FLO TV is dead, long live portable TV

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FLO TV was a terrible idea by Qualcomm, and no quantity of advertising (including ads in last year's superbowl) was going to save this one. You were asking us to carry around another small black square with a screen and pay another subscription every month.

No way buster.

I just sat through a number of new product pitches earlier today. Three of them were some sort of tablet, but specialized in some form.

I will say this straight up: if you are thinking some kind of single-use phone to tablet sized device is a good idea - it isnt. E-book readers are the single exception because they are specialized and serve a huge market, but the concept of paying for mobile TV? I get mobile TV on my Pre. I even watched a lot of the World Cup on the phone while I was on my boat this summer. Why the hell would I want to carry another similar sized device? Music? My phone. Movies? My phone. Games? My phone. Mobile TV? My phone. Mobile internet? My phone.

FLO TV was a terrible idea, and someone at Qualcomm should have been able to read the writing which was plastered all across the goddamn world in billions of dollars of sales of smartphones with big-ass screens. But they didn't and they paid. Bad Qualcomm, bad.

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