This just in: Apple's iTunes 9.0.2 update not only enables Palm Pre syncing, it hold it enthusiastically, presenting to allow you transmit all of your content to one of Palm's devices to make it simple to switch to the opponent handset with ditch your iPhoto.

No, in a far less amazing improvement, iTunes 9.0.2 once again blocks Palm's try to ride on Apple's coattails. The cat-and-mouse game among the two companies reminds me of a few of my preferred classic John Le Carré Cold War espionage dramas--you know, if Cold War espionage dramas had been in fact boring as well as mainly revolved around mysterious details of software development.

Palm, you might have received some points for being rude when you first boasted that the Pre would sync with iTunes, but at this point, you just look lazy--like you didn't want to spend the time or else energy developing your individual Mac-compatible software. Even RIM took the time to make its own Mac software. You might just be using doubleTwist for media sync--which, we'll note, is by now well-suited with the yet-to-be-released Motorola Android--and that would have been very well. But no, you had to base a marquee feature of your flagship product on a hack--and an easily blocked hack, at that.

So, Rubinstein and co., it's time to dial back on the argument with Apple. Your effort to call in the USB Implenters Forum backfired; you don't in fact have much option left, short of trying to charge Apple and let's be honest--you've by now bet the company on the Pre, so banking on lawsuits most likely isn't the best move at this end. If nothing else, you still have the possibility to look like the bigger person by being the one to stand down. But that window is rapidly closing, so think quickly--and think unusual.