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Senior Wired Magazine editor Robert Capps penned an article titled "The Good Enough Revolution" for Wired's September 2009 edition. The print edition included the daring (and perhaps intentionally provocative) subtitle "Why lo-fi tech will rule the world."

This rings of an absolutism, and such rings set off our antennae.

In order to compete with the iPhone, you not only have to have a multi-touch interface and a slew of apps, you also have to offer the music and media that the iPhone provides thanks to its ability to sync with iTunes. For Google's Android mobile OS, the music comes courtesy of Amazon's MP3 Store which is preloaded on G1 phones. But more recently, Palm seemingly trumped Android when they revealed how their new Pre smartphone would bring music to the device: it pretends to be an iPod. Apple surely couldn't have been happy about that news and today, they're letting the world know. The Cupertino-based company has just issued a thinly veiled threat to owners of "unsupported third-party digital media players," stating that the players may not work with newer versions of iTunes. Yep, Palm Pre, they're looking at you.

If there was any doubt that the upcoming Palm Pre is being poised as an iPhone competitor, some recently discovered documents about Palm's financial plans can put those thoughts to rest. According to Palm's Subscription Accounting plan for the Palm Pre (PDF link), all revenue and expenses for the device will be distributed across 24 months - the required 2-year contract period for new Pre owners. What this means is that Palm will account for device sales immediately, but plans to use the subscription fees to fund ongoing R&D efforts. For Pre owners, the documents promise "new software features free of charge." Sound familiar? It should - it's the same accounting model used by Apple for their iPhone.

Google's VP of Engineering, Vic Gundotra, showed both a new mobile version of Gmail running on the iPhone and HTC Magic today, as well as a new mobile version of Google Maps running on the Palm Pre. The new mobile Gmail app, which Gundotra demoed at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, makes extensive use of new features that are only available in HTML5. Among these new Gmail features were offline access, even in the browser, as well as support for labels.

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