[berdinkerdickle]

The more I read the more I think to myself "damn people need to relax!" I really doubt HP spent 1 billions dollars on palm just to drop its smartphone support just like that. It just came out in Europe and at&t for gods sake!!

I agree.

[MDsmartphone]

wow, whatever you believe the CEO OF THE COMPANY THAT PURCHASED PALM truly means, the bottom line is it was poorly worded and announced with such a poor timing that it makes us ALL, no matter what you believe, scratching our heads.

palm fans, this is the ceo who is taking over??? Att just released the pre plus and will be releasing the pixi plus later this week. Palm WebOS phones are now on three major US carriers, in canada, mexico, europe, and china. And many of these carriers were just added. So if webos and palm are "failed" ventures, what gives? Why are all these carriers picking up a supposedly dead platform? Is it to hold on to past palm pda/treo/centro users? That doesn't make sense. but why else would verizon and att pick up the pre and pixi plus, yet not really advertise it as a top tier smartphone and instead stash in the back of the showroom with all those capable but consumer undesirable winmo 6.5 phones?

hp's ceo's announcement and timing, and carriers recently adding webos devices to their offerings without promoting them, something just doesn't add up. I feel like there is a HUGE unexplained scenario here.

regardless, palm users, lets face it,we are in a very vulnerable, confusing, and sensitive situation to begin with and this ceo's rambling has NOT helped calm the situation. Even if palm or hp clarify things over the next few days, tonights hp announcement has left us all with a little sense of WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?

ramblings, late at night...

goodnight

[jhoff80]

If the first couple of sentences didnt seem clear and people want to spin it, then read the other quote carefully...

"HP isn't going to 'spend billions of dollars trying to get into the smartphone business; that doesn't in any way make any sense.'"

They seem to imply they have billions to spend... but clear they are not going to spend the money to compete in the smartphone space.

I think the webos will be awesome in a tablet. Integrate it into TVs and Sony Dash type clocks... they have a bigger vision for Webos and I think many here will be impressed.

I say give it another... oh 12 hours or so, and I bet a clarifying press release comes out saying what the "people [who] want to spin it" are saying: yes HP has a broader vision for webOS than only smartphones, but that does not mean in any way, shape, or form that it's the end of webOS on smartphones. If you're going to pick which comments you're listening to, maybe you should read the part "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."

Come on, do you REALLY think that a smartphone isn't included in that "common set of devices" across a "web-connected environment"?

Really, this was a throwaway comment at an event for investors (which mostly had absolutely nothing to do with Palm, so it's not like they were laying out their strategy for Palm here), that is exactly in line with everything they've said in the past. I can't believe how blown out of proportion this is getting.

Even if they don't issue an immediate clarifying press release as I suspect they might, maybe we should wait and see what actually happens before claiming the sky is falling.

[berdinkerdickle]

No! we all need to dump all that we own Palm before it sucks us under.
Sheesh! Guys!

[Stormbot]

wow, whatever you believe the CEO OF THE COMPANY THAT PURCHASED PALM truly means, the bottom line is it was poorly worded and announced with such a poor timing that it makes us ALL, no matter what you believe, scratching our heads.

palm fans, this is the ceo who is taking over??? Att just released the pre plus and will be releasing the pixi plus later this week. Palm WebOS phones are now on three major US carriers, in canada, mexico, europe, and china. And many of these carriers were just added. So if webos and palm are "failed" ventures, what gives? Why are all these carriers picking up a supposedly dead platform? Is it to hold on to past palm pda/treo/centro users? That doesn't make sense. but why else would verizon and att pick up the pre and pixi plus, yet not really advertise it as a top tier smartphone and instead stash in the back of the showroom with all those capable but consumer undesirable winmo 6.5 phones?

hp's ceo's announcement and timing, and carriers recently adding webos devices to their offerings without promoting them, something just doesn't add up. I feel like there is a HUGE unexplained scenario here.

regardless, palm users, lets face it,we are in a very vulnerable, confusing, and sensitive situation to begin with and this ceo's rambling has NOT helped calm the situation. Even if palm or hp clarify things over the next few days, tonights hp announcement has left us all with a little sense of WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE?

ramblings, late at night...

goodnight

Ya but at the same time carriers like Bell are basically paying you to get rid of their Palm inventory.

Free Phone + 300$ + 75$ worth of accessories says a lot.

[ZombieElvis]

A quick thought:

Maybe Hurd was talking that HP will NOT get into the smartphone business, but they will let PALM operate in its own entity and they will REMAIN in the smartphone business, just food for thought.

That probably is what he meant but if that is indeed the case he should have *said* that. He's the CEO of a major American tech company not a writer for Lost. Gadget buyers shouldn't have to parse subtext.

[Cantaffordit]

wow, whatever you believe the CEO OF THE COMPANY THAT PURCHASED PALM truly means, the bottom line is it was poorly worded and announced with such a poor timing that it makes us ALL, no matter what you believe, scratching our heads.

...

ramblings, late at night...

goodnight

+1

If everyone was just scratching their heads (or any anything else that itches) it would be one thing, but this insane posting panic is just ridiculous. Hopefully HP will address concerns so concisely that people will start going back and deleting their posts out of embarrassment.

I'm expecting this to show up on snopes.com soon:

Did HP really buy Palm to get OUT of the smartphone business?

False.

Origin: An irresponsible journalist took a poorly worded statement out of context, without even publishing the question that was being answered. And without giving HP or Palm a chance to comment, rushed a provocative headline to print. Once the active user community at PreCentral saw the story, pandemonium ensued and and many people were trampled to death as everyone rushed to the cliff like a bunch of mindless lemmings. Once HP was able to clarify and everyone realized that people will believe bad news and journalists can print anything they want.... well, it was too late because so many had already jumped off the cliff. Sadly, this rumor persists in sparsely populated user forums and in chain emails that promise bad luck if it isn't forwarded to at least 5 friends.

[nimer55]

jhoff80, while i hate you as a person, I couldn't agree more..

(don't actually hate you, but thought that, that would make my agreeing with you alot more powerful, well i guess this ruins it.. Unless people stop reading before they get to this.. What if you stop reading before you get to this? If you read this then continue without commenting, if you haven't read it, let me know)

Anways, in a different post i said 72 hours, but yea same idea.. Theres no way they are going to ignore smartphones. They prob won't go after it as intensely as some members here including myself wanted them to. But if they spend the amount of resources that i'd spend... Well lets just say someone would have to buy hp...

Hp has said already that they are going to release their full plans once they acquisition is complete.

[jhoff80]

That probably is what he meant but that is the case he should have *said* that. He's the CEO of a major American tech company not a writer for Lost. Gadget buyers shouldn't have to parse subtext.

It's not like these were planned remarks, he was asked questions, and he responded to them. Sometimes, things don't come out as clearly as you'd like in a Q&A like that.

[Cantaffordit]

It's not like these were planned remarks, he was asked questions, and he responded to them. Sometimes, things don't come out as clearly as you'd like in a Q&A like that.

Can somebody post the question he was asked? My bet is that it wasn't "Did HP buy Palm just to get out of the smartphone business, and with the bonus of being able to really irritate PreCentral members?"

[ilovedessert]

The more I read the more I think to myself "damn people need to relax!" I really doubt HP spent 1 billions dollars on palm just to drop its smartphone support just like that. It just came out in Europe and at&t for gods sake!!

You're 101% right!

[pip smith]

You're 101% right!

+1

[jhoff80]

Can somebody post the question he was asked? My bet is that it wasn't "Did HP buy Palm just to get out of the smartphone business, and with the bonus of being able to really irritate PreCentral members?"

Re-reading the article, it's possible that I could be mistaken on this point, that it was a Q&A.

I guess it's more of a suspicion than definitely true. The event seems to have been focused on data centers, HP's layoff announcements, and finances, with slides accompanying it: HP cuts jobs in restructuring, invests private cloud infrastructure | ZDNet, though it might be they were two separate events, now that I'm looking at it.

My assumption is that like most financial events like this, that there's a brief Q&A after the prepared remarks, and given that the focus of the event had nothing to do with Palm (and that there's no slides about his comment on Palm), it seems highly likely to me that this is what the case is here as well.

[ilovedessert]

Hp has said already that they are going to release their full plans once they acquisition is complete.

Great so why don't we cool off and stop having a cow, over what is very likely NOTHING AT ALL to worry about!

[deesugar]

I say give it another... oh 12 hours or so, and I bet a clarifying press release comes out..

I don't know about everyone else but I'm kinda sick of press releases, talk and speculation. It's time they show a roadmap or release something more concrete about new WebOS phones. I'm not talking about a leak either, I'm talking about something direct from the company.

Because at this point so much damage has been done to Palm's name and the future of it's brand that it won't matter if they have something up there sleeves, nobody will be around to care anymore. I'm pretty die hard Palm fan but it's time for some good news, not troubling news.

[bulls96]

Worried about HP's statements today? watch http://bit.ly/bk807w no mention of not making phones its "one type of mobile device" they'll make

[nimer55]

I don't know about everyone else but I'm kinda sick of press releases, talk and speculation. It's time they show a roadmap or release something more concrete about new WebOS phones. I'm not talking about a leak either, I'm talking about something direct from the company.

Because at this point so much damage has been done to Palm's name and the future of it's brand that it won't matter if they have something up there sleeves, nobody will be around to care anymore. I'm pretty die hard Palm fan but it's time for some good news, not troubling news.

unfortunately they can't until they have fully acquired palm..

they can't praise something, and then end up having to bash it... well they already have praised it, but you know...

[ilovedessert]

I don't know about everyone else but I'm kinda sick of press releases, talk and speculation. It's time they show a roadmap or release something more concrete about new WebOS phones. I'm not talking about a leak either, I'm talking about something direct from the company.

Because at this point so much damage has been done to Palm's name and the future of it's brand that it won't matter if they have something up there sleeves, nobody will be around to care anymore. I'm pretty die hard Palm fan but it's time for some good news, not troubling news.

Hi,

I would love it if the did release info ASAP. However, for legal reasons due to the buyout/merger, I highly doubt it will happen. To us the Palm lovers, this is a big deal. However, the world will not end, if all of us sat on our hands, stopped getting worked up, over what more than likely is nothing. The merger is just weeks away at this point, so why not relax and stop making ourselves crazy.

In addition, by getting so worked up over this, we are scaring off potential customers.

Take care, Jay

[jhoff80]

I don't know about everyone else but I'm kinda sick of press releases, talk and speculation. It's time they show a roadmap or release something more concrete about new WebOS phones. I'm not talking about a leak either, I'm talking about something direct from the company.

Because at this point so much damage has been done to Palm's name and the future of it's brand that it won't matter if they have something up there sleeves, nobody will be around to care anymore. I'm pretty die hard Palm fan but it's time for some good news, not troubling news.

Any product announcement for a future product risks cannibalizing the already low sales of their current products.

Remember, the buy-out still hasn't been completed, Palm still doesn't have extra funding, and they're still on a bit of a tightrope for a while.

Besides that, the carriers already have unsold devices sitting on shelves, in some cases. And AT&T just launched the Pre Plus. Do you really think the carriers would be happy with a new product announcement that makes the current phone in their warehouses obsolete?

[donm527]

from reading the zdnet article just sounded like he was talking about HP as a whole and the direction they are taking the company and then mentioning parts of its business and he mentioned his view on palm and how it fits in the big picture.

The last part...

"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."

does sound like the number one reason to buy palm is for webos and the IP... the gui and probably the patents for multitouch display and everything... so that whatever they build, they can build devices that will have "a common look and feel and a common set of services laid against that environment." ... my interpretation is touchscreen and common ui across all platforms from consumer to enterprise... from tablets to servers.

they dabbled in phones... they may throw a few million a year at palm to make a phone... but doesnt really seem like they really care about the phone. yes, they spend 1.3 billion and phone freaks here may think its going to be because they want to battle apple and iphone... but 1.3 was petty cash to them for webos... they really look like that they are focusing on competing on other levels... bigger prize.

Can somebody post the question he was asked? My bet is that it wasn't "Did HP buy Palm just to get out of the smartphone business, and with the bonus of being able to really irritate PreCentral members?"