[pcurve]

I love seeing new product ideas, but I'm baffled at how this one made it all the way to production.

Basic premise is.. "Hey, we're going to make our smartphone so undesirable that you won't want to use it except when you absolutely need it. However, we'll make sure it looks well-built so people know that you've made a deliberate lifestyle choice and that this isn't your primary phone."

[joecool1029]

To be fair it wouldn’t be the first time a lifestyle luxury phone brand took off (see Vertu or Porsche Design). Palm does still have mindshare in the older crowd so that could be leveraged. The issue is the new logo bears no resemblance.

Alternatively, if they keep the price down it can be a viable second phone when traveling light (provided batt life doesn’t suck).

Personally I think their pitch on the site sucks and the product will be a flop since there’s no way in hell they’ll get software and hardware build quality perfect at launch. It might inspire xiaomi or another more experienced Chinese manufacturer to make a better comparable product.

[leetbulb]

Seriously. Plus you can buy these things on AliExpress for 1/5th the cost. And if you don't want to give up your smart phone completely, you can buy slick looking "bluetooth dialers" on AliExpress for even cheaper.

[joecool1029]

The general cheap small smartphone on aliexpress are MTK chipset phones running android gingerbread (or some other ancient version). You get what you pay for, unless I’m wrong and you actually have some decent products to link.

[leetbulb]

Yeah good call on the MTK chipset, looks like that's the case. :(

[hndamien]

Or an Apple Watch.

[microcolonel]

> isn't your primary phone

I'm sure this seems like the only conclusion, if your concept of human being is "those weird animals that spend 100% of their time glued to one or another smartphone". My primary phone is a Nokia 106, and life without Uber, maps, and Spotify on my phone is actually just fine (though I would probably have a smartphone if that was the extent of the deal). It stands by for the better part of a month, and gives me about a day and a half of periodic battery warnings until I think it's time to plug it in.

I don't see any reason why, with today's radio/application chipsets, battery technology, display technology, and sensors, we can't have a reasonably-sized (think iPhone 4S but 5C thick) good quality smartphone which holds a charge for more than just a couple days and can run WhatsApp.