Although HP’s press release says the company “will continue to explore options to optimise the value of webOS software going forward”, owners of the TouchPad and smartphones like the Pre 3 probably don’t have much to look forward to in terms of future development and support — at least from HP. (The TouchPad itself has only just gone on sale in Australia, meaning WebOS has never had any kind of real crack at the local market.)
HP is also looking at spinning off its personal computing systems group, getting out of the hardware game altogether it seems. There’s not much else known except the brief announcement, but for more commentary and background you can check out Mat Honan’s post on Gizmodo.
HP Confirms Discussions with Autonomy Corporation plc Regarding Possible Business Combination; Makes Other Announcements [HP Newsroom via This Is My Next]
Que
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 8:10 AMNo surprise but sad all the same. I remember my first ‘pad’ was a monochrome palm pilot in the nineties.
olearymo
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 8:30 AMPathetic, HP. As always. I knew when HP bought Palm it’d end in tears.
Would’ve been better off being bought by Apple.
Mario
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 8:58 AMThats messed up, I was thinking of getting a HP Tablet, thank the lord for that! I bought an Asus Transformer instead.
Steve Raharja
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 9:05 AMCould this mean big discount on existing TouchPad?
Hughhh
Thursday, September 1, 2011 at 5:45 PMNostradamus in the house!
LG
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 10:50 AMI used a Pre when it was first released and was blown away. Superior to iOS and Android in every way – except third party developers. Such a shame that this great OS will probably just wither on the vine now
Stove
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 10:56 AMMan, this is actually pretty disheartening. We don’t have much chance of it being open-sourced since it’s HP, but they’ve previously mentioned plans to use webOS as a quick-boot embedded OS. I wonder if that’s still going ahead?
Stove
Friday, August 19, 2011 at 11:36 AMI should probably break out the google before commenting: http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-08-hps-webos-tablet-foxhole-appliance.html