Comment by joshmarinacci

Former Palm employee here. I was a developer advocate working directly with app devs from a couple of months before Palm was acquired until after the shutdown.

I remember Phil and rather liked him. Everything he states in the article is correct as far as I remember it. Yes we were being slammed by the iPad, but we were far and away the #2 tablet that summer. Android tablets really sucked then, and despite Google's push there were more tablet native apps in the TouchPad app store than Android's. In hindsight it should have been cheaper and faster. And it would have been by Christmas (the TouchPad mini was just weeks away from shipping). Given more time and funding it would have been a contender (maybe not "winning" but still having a good run).

I suspect Palm was doomed the moment Apotheker took over. He wanted to turn HP into IBM. HP's plans to use WebOS everywhere (I was able to see prototypes of fascinating future products that I still want today) were well thought out, but didn't fit his vision. If you want to blame someone, blame the board for hiring him.

Ultimately WebOS's destruction was great for the rest of the ecosystem. Some really talented people went to Apple and Google, improving their interfaces at the expense of losing a 3rd way. I still wish I'd kept at Pre3. Modern iPhones and Android devices may be more powerful, but they don't have that elegant simplicity I miss from WebOS.

[Some notes](https://joshondesign.com/2012/06/06/webos-on-the-verge) I wrote shortly after the shutdown.

PS: I wish I'd see this post yesterday and could have responded earlier. I'm happy to answer any questions. email me josh at josh dot earth.