Official: General Palm (HP/Palm) Complaints / Farewell Thread

[realistdreamer]

I just had to post here. I will add my name to the list of "I told you so" posts. It's painful to see, but let this be a lesson about loyalty and corporate decision-making. They are with you until they're not. It's that simple. This was a $1.2 billion experiment that failed miserably. What's worse, all they had to do was read these forums and they could have known that before they bought the company.

RIM will be right behind them with the Playbook except they have enough of an installed base to fool themselves for a couple more quarters. Having been a business consultant to companies like this, I can't say I'm shocked. Dismayed is more like it. WebOS will die a long slow death like GEOs (look it up). It will be another smart OS that finds its way into myriad devices, but never gains a mass following.

As a USROBOTICS Palm owner and devotee since 1995, I sickened, but the writing has been on the wall for 5 years. Earlier this year, I bought my iPad (shouldda got a Galaxy Tab 10.1) and I'm not looking back.

[otterpop]

so I guess hellonnnewman is going to move every thread into here now? maybe just a front page redirect to this thread...

weak sauce, HP.

[johnsonbx]

I just got a return label from HP to send my Touchpad back. I hope HP finds a licensee for WebOS or makes it open source, because it really had potential. (Maybe I'll buy a $10 TP on eBay for tinkering!) Until then, THANKS HOMEBREWERS AND WEBOSINTERNALS - you made it fun.

[johnsonbx]

PS - I'd encourage everyone to spend the $50 app credit before returning their TPs - that way HP will have to pay the developers who gave it a shot before they turn off the lights.

[Quintus]

Yup.....why?

[thane777]

This is what they meant by "making it right"?

[Cantaffordit]

I guess they shouldn't have fired Mark Hurd. I'm sure he is laughing right now.

[jcohengd]

I am livid about the abandonment of WebOS. If anyone thinks that this was just a spur of the moment decision is dumb. HP execs played us like fools, and us WebOS loyal Let's just look at the timelines since July 2011:

June 30th - HP announces early adopter make it right program. Early adopters must buy 32gb model. Interpretation: HP knew this thing wouldn't sell for $600 and "forced" early adopters to buy the 32gb model so they could weasel $50 additional dollars out of early adopters (who foolishly, like me, did such with trust). We figured we got the "better" Touchpad for only $50 more. It was the illusion of a deal. In reality we got the model that HP knew wasn't going to sell. Certainly if we could have used the $50 on the 16gb many of us would have done so.

Also keep in mind HPs clever little line in their rebate terms and conditions: "Once the rebate has been applied for the device cannot be returned".

July 1st: Hp Touchpad Release. Interpretation: Crickets chirping; early adopters/webos devotees rushing to buy. Flushing $600 down the drain with promised rebate which none of us have gotten, heard a peep about, and probably won't ever see.

July 11th: Jon Rubinstein no longer in charge of WebOs Interpretation: He knew what was going on and either 1. Didn't want to be a part of it, or 2. Put up a fight and HP usurped his power

July 17th: WebOS "hard launch". Interpretation: HP tricks early adopters into not returning their devices. Most places have 30 day return policies. HP just had to string early adopters along for ~10 more days. Conveniently HP announces that an "update" to the Touchpad


July 31st: HP announced that the Touchpad's price was reduced by $50. Both the 16gb and 32 gb models. Interpretation: HP says a big slap to early adopters, who's $50 rebate was now rendered useless.

Aug 1st: HP releases WebOS 3.0.2 for Touchpad. Early adopters rejoice that their Touchpads are finally "the way they should have been at launch". Interpretation: Conveniently HP released the update a day after most return policies expired.

Aug 3rd: Staples releases a $100 off Touchpad coupon. This may seem insignificant but it's not. As early as July 20th Staples had a coupon for $100 off any tablet with certain exceptions. Those being the iPad, the Nook, the Kindle, and the TOUCHPAD. At this point Staples thought that Touchpad still had a chance. From that time to Aug 3rd, they must have been given information that would prompt them to release a coupon for $100 off the Touchpad only. Interpretation: Some sort of insider tipping of Staples by HP.

Aug 4th: HP announces promotional $100 off from Aug 5th-7th. Interpretation: Experiment to see market reception of the Touchpad at a reduced price. If they could get a favorable reaction they would continue to support WebOS. Also another HUGE slap to early adopters, laughing in our faces after now ripping us off for $100.

Aug 10th: HP announces permanent $100 off discount. Interpretation: HP realized the Touchpad was done for. Last ditch attempt to sell off as much hardware as they could. Again, another slap in the face for the early adopters.

Aug 11th: HP announces $50 app credit for the Touchpad: Interpretation: Guise to keep early adopters from suing showing how much they "care" about their loyal consumers. $50 to an app store that they know would not have support in 10 days.

Aug 16th: Official Palm Pre 2 update to 2.1 for Verizon: Interpretation: Not quite sure what this said. I thought it was hope that the Pre 3 would be coming but looking back I think it was more of a "last hurrah" for WebOS on VZW. Got that out the door before they closed shop. It was extremely weird though seeing the HP logo upon boot instead of the Palm logo. Deceptively thought that maybe this was a sign of good things to come from HP.

Aug 16th: Release of the Pre 3 trickled in Europe. Interpretation: Clearly an attempt to dump inventory on early adopters/WebOs loyal consumers. There wasn't even an official announcement about the release until after early adopters got shipping notifications. The announcement was pedestrian at best.

Aug 17th: Best Buy outs HP of terrible Touchpad sales; wants refund. Interpretation: Best Buy finally got the leak that Staples got back in early August that the Touchpad was dead. However, they were mad that they were last to know of the leak so they publicly ripped HP a new one.

Aug 17th: Touchpad 64gb announced in France: Interpretation: The trickery continues. Complete last ditch attempt to sell off failed hardware.

Aug 18th: HP announces death of WebOS, WebOS devices including Touchpad, Pre, and Veer. Interpretation: Eff you early adopters. Enjoy your $600 brick. At least we recouped SOME money off of our awful ads and 1.2 billion dollar investments. How do you launch the euro Pre 3, the 64 Touchpad, and the Touchpad in general while knowing in 2 days you're ditching it all? They do it because they are crooks who took advantage of their early adopters and knew that there were a few fools out there who'd buy it day one. That's the ultimate poker face.

To be honest I am shocked that they didn't release an incomplete Pre 3 in the USA to try to unload inventory too.

Now were is that class action lawsuit?

Goodbye WebOS

[DavidVogt]

I agree, HP really took advantage of early adopters. I also think management pulled the rug right from under the Palm GBU.

[sdguy101]

Any sane person saw this coming from miles away.

I've been saying idiots are running this company.

[jcohengd]

Originally Posted by sdguy101

Any sane person saw this coming from miles away.

I've been saying idiots are running this company.

That's completely false. No company (except a really bad one) pays 1.2 billion dollars for a company, announces a pompous "think beyond" event, and then bails 6 weeks after the release of it's flagship tablet and 2 days about it's flagship phone.

Edit: Yes - Idiots are running this company. I was disagreeing with the first statement about any sane person.

[Cantaffordit]

<thread merged>

[jp99]

I've had a Pre minus on Sprint since day 4 after launch, and this was my first smartphone. I've really enjoyed this OS, the open nature of it, and the user community.

First, my hat's off to you fellow users who've posted here for months and years and contributed so much to making this system fun to use and functional.

An even bigger hat's off to webOS Internals, homebrew developers and app developers in general who made the platform more than just a phone - it was tech that was fun and easy to use. Folks here are among the best.

I'm not sure what's next, but by late this year my 4 lines for my family move on to iOS or to Android, neither of which I want to move to but I want an active community and growing application base for my mobile computing.

Originally Posted by jcohengd

Yes - Idiots are running this company.

I've used HP products for 3 and 1/2 decades now (yeah, I'm old). HP calculators, the best of the best, got me through engineering school. I've used many HP products since then. Hewlett and Packard left a great, sound engineering and development legacy with the company.

Regarding today's upper "managers" of HP, I've only got one comment:

You morons aren't worthy to hold the used jock straps of Hewlett and Packard in your hands.

[SnotBoogie]

Originally Posted by Cantaffordit

I guess they shouldn't have fired Mark Hurd. I'm sure he is laughing right now.

part of the reason they have had declining sales, declining profits, losing pc share, etc. for so long is mark hurd. They were failing when they brought Leo in. Not to mention, Mark Hurd was at the helm when they bought Palm. They surely don't want his, profit killing, Palm buying decision making now. This is exactly the sort of thing they got Leo for.

[hrminer92]

Originally Posted by jp99

You morons aren't worthy to hold the used jock straps of Hewlett and Packard in your hands.

you've got that right!

[jcohengd]

Originally Posted by Cantaffordit

I guess they shouldn't have fired Mark Hurd. I'm sure he is laughing right now.

Dude what are you talking about? Do you remember when Hurd said this:

"We didn't buy Palm to be in the smartphone business. And I tell people that, but it doesn't seem to resonate well. We bought it for the IP. The WebOS is one of the two ground-up pieces of software that is built as a web operating environment...We have tens of millions of HP small form factor web-connected devices...Now imagine that being a web-connected environment where now you can get a common look and feel and a common set of services laid against that environment. That is a very value proposition."

Yes, he's even dumber than we thought. The only thing that WebOS had going for it was smartphones. Oh yeah, WebOS on a printer really made sense.

Regardless, they said they weren't in the smartphone business which proves why they only launched one WebOS smart (HP brand) in the 16 months they acquired Palm. Ironically they didn't release anything else either except the Touchpad. They messed up.

[jsh1975]

Originally Posted by finngirl

what's your loss? They promised you a device, with a certain OS. Got it. They might have implied other feature sets were coming, but the product you bought had some features specified, which you got. They promised you an app store, which you have.

the only grounds for a CAL would be if they turned the servers off and made the profiles unusable.

Class action lawsuit for defrauding the general public. I am sure they knew this was coming and wanted to release to the marketplace to try and recoup some of their money.

[Finally Pre]

Dearest WebOS family,

This has been a wonderful ride. I would like to thank all the developers, admids and supporters of WebOS. Together we have helped to advance the operating system into the greatest OS the world has ever seen. Now it may be time to move on. I have two TouchPads that I got on the 31st from B.B. and hope I can still return them. I'm sure I'll eat the covers. Then there was the cost of the apps before HP kicked in 50.00 x 2. In the end almost everyone here had some cost. Some more than other. The big money and time of the developers. Uuuuw that makes me want to scream.

Then the 2 Pre's out of contract with Sprint, 7 TS, 2 car mounts, 5 additional AC chargers and the 4 DC chargers. Where to go. Sure the "I" pads/phones work well but it's Apple. And android, so fragmented.

Wherever I go I hope I see most of you again. On a sister site. I Lov' ya' all. Take care and goodbye.

Your friend,
Scott

[HelloNNNewman]

You know.. the stuff still works and the OS is still being supported, right?

[Finally Pre]

Originally Posted by HelloNNNewman

You know.. the stuff still works and the OS is still being supported, right?

my pres are dieing so what would you do. One of them has to be hit in order to even answer a call. And right now I am under 30 day return option on my HP's. I can still get my money back. I don't want to go but with all the uncertainty I have to cut my losses before I cant.