sprint. In recent weeks RadioShack was offering both Palm models for free, probably in order to clear out inventory.”

I’ve asked both Palm (PALM) and RadioShack (RSH) for comment and will update here if and when I’m given one.

UPDATE: Wendy Dominguez, corporate media relations manager for RadioShack, just provided me with the following comment: “For competitive reasons we don’t comment on inventory numbers and distribution of specific devices. Palm has been a good partner. We expect that relationship to continue.”

Dominguez declined to explain why Palm devices are no longer available for sale in RadioShack’s Palm Store. Nor would she comment on reports that the Palm Pre and Palm Pixi have disappeared from a number of the company’s brick-and-mortar locations.

UPDATE: Palm has declined comment.

UPDATE: Sprint has confirmed to Tech Trader Daily that it is indeed phasing out sales of both the Palm Pixi and Pre. “The plan is for the Pre to be replaced by a BlackBerry device and the Pixi for a message-centric device,” a spokesman told the blog.

FURTHER READING:

• Palm: I Cast Thee Out Creepy Lady Ad Agency
• Palm’s Worst Nightmare: New iPhones on AT&T and Verizon
• A Palliative for Palm
• Good Luck Competing on the iPhone’s Home Turf, Palm
• Exercise in Futility? Palm Pre Plus, Pixi Plus Headed to AT&T
• Palm: Pssst. Wanna Buy 1.15 Million Smartphones?
• Palm Pileup: Weak Smartphone Sales and a Gruesome Q4 Forecast
• Could Be Worse, Could Be Raining: Palm’s AT&T Launch Delayed?
• Could WebOS Licensing Be Palm’s Salvation?
• Palm’s Salvation? Less Push, More Pull.
• And if Palm’s Project JumpStart Doesn’t Work Out, There’s Always “Project Defibrillator”
• Double Face-Palm: Analysts React to Palm’s Lowered Guidance
• Time to Start Looking for a Buyer, Palm?
• 2010: Year of the Palm? Maybe Not…
• Analyst: Palm May Be Acquired in the Next Two Years

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100419/radio-shack-dumping-palm/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100412/palm-those-were-the-videos-my-friend-i-thought-roger-mcnamee-would-never-end-up-selling/ http://allthingsd.com/20100412/palm-those-were-the-videos-my-friend-i-thought-roger-mcnamee-would-never-end-up-selling/#comments Mon, 12 Apr 2010 12:27:09 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=26577

With rumors flying hither and yon about the sale of Palm–likely to an Asian company, such as HTC or Lenovo–BoomTown is getting all misty for those days of hope that the little innovative smartphone pioneer might actually prevail against the giants.

Not for the creepy lady in the advertising for the Pre, mind you, but everything else.

Thus, here are three videos in which the dream was still alive at Palm (PALM).

The first, below, is an interview BoomTown did with Elevation Partners’ Roger McNamee, who sank $425 million into Palm and talks about the sky-high prospects for the company at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, where Palm was the belle of the geeks.

The second is from the seventh D: All Things Digital conference, where McNamee and Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein appeared in June 2009 to talk up the launch of the device.

In it, McNamee pooh-poohed the idea that Apple (AAPL) would care about the Palm Pre mimicking an iPhone in iTunes (which Apple did care about a lot) and had a delightful cat fight with me about the mirror on the phone for the “ladies.” It begins with a mock video Rubinstein and McNamee made for D7 in which they make fun of McNamee’s proclivity for telling tall tales about the Pre.

The third is a highlights reel from an interview I did with Rubinstein at this year’s CES, as well as a short clip from that interview of him telling me he had never touched an iPhone.

No, unfortunately, he never did.

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100412/palm-those-were-the-videos-my-friend-i-thought-roger-mcnamee-would-never-end-up-selling/feed/ 3 http://allthingsd.com/20100406/palm-dumps-ad-agency/ http://allthingsd.com/20100406/palm-dumps-ad-agency/#comments Tue, 06 Apr 2010 11:50:57 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=38274

“The Pre is probably being talked about more than other phones right now because of the marketing and advertising, and that’s a good thing. Could the ads work harder to show exactly how the phone works? Yes, but we knew it would be polarizing people to have a woman not shout at them and tell an interesting story.”

– Gary Koepke, co-founder of Modernista, the agency responsible for the absurd marketing campaign that launched the Palm Pre

Well, Modernista founder Gary Koepke was right about one thing: The absurd ads his agency conceived for the launch of the Palm Pre really could have worked harder to show how the phone worked–a lot harder. Because here we are a year after the device launched and Palm (PALM), which was the toast of the Consumer Electronics Show when it announced the Pre, is languishing amid lousy sales and an alarming inventory problem.

Little wonder then that Palm is rumored to be cutting the agency loose, evidently having finally realized that launching a bet-the-company smartphone with an advertising campaign that says almost nothing about it was unwise, if not utterly foolish–almost as foolish as choosing as a lead for that ad a female character far better suited for a role in “The Exorcism of Emily Rose.”

In the end, Modernista’s Palm campaign was simply far too short on product description and far too heavy on inane imagery (an army of jumpsuit-wearing Chinese dancers and a strange mumbling woman on a rock?) to be effective. If, as Advertising Age claims, Palm is dumping Modernista and negotiating with several other agencies to handle upcoming campaigns, it’s a wise move. Here’s hoping we see some new ads with clearer messaging and a focus on features over directorial foppery in the future.

PREVIOUSLY:

• Creepy Lady Mercifully Absent From New Palm Commercials, Redux
• Creepy Lady Mercifully Absent From New Palm Commercials

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100406/palm-dumps-ad-agency/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100406/what-do-rush-and-npr-have-in-common-internet-talk-radio-hub-stitcher-nabs-6-million-from-benchmark/ http://allthingsd.com/20100406/what-do-rush-and-npr-have-in-common-internet-talk-radio-hub-stitcher-nabs-6-million-from-benchmark/#comments Tue, 06 Apr 2010 11:30:25 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/?p=26216

Online talk radio aggregator Stitcher nabbed $6 million from Benchmark Capital and will use the money to give radio blabbermouth Rush Limbaugh, as well as the endlessly talking heads of National Public Radio, even more digital distribution.

The San Francisco-based start-up often describes itself as the the Pandora of online talk radio. And like the digital music site, Stitcher lets its users create and customize their own free personalized talk/information/news radio stations.

The site focuses mostly on its apps for a variety of mobile devices, especially increasingly popular smartphones. It offers programs from about a thousand different sources, such as NPR, E! and The Onion.

Stitcher also recommends new programs to users based on their selections.

The infusion of funding in a Series B round led by Benchmark–whose partner, Bob Kagle, will have a seat Stitcher’s board–will allow it to expand its advertising sales force and improve its offerings, said CEO Noah Shanok in an interview with BoomTown last night.

“The hope for everyone in terrestrial radio is to find new audiences, so as we grow, they will too,” said Shanok, who co-founded Stitcher in 2008. “We want to be a part of everyone’s everyday life.”

Shanok said fast-growing usage and engagement–which he declined to give specifics about–was the reason Benchmark was attracted to the company.

The new funding adds to $3 million Stitcher already raised from New Atlantic Ventures and investors Ed Scott and Ron Conway, who also participated in the new round.

While the mobile app on the Apple (AAPL) iPhone is the most popular, Stitcher also offers software for Research in Motion (RIMM) BlackBerry, Palm (PALM) Pre and Google (GOOG) Android devices.

Stitcher is also pushing into other areas, such as being part of Ford’s (F) initiative to make its SYNC-enabled vehicles into Wi-Fi hotspots, allowing people to connect to the Internet everywhere much more seamlessly in a moving car. They will be available later this year.

Here’s the press release on the funding:

Stitcher Secures $6 Million in Series B Venture Funding

Benchmark Capital Leads New Round to Help Transform the Way We Listen to Talk Radio

SAN FRANCISCO, CA. (April 6, 2010)–Today, Stitcher, a service that allows users to customize talk radio programming on their mobile devices, announced that it has completed its Series B round of financing. Led by Benchmark Capital, with participation from previous investor New Atlantic Ventures and tech veterans including Ed Scott and Ron Conway, the funding will be used to further Stitcher’s product and platform development. Bob Kagle of Benchmark will join Stitcher’s board of directors.

“We know that people prefer listening to news, talk and information programming when they’re on-the-go. The rise of smartphones has finally created an opportunity to give people exactly what they want to hear–on their commute, at the gym, on a road-trip–wherever and whenever they want it and that’s exactly what Stitcher does,” said Noah Shanok, CEO of Stitcher. “Benchmark’s funding, combined with Bob’s guidance, will help us continue to take advantage of the growing market for mobile content distribution.”

Stitcher’s free service allows users to create a personalized audio programming experience. With Stitcher, users can listen to the news and talk radio shows they enjoy whenever and wherever they like, using their mobile devices. Users choose their favorite programs from more than a thousand different sources, and Stitcher then delivers the audio feeds to their phone as a single, regularly updating radio station. Stitcher also helps users discover new content on a variety of topics–including business, sports, politics, entertainment, and current events–by recommending additional programs based on the shows users have in their feeds. A single radio station can include programming as diverse as Fox Headline News, NPR’s Fresh Air, TechCrunch Headlines, Onion Radio News, and E!’s Hollywood Rap Up.

“Stitcher is transforming the way we all consume news, talk radio, pod casts,” said Bob Kagle, general partner at Benchmark Capital. “Noah and his team are building a platform that will deliver the personalized experience consumers currently enjoy for music to the broader world of audio programming. We’re thrilled to join the Stitcher revolution.”

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100406/what-do-rush-and-npr-have-in-common-internet-talk-radio-hub-stitcher-nabs-6-million-from-benchmark/feed/ 1 http://allthingsd.com/20100401/verizons-palm-pre-and-pixi-prices-officially-insaaaaaaane/ http://allthingsd.com/20100401/verizons-palm-pre-and-pixi-prices-officially-insaaaaaaane/#comments Thu, 01 Apr 2010 18:59:20 +0000 John Paczkowski http://digitaldaily.allthingsd.com/?p=37979 Verizon has a solution to Palm’s (PALM) daunting inventory problems: Dramatic price cuts on the company’s webOS smartphones.

The carrier is now selling the Pre Plus, which debuted on its network in late January at $149.99, for $49.99. And the company has dropped the price of the Pixi Plus to $29.99 from $99.99.

Substantial discounts, even more so because Verizon (VZ) is offering a buy one/get one free deal for both devices. And, on top of that, the carrier is now offering its Mobile Hotspot service, which transforms the smartphones into Mi-Fi-style hotspots for free.

Inventory purge, anyone?

]]> http://allthingsd.com/20100401/verizons-palm-pre-and-pixi-prices-officially-insaaaaaaane/feed/ 0 http://allthingsd.com/20100330/feeling-at-home-with-a-router/ http://allthingsd.com/20100330/feeling-at-home-with-a-router/#comments Wed, 31 Mar 2010 04:02:29 +0000 Katherine Boehret http://solution.allthingsd.com/?p=1146 Like a hornets’ nest, the home router sits undisturbed by those who know better than to touch it. This antenna-enhanced box sends data to and from desktops, laptops, smart phones and TiVos (TIVO) throughout the house. Its indicator lights glow, signaling all is well with the network.

But setting it up can be a major ordeal. People beg their techie friends for help. Some sit for hours on the phone with customer support. A few brave souls muddle through a sea of acronyms and secure codes in an attempt to install the router. Once it is set up, many are afraid to change its settings for fear of disrupting it and losing Internet connectivity.

Enter Valet (TheValet.com), a new wireless router designed for people who are tired of being intimidated by a blinking box. Valet is designed by the people who brought us the Flip video camcorders, the ultra simple handhelds with ultra simple software that just work. And it comes from Cisco (CSCO), which also owns Linksys—a router brand that people know and trust.

I’ve been using Valet for the past week, but it took me only 10 minutes, from start to finish, to get it going, thanks to a simple USB key that plugs into the computer and sets everything up in the background in less than five minutes. I tried it on a Windows 7 PC running and on an iMac, as well as on mobile devices, including a BlackBerry, Palm (PALM) Pre and the HTC HD2. The Valet is available Wednesday for $100 on Amazon.com (AMZN), TheValet.com and Staples (SPLS) stores. Over the next two weeks, it will be sold at Best Buy (BBY), Target (TGT) and Wal-Mart (WMT). There’s also the $150 Valet Plus, with a Wi-Fi range about 20% greater than the Valet.

I ran into a bug while trying to install the Valet software on a Mac: I plugged in the USB key but its built-in software didn’t install and I got a message telling me that Valet wasn’t able to set up on my computer. A Cisco representative said this was a rare Mac bug that will be fixed over this week and next week.

Along with its simple setup, Valet automatically creates a guest network to go with the main network so visitors can log onto a household’s Wi-Fi—either with or without a password, depending on settings—and not gain access to files shared within that network. The Valet software has parental controls that make it a cinch to set up restrictions like blocking certain Web sites or cutting off Internet access after a certain time on school nights or weekends.

The Valet isn’t the first router to enable parental controls and guest-network access. Apple Inc.’s (AAPL) $179 AirPort Extreme Base Station allows users to set up guest networks. Likewise, Netgear’s (NTGR) six most recently introduced routers, priced from $70 to $190, offer guest networks and parental controls. But just as the Flip camera’s built-in software simplified the process of editing, uploading and sharing home videos, the Valet’s software makes networking approachable for anyone—regardless of technical skill.

The Valet comes in a box with a USB Easy Setup Key, wireless router, Ethernet cable and power adapter (the last two are hidden under the box’s interior packaging). Instructions on the box told me to plug the USB key into a PC or Mac. Then on-screen directions popped up, instructing me to plug the Valet router into the wall with the power adapter and then into my home’s modem using the Ethernet cable. I selected the “connect” option on the computer screen, and four minutes later, the network was set up.

The device’s software, called Cisco Connect, is divided into four categories: Computers & Devices, Parental Controls, Guest Access and Settings. With these, I could quickly see how many devices were connected to my network and learn the name and password for the guest network if I forgot it. (Valet networks have pre-set, randomly selected names and passwords that people can easily change. My network’s default name was RubyPanda and its password was mango62—both simple word/number combinations that are easy to remember.) If the guest network is password-protected, guests have to enter that password on a Web browser page, like at a hotel. This could be confusing for people used to entering network passwords at the operating-system level, right as they select the Wi-Fi network. A Cisco representative said using a Web browser page is a more consistent way of entering passwords and it saves people from having to answer questions they may not be able to answer if they’re logging onto the main network, like the name of the “WPA key.”

If people get stuck during setup, which happened with me when I ran into the Mac bug, a screen immediately displays a customer-service number for Valet that’s available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I spoke to a woman who tried several troubleshooting methods, but she didn’t know about Valet’s rare Mac bug. Once a computer is set up with the Valet network, the USB key can be taken to other computers to update them with the same network passwords and settings.

Using the parental controls couldn’t have been easier. After a password is set up, Web content can be blocked at a teen or child level on some or all devices. Specific sites can be blocked, and when I blocked Facebook on a connected Mac, it wouldn’t open on that computer without the parent password. Time restrictions on Internet usage can be set up here, with different settings for school nights and weekends.

Though the $100 Cisco Valet is more than twice as expensive as some wireless routers, its built-in software puts great emphasis on simplicity and ease of use, and turns setting up and using a a home network into an unusually pleasant experience.

Edited by Walter S. Mossberg.

Write to Katherine Boehret at mossbergsolution@wsj.com

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