4 ms·

As a long-suffering webOS fan (Pre- through to Pre3 & Touchpad), all I have to say to this news is, yay! WebOS is a fantastic system that does not deserve to l

by j_col 15y ago

As a long-suffering webOS fan (Pre- through to Pre3 & Touchpad), all I have to say to this news is, yay! WebOS is a fantastic system that does not deserve to linger and die due to HP's lack of leadership and vision. Jeff Bezzos, on the other hand, is a true visionary in my opinion and I would be happy to see my webOS HP Profile become an Amazon profile sometime soon. My only doubt though: will they make phones?

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
zitterbewegung 15y ago
I don't think they will make phones or even continue webOS. I have a feeling that this is a talent acquisition and they will use it to improve the Kindle Fire.
- j_col 15y ago
  Considering they already fired all of the hardware people, most of the talent have already gone (unless you mean't software, and it that case webOS is a pretty different system to Android, so it's not like Amazon would be picking up a few hundred Android developers here).
  - firefoxman1 15y ago
    Well most of Palm's hardware in recent years sucked anyway. WebOS is where the talent went in. Even if it was a talent acquisition, I think WebOS has a better chance of at least being open-sourced if it's owned by Amazon than if it was stuck with HP.
- technoslut 15y ago
  They will undoubtedly make phones. Why give away a market to competitors that is worth billions? Amazon wants to keep users in their ecosystem. To do that you need a phone as well, which they're essentially already doing in their AppStore. Within three years Amazon will come out with their own phone. It will be the same game plan that they used with the Fire and gear it towards the low end. Eventually they will go towards the high end.
  - w33ble 15y ago
    The Fire makes sense, it's a media portal that plugs directly in to Amazon's forte; books, and more recently, apps and streaming video. It's not a tablet though, and Bezos readily, and correctly, admits that. What exactly would they gain by making a phone? Sure they would stand to sell more apps, but I think Amazon is most interesting in selling books and being a player in the streaming media game. The cell phone, with its small screen, isn't well-suited for those. Not to mention that their apps are Android apps, something I wouldn't think Palm would make a great resource for. If they are buying Palm for hardware and cell phone experience, I'd think there would be a cheaper way to get those somewhere else. Phones don't make sense in Amazon's model at all to me. Of course, I could be wrong, but unless it's driving sales of Amazon products, like the Kindle does, there's no incentive.
    - rudiger 15y ago
      How is the Kindle Fire not a tablet?
      - w33ble 15y ago
        It kind of is as a secondary function, but it was built as a media consumption/purchasing device, a kind of hand-held portal into the world of Amazon; even their browser relies heavily on their EC2 platform. Compared to the Android tablets on the market, it lacks a lot in the way of expandability and even storage. Even the underlying Android OS was forked to bring it further away from a tablet and more to an Amazon portal. That it runs Android Apps is just a pleasant side effect. To quote Bezos himself, "We think of Kindle Fire as an end-to-end service" http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/29/bezos-in-the-modern-era-of-consumer-electronics-devices-if-you-are-just-building-a-device-you-are-unlikely-to-succeed/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/29/bezos-in-the-modern-era-of-...
        jonursenbach 15y ago
        Aren't all tablets media consumption and purchasing devices though?
Charmander 15y ago
Amazon will make iPod Touch like devices before they make phones (although the Kindle Fire already falls into that market segment due its price point). This proposed webOS purchase is to hedge their bets against Google keeping ICS and future versions closed source. Amazon can't out a 10" Kindle tablet with the underlying system based on Gingerbread. The Amazon services could be provided but there would be no apps and games made for it.
- cpeterso 15y ago
  > Amazon can't out a 10" Kindle tablet with the underlying system based on Gingerbread. Why not? What makes Gingerbread so inappropriate for a tablet compared to Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich? Amazon can tabletize Gingerbread in their fork.
  - barista 15y ago
    Exactly. I don't get why Amazon would buy a new OS when it can get an existing well supported well publicized and we ll maintained OS for free. Currently they are freeloading on android which is a great thing to get all the android benefits without having to pay apenny for it. Why spend money on a new platform and then spend some more developing for it and inviting developers to it. I hope they don't make this mistake.
    - Steko 15y ago
      (1) Android is not free, ask Samsung about the $180 million check they're writing to Microsoft this year and the 20 court cases the have with Apple. There's potential liability with Oracle and if they put 3G/4G chips in them, Nokia. Then since Amazon is forking it they have their own development costs anyway. (2) Amazon is locked out of Google Services and the latest version of Android, if ICS or Jellybean has a truly killer feature/service they could get their clock cleaned by other Android vendors. Hoping Google will always release the source early on releases yeah you might not want your eggs in that basket. (3) Integrated development ala Apple can be the most profitable model. (or it can not, cough Palm) (4) There's a lot of IP here and Amazon doesn't have a lot of patents. (5) The tanking of everything WebOS may mean the price is very cheap. Maybe they implement a WebOS-like layer in Android.

by j_col 15y ago

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

zitterbewegung 15y ago

I don't think they will make phones or even continue webOS. I have a feeling that this is a talent acquisition and they will use it to improve the Kindle Fire.

j_col 15y ago
Considering they already fired all of the hardware people, most of the talent have already gone (unless you mean't software, and it that case webOS is a pretty different system to Android, so it's not like Amazon would be picking up a few hundred Android developers here).
- firefoxman1 15y ago
  Well most of Palm's hardware in recent years sucked anyway. WebOS is where the talent went in. Even if it was a talent acquisition, I think WebOS has a better chance of at least being open-sourced if it's owned by Amazon than if it was stuck with HP.
technoslut 15y ago
They will undoubtedly make phones. Why give away a market to competitors that is worth billions? Amazon wants to keep users in their ecosystem. To do that you need a phone as well, which they're essentially already doing in their AppStore. Within three years Amazon will come out with their own phone. It will be the same game plan that they used with the Fire and gear it towards the low end. Eventually they will go towards the high end.
- w33ble 15y ago
  The Fire makes sense, it's a media portal that plugs directly in to Amazon's forte; books, and more recently, apps and streaming video. It's not a tablet though, and Bezos readily, and correctly, admits that. What exactly would they gain by making a phone? Sure they would stand to sell more apps, but I think Amazon is most interesting in selling books and being a player in the streaming media game. The cell phone, with its small screen, isn't well-suited for those. Not to mention that their apps are Android apps, something I wouldn't think Palm would make a great resource for. If they are buying Palm for hardware and cell phone experience, I'd think there would be a cheaper way to get those somewhere else. Phones don't make sense in Amazon's model at all to me. Of course, I could be wrong, but unless it's driving sales of Amazon products, like the Kindle does, there's no incentive.
  - rudiger 15y ago
    How is the Kindle Fire not a tablet?
    - w33ble 15y ago
      It kind of is as a secondary function, but it was built as a media consumption/purchasing device, a kind of hand-held portal into the world of Amazon; even their browser relies heavily on their EC2 platform. Compared to the Android tablets on the market, it lacks a lot in the way of expandability and even storage. Even the underlying Android OS was forked to bring it further away from a tablet and more to an Amazon portal. That it runs Android Apps is just a pleasant side effect. To quote Bezos himself, "We think of Kindle Fire as an end-to-end service" http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/29/bezos-in-the-modern-era-of-consumer-electronics-devices-if-you-are-just-building-a-device-you-are-unlikely-to-succeed/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/09/29/bezos-in-the-modern-era-of-...
      - jonursenbach 15y ago
        Aren't all tablets media consumption and purchasing devices though?

Charmander 15y ago

Amazon will make iPod Touch like devices before they make phones (although the Kindle Fire already falls into that market segment due its price point). This proposed webOS purchase is to hedge their bets against Google keeping ICS and future versions closed source. Amazon can't out a 10" Kindle tablet with the underlying system based on Gingerbread. The Amazon services could be provided but there would be no apps and games made for it.

cpeterso 15y ago
> Amazon can't out a 10" Kindle tablet with the underlying system based on Gingerbread. Why not? What makes Gingerbread so inappropriate for a tablet compared to Honeycomb or Ice Cream Sandwich? Amazon can tabletize Gingerbread in their fork.
- barista 15y ago
  Exactly. I don't get why Amazon would buy a new OS when it can get an existing well supported well publicized and we ll maintained OS for free. Currently they are freeloading on android which is a great thing to get all the android benefits without having to pay apenny for it. Why spend money on a new platform and then spend some more developing for it and inviting developers to it. I hope they don't make this mistake.
  - Steko 15y ago
    (1) Android is not free, ask Samsung about the $180 million check they're writing to Microsoft this year and the 20 court cases the have with Apple. There's potential liability with Oracle and if they put 3G/4G chips in them, Nokia. Then since Amazon is forking it they have their own development costs anyway. (2) Amazon is locked out of Google Services and the latest version of Android, if ICS or Jellybean has a truly killer feature/service they could get their clock cleaned by other Android vendors. Hoping Google will always release the source early on releases yeah you might not want your eggs in that basket. (3) Integrated development ala Apple can be the most profitable model. (or it can not, cough Palm) (4) There's a lot of IP here and Amazon doesn't have a lot of patents. (5) The tanking of everything WebOS may mean the price is very cheap. Maybe they implement a WebOS-like layer in Android.