5 Vendors Who Dropped The Ball This Week

1. McAfee Downplays Crippling EPO Glitch

We don't mean to pile on, McAfee, as you've obviously had a tough week. Your buggy antivirus software update that caused computers running Windows XP to shut down and experience serial reboots was an accident of the type that could happen to any vendor.



Still, cloud computing is forcing vendors to be more honest and communicative about service outages. While this wasn't a cloud-related issue, the same applies to security vendors, and downplaying an issue is tantamount to pouring gasoline on a fire. McAfee, we give you credit for revising your statement on the matter, but we think you just learned a tough lesson about reacting to these sorts of incidents in the future.

2. Barnes and Noble Issues Nook Update

Barnes and Noble this week released a software update for its Nook e-reader that includes a basic Web browser, improved Wi-Fi, book previewing and games like chess and Sudoku. That may be enough to keep up with Amazon's Kindle, but it's hard not to look at the Kindle's greater share, and the early popularity of the iPad, and wonder if the Nook isn't destined to remain a niche, small potatoes type of product. In some respects, Barnes and Noble can't be blamed for the ferocious effectiveness of Apple's product design teams, but how much room really exists in this market? Barnes and Noble didn't drop the ball in this update, but it may have already dropped the ball in a general sense.

3. Facebook Extends Reach, Freaks People Out Even More

Really, Facebook? Have you not learned that each new feature you unveil for facebook just scares the heck out of people, even ones that don't pay much attention to privacy concerns?



This week at Facebook's F8 conference, company officials talked about new features like Open Graph, which integrates third party data into Facebook in a more robust way than Facebook Connect, its predecessor. Social Plug ins, which layers additional messaging and social networking capabilities into Open Graph, is another new feature.



But while this whole idea of "instant personalization" might be fascinating to partners, for users, it's another development that's going to lead to a whole new round of rumors about Facebook building the world's largest privacy killing engine. You guys need to work on your bedside manner with this stuff.

4. Lenovo Reportedly Looking At Palm

This week, Lenovo was reportedly looking seriously at an acquisition of Palm. This would fit with Lenovo's budding mobile strategy, but hold on there Lenovo, pump the brakes, have you thought about why HTC and Huawei -- which were reportedly looking at Palm -- already got scared off by the company's financials?



The Palm Pre is a solid mobile device, but Lenovo, think long and hard about this one. The slowing of Palm's sales momentum doesn't exactly bode well for the future.

5. Apple And The Next Generation iPhone Snafu

OK, if you believe that the discovery of a fourth generation iPhone prototype in a Silicon Valley bar wasn't a clever marketing ploy, then there are some serious questions that Apple needs to answer. Such as, how the heck do you allow an employee to take the device outside the company headquarters?



Apple's legendary secrecy about products has been its bread and butter over the years. The company reportedly would only allow early iPad testers to check out the device in a room where iPads were chained to tables. You'd have to think the forthcoming iPhone would be the same deal.