WebOS is certainly way ahead of the moribund WinMo, better than the creaky Blackberry software, better than Symbian, and with a better UI than Android.

The question is who would buy them? Motorola just rolled their own Android solution, Microsoft did nothing with Danger other than killing a competitor, and actually going with WebOS would mean surrendering the browser war to Webkit/Apple. Nokia is already supporting several competing OSes and RIM is afraid of any radical change that might bother their hide bound corporate customers.

So someone in the smartphone arena would have to get a lot more desperate than they are now to buy Palm. WIll Elevation Partners keep pouring cash into Palm long enough for that to happen?

Palm’s quarter was excellent. While others constantly make comparisons to the iPhone, there’s really no need. The Pre can be successful in its own way without dethroning the apparent love of your life. Just as RIM can be successful or the Google phones. The smart phone industry is really just at the beginning.

Quit viewing Palm as some sort of threat to your precious that must be swatted down with drama mama antics.

In 2007, the original iPhone had these disadvantages:

- no 3rd party apps
- no 3G
- no GPS
- no carrier subsidy (!)
- no tethering
- no MMS
- limited Bluetooth
- the touch screen and virtual keyboard were unproven technology
- Apple had never sold a cell phone before
- their carrier partner, Cingular, merged with others to become AT&T in-between the introduction and the launch

Yet 2007 iPhone sales = 5,000,000. All in only 2 quarters.

Now, 2 years later, in the golden age of the smartphone, when you don’t even have to explain to people anymore “why they would want a browser in their phone,” the Pre cannot sell 500,000 per quarter? That is really, really bad. There are no more excuses left for Pre. What a disaster.

You don’t even have to compare to iPhone 3GS. The iPhone 3G continues to outsell the Pre all by itself, even though it is last year’s model.