World hunts CherryPal cloud PC chimera
Have you seen the 2 watt mini machine?
People are beginning to wonder if Max Seybold's sandwich-sized wonder machine really exists.
The CherryPal CEO says his 2-watt thin client cloud PC finally shipped on November 4, after months of delays. But a chorus of CherryPal "Brand Angels" - Web 2.0 denizens enlisted to promote the product in the blogosphere - say they've yet to see any hardware.
"I know I'm not alone in suspecting that all the promises of shipments and funding up until now were a ruse - as far as I can tell, there's not a single CherryPal computer out in the wild yet, and I'm starting to doubt that there'll ever be," one Brand Angel says on a private social network the company may or may not have set up for these blog-happy reviewers.
Seybold has fashioned his Mountain View-based operation as a mashup of every buzzphase now gripping the minds of the worldwide digerati, from cloud computing to green tech to, yes, user generated content. Each Brand Angel was promised a free cloudy, green machine - and perhaps free stock options - in exchange for some online viral marketing. But the Brand Angel social network includes 106 members, and none say they've received a system.
In June, the CherryPal CEO told The Reg that his Freescale-powered mini-machine would outpace both your Vista desktop and your beloved Macintosh. And little more than a month later, the startup began taking pre-orders at $249 a pop, telling buyers that units would ship within a matter of days.
Seybold and company promised a 10.5-ounce box that moves "most of the software and data that traditionally sits on the desktop to the Internet." The unit would include a small solid state drive, but it would also tap into data and services sitting on Amazon's S3 cloud.
Have you seen me?
Then the company said a snafu involving its graphics hardware would push shipments back at least two weeks. Then two months passed. But Seybold insisted his mystery machine would finally make its debut on November 4, US election day.
Next page: Halloween tale
COMMENTS
Have google rumbled them?
Cherrypal's shop page is now showing shipments in 5 business days, but if you try to purchase through Google Checkout it is no longer possible.
Have google rumbled that this is a scam and removed the payment processing? This leaves the only possibility as a direct bank transfer -- not something I'm prepared to do, you might as well just give money to a stranger in the street!
Poor Folk .... :(
check out this recent post....I feel so bad for people who bought it and are still hopeful!
http://weblog.dollarish.com/dollarish/683612294/cherrypal-a-new-deliciously-affordable-desktop-for-the-thrifty-consumer.html#
Another Brand Angel weighing in
I'm a CP Brand Angel too, and can verify that there are about 105 of us in the Ning group and nobody has received anything yet. Despite CherryPal's assertion that 150 computers have already supposedly been shipped, I can say with confidence that NOBODY has received one of these computers yet because there hasn't been one word anywhere either online or in print about it. If it were for real--and if the lucky 150 people who received them were "super geeks" who trumped the 130 Brand Angels who had to sign contracts for the deal--wouldn't we be reading about it somewhere?
CherryPal SWEARS that the Brand Angels will be shipped their computers on Dec. 4 (I think that's the date--will have to check the discussion again)--but I will be absolutely shocked if I ever see that computer.
The thing is, at this point, even if the machine itself was incredible, the customer service would be so deplorable that the company would go out of business in a minute. It's not like they invented the concept of cloud computing--there are many credible, well-funded competitors out there who will be able to produce not only the computer but the reputation and customer service to back them.
There really are Cloud PCs; they're useful, they're amazingly affordable.
Here's the Cloud PC that you can actually buy that the Cherry wishes it could be.
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/thinlinx/
Cherry this, Cherry That
Is it just me, or does the name and logo bear more than a passing resemblance to the Cherry Mac Emulator that was widely discredited as being a rip of of Pear PC ?
