I just got a Palm Pre.  It's my first smart phone and I couldn't be happier with it.  I'm going to try to avoid writing about why I like the phone itself and instead focus on why the phone is a big step forward for technology in general.

First, a disclaimer:  It's impossible to talk about the Pre without comparing it to the iPhone.  When I favor the Pre in this post, I'm not necessarily saying that you as an individual would like a Pre better than an iPhone. I'm not trying to criticise people that are happy iPhone owners.

With that said, something bothers me about how most companies are operating these days.  Everyone seems to try so hard to "synergize" their various revenue channels that they forget about making the best product they can.

For example, the iPhone isn't just a great phone.  It's a way for Apple to sell more songs on itunes, make money from the app store, incentivize users to sign up for the ridiculously overpriced MobileMe service, etc.  For the most part, the iPhone seems great and I certainly don't fault Apple for trying to make money, but there are a lot of improvements that haven't happened because it wouldn't fit with Apple's strategic positioning.  Apple generally takes a very closed approach with all of their products for this same reason.

Verizon is famous for disabling features on their phones.  Some of their phones don't sync automatically with Macs because they have a deal with Microsoft.  Some of their phones have the GPS or bluetooth disabled for reasons that I can't even understand.

And then there's Palm.  Palm is a failing company.  They needed to swing for the fences with this product.  It almost seems like a team of fancy-pants executives were sitting in a room trying to figure out how to leverage Palm's corporate strengths (or some other weird business jargon) and some young upstart suggested something crazy: "Let's just try to make the best phone we can!"

I'm sure this suggestion got some laughs originally but when no one had any better ideas, they gave it a shot.  It sounds stupid, but this is the first product I've purchased in a long time where it really seems like they just tried to make what consumers wanted most.  Here are some ways in which the Pre seems to have ignored all the dumb business stuff and instead focused on the user:

• You can plug the palm into a computer and it looks just like a USB hard drive.  You copy files to the pre and they're available on the phone.  This includes moving any MP3 file into the "Ringtones" folder.  They don't mess around with DRMs or trying to partner with a desktop media app.
• You can sync with most accounts that people actually use: Gmail, Google Apps, Microsoft Exchange, Facebook, iTunes, Amazon (for downloading music), photobucket, AIM...
• You can open the phone up.  This may sound unimportant but it means that third parties can make hardware upgrades for the phone which isn't an option on the iPhone from what I understand.
• GPS, bluetooth, wifi, etc. all seem to be fully enabled with no restrictions.  Sprint normally charges users to use their GPS program but the Pre comes with a pretty solid one for free.
• There is a normal 1/8" headphone jack.  A lot of phones have some proprietary jack so that they can sell extra hardware.
• The pre uses an open format for the charging cable (micro-usb).  I've read that you might need a proprietary cable to actually sync data with a computer, but being able to charge is enough for me.  Everything is syncing over the air anyway.