I've been thinking a bit about how the tablet game plays out over the next few months. Just for fun, here's some speculation:
1) Apple sells a crap ton of iPads. Their biggest problem will be that they can't make them fast enough. Don't whine to me about "openness" or the notifications system. They'll sell lots of them and we all know it.
2) HP gets the TouchPad into stores. There are no queues to buy one on day one, but it does OK in the first few weeks. Sells maybe a million units in the first three months.
3) Consumers shopping for a tablet are now faced with a choice: I can buy an iPad and wait four to five weeks for it to arrive (those are the times Apple's website is currently quoting), or I can buy a HP TouchPad and take it home today. For some, that'll be enough to bring them over to HP.
4) HP's TouchPad gets some traction. Enough to justify a version two. Nowhere near enough to knock Apple off it's perch.
5) HP does something badly wrong. One of the MBAs gets in the way, makes a decision he has no place making, and hands one of HP's competitors a major competitive advantage. Maybe they decide the TouchPad should be US only for the first year. Maybe they piss off developers in some creative way, so no-one writes apps for the platform. I don't know what they'll do, but I can't shake the feeling that they'll fuck it up somehow.
6) Android tablets come out too. Nerds like me buy them, while our grandmothers buy iPads and TouchPads. There are many more grandmothers in the world than nerds. Android tablets do badly. Attempting to explain this, reviewers looking at 2011 retrospectively will cite a confusing UI, a flash implementation that was promised but never materialised (or materialised in a broken state), and many of the same compatibility issues that we see now with Android phones.
7) Microsoft announces Windows 8 with a completely redesigned UI based on Metro. This UI will try to work just as well with the keyboard and mouse as it does on touch devices. Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading that -- spot on. Just for kicks, here's my more optimistic vision for the future:
1) HP/WebOS focuses it's marketing message on using "open" tech (HTML, CSS, JS). Some iOS/android developers convert apps, some web devs convert websites, most don't bother.
2) People pick these up as they are in stock and get to the sites people need with flash as a big selling point as well (news, mail, youtube, hulu, entertainment, etc).
3) Google releases a ChromeOS Tablet, using point 2 above to their advantage by claiming compatibility with all internet sites (even flash!). They sell quickly and cheaply, as google takes a loss on each tablet in hope of gaining market share and increasing google search usage (it's the default home-page on this device).
4) More hardware / software manufacturers follow Google's lead, and momentum shifts towards using tablets mainly as dumb web-clients (with offline storage, better graphics, and other "native" features provided by HTML5 APIs).
5) Apple raises the bar by releasing an extremely-polished-at-this-point itunes.com and a super-cheap "air/cloud" tablet (similar to chromeOS's offer), allowing you to buy and sell "cloud" apps (HTML CSS JS) with existing app store rules and credit cards on itunes.com or in the "cloud" app store. Buy once, use on all your iOS and Mac devices (includes apps, music, video).
6) Tablets aren't bought and sold based on whether angry birds runs on them (its a web-app and runs everywhere), but instead on hardware features and performance (battery-life, screen size/resolution, heat, weight, etc.). Forced to compete on these grounds, hardware manufacturers invent better batteries, hybrid color e-ink/lcd screens that can be used in the sun, better speakers, and maybe even something crazy like user-replaceable batteries, RAM, and hard disks.
As your speculation hints, maybe WebOS is something to watch for the future, but at this point, it's probably financially a waste of time to develop for it. A lot of chips have to fall into place before that changes.
"Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot." LOL that's comment gold right there. I jumped over to brianwillis.com to see if you blogged, but no luck. You should think about starting.
Looking at current sales of Android smartphones, I think there would be a lot of people buying android tablets.
A lot of people just want a cheap tablet and Android is going to step up and fill the void. These would have slower hardware and older software but most people won't worry much over it (looking aback t PC vs Mac era).
Over the coming years prices will drop, the gimmick will wear off and the market of rich guys who want a third computer for browsing and reading on their sofa will become saturated.
I remain thoroughly unconvinced by the long-term success of tablets.
If any team has the right attitude and technology to out-Apple Apple, it's HPalm. I really hope they do well, and I can't wait to tinker with this SDK.
My only peeve: no 7" WebOS tablet. It's a glaring hole in Apple's lineup, currently dominated by the Kindle and Nook Color, but which will be a gold mine for the first company to get it right. Blackberry has a chance with their PlayBook, especially if they're willing to keep iterating on both hardware and software.
HP is comparable to Apple in that they have complete control of their product. Yet I haven't seen anything that makes me believe that the management of HP is comparable to Apple.
Installing webOS on all of their PC's strikes me as a really dumb idea. From what I've read they are not delivering quality PC's these days. Associating webOS with a poor product seems like a bad idea. Also I think a boot menu will confuse the heck out of a lot of people. It seems that they are desperate to show that they are doing something with the product and this is all they could do in a reasonable time frame.
They have already owned Palm for a year and if that's all they got then I'm not impressed. The creativity of HP was seemingly gutted by Hurd and will need to be rebuilt.
We can learn a lot from the troubles Microsoft is currently having updating their phone. An important key to success is turning out to be control of the devices after they are sold. Microsoft is apparently screwed because there are so many players in the process of releasing updates with each having a vote. First Microsoft develops the update but then the device manufacturer and the carrier have to agree to the release and can change the release to fit their own needs. That's not the case with Apple. They control everything. Successful product owners will need to mimic Apple and not Microsoft. They will need a management with stones in order to get that deal if it's even possible now that there are so many alternative products the carrier can provide. Android also has this issue as can be seen by the number of OS versions that a developer has to support.
Where HP has an opportunity is in their enterprise connections. I think this will be a short lived advantage. HP would have to own this market before Microsoft launches an enterprise tablet and reluctance to change gives them the advantage.
HP has a great opportunity because they bought a great product. The odds are better than even that they will blow it.
Best part about the signup form was a comfortable option for the security question "What is your favourite programming language?", although a lot of my friends can guess it if I used the right answer, it's still a good try to give options related to the user.
It's persuasive until you actually try and do it. Then you find that you can't make anything nearly as nice and it takes you 10 times as long to do it because you spend forever figuring out weird quirks of mobile browsers that make not much sense at all.
[+] [-] brianwillis|15 years ago|reply
1) Apple sells a crap ton of iPads. Their biggest problem will be that they can't make them fast enough. Don't whine to me about "openness" or the notifications system. They'll sell lots of them and we all know it.
2) HP gets the TouchPad into stores. There are no queues to buy one on day one, but it does OK in the first few weeks. Sells maybe a million units in the first three months.
3) Consumers shopping for a tablet are now faced with a choice: I can buy an iPad and wait four to five weeks for it to arrive (those are the times Apple's website is currently quoting), or I can buy a HP TouchPad and take it home today. For some, that'll be enough to bring them over to HP.
4) HP's TouchPad gets some traction. Enough to justify a version two. Nowhere near enough to knock Apple off it's perch.
5) HP does something badly wrong. One of the MBAs gets in the way, makes a decision he has no place making, and hands one of HP's competitors a major competitive advantage. Maybe they decide the TouchPad should be US only for the first year. Maybe they piss off developers in some creative way, so no-one writes apps for the platform. I don't know what they'll do, but I can't shake the feeling that they'll fuck it up somehow.
6) Android tablets come out too. Nerds like me buy them, while our grandmothers buy iPads and TouchPads. There are many more grandmothers in the world than nerds. Android tablets do badly. Attempting to explain this, reviewers looking at 2011 retrospectively will cite a confusing UI, a flash implementation that was promised but never materialised (or materialised in a broken state), and many of the same compatibility issues that we see now with Android phones.
7) Microsoft announces Windows 8 with a completely redesigned UI based on Metro. This UI will try to work just as well with the keyboard and mouse as it does on touch devices. Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot.
[+] [-] morrow|15 years ago|reply
1) HP/WebOS focuses it's marketing message on using "open" tech (HTML, CSS, JS). Some iOS/android developers convert apps, some web devs convert websites, most don't bother.
2) People pick these up as they are in stock and get to the sites people need with flash as a big selling point as well (news, mail, youtube, hulu, entertainment, etc).
3) Google releases a ChromeOS Tablet, using point 2 above to their advantage by claiming compatibility with all internet sites (even flash!). They sell quickly and cheaply, as google takes a loss on each tablet in hope of gaining market share and increasing google search usage (it's the default home-page on this device).
4) More hardware / software manufacturers follow Google's lead, and momentum shifts towards using tablets mainly as dumb web-clients (with offline storage, better graphics, and other "native" features provided by HTML5 APIs).
5) Apple raises the bar by releasing an extremely-polished-at-this-point itunes.com and a super-cheap "air/cloud" tablet (similar to chromeOS's offer), allowing you to buy and sell "cloud" apps (HTML CSS JS) with existing app store rules and credit cards on itunes.com or in the "cloud" app store. Buy once, use on all your iOS and Mac devices (includes apps, music, video).
6) Tablets aren't bought and sold based on whether angry birds runs on them (its a web-app and runs everywhere), but instead on hardware features and performance (battery-life, screen size/resolution, heat, weight, etc.). Forced to compete on these grounds, hardware manufacturers invent better batteries, hybrid color e-ink/lcd screens that can be used in the sun, better speakers, and maybe even something crazy like user-replaceable batteries, RAM, and hard disks.
One can dream, anyway...
[+] [-] dangero|15 years ago|reply
As your speculation hints, maybe WebOS is something to watch for the future, but at this point, it's probably financially a waste of time to develop for it. A lot of chips have to fall into place before that changes.
"Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot." LOL that's comment gold right there. I jumped over to brianwillis.com to see if you blogged, but no luck. You should think about starting.
[+] [-] aidenn0|15 years ago|reply
Already nobody writes apps for the platform; they need to do something right in a creative way to get people to even port iOS or android apps.
[+] [-] budwin|15 years ago|reply
This is kind of mean spirited. Why hate on the MBAs?
[+] [-] digitailor|15 years ago|reply
Quote of the day.
[+] [-] suraj|15 years ago|reply
A lot of people just want a cheap tablet and Android is going to step up and fill the void. These would have slower hardware and older software but most people won't worry much over it (looking aback t PC vs Mac era).
[+] [-] halo|15 years ago|reply
I remain thoroughly unconvinced by the long-term success of tablets.
[+] [-] krmmalik|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|15 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] lukifer|15 years ago|reply
My only peeve: no 7" WebOS tablet. It's a glaring hole in Apple's lineup, currently dominated by the Kindle and Nook Color, but which will be a gold mine for the first company to get it right. Blackberry has a chance with their PlayBook, especially if they're willing to keep iterating on both hardware and software.
[+] [-] tene|15 years ago|reply
http://www.precentral.net/hp-touchpad-targeting-june-release...
[+] [-] forgotAgain|15 years ago|reply
Installing webOS on all of their PC's strikes me as a really dumb idea. From what I've read they are not delivering quality PC's these days. Associating webOS with a poor product seems like a bad idea. Also I think a boot menu will confuse the heck out of a lot of people. It seems that they are desperate to show that they are doing something with the product and this is all they could do in a reasonable time frame.
They have already owned Palm for a year and if that's all they got then I'm not impressed. The creativity of HP was seemingly gutted by Hurd and will need to be rebuilt.
We can learn a lot from the troubles Microsoft is currently having updating their phone. An important key to success is turning out to be control of the devices after they are sold. Microsoft is apparently screwed because there are so many players in the process of releasing updates with each having a vote. First Microsoft develops the update but then the device manufacturer and the carrier have to agree to the release and can change the release to fit their own needs. That's not the case with Apple. They control everything. Successful product owners will need to mimic Apple and not Microsoft. They will need a management with stones in order to get that deal if it's even possible now that there are so many alternative products the carrier can provide. Android also has this issue as can be seen by the number of OS versions that a developer has to support.
Where HP has an opportunity is in their enterprise connections. I think this will be a short lived advantage. HP would have to own this market before Microsoft launches an enterprise tablet and reluctance to change gives them the advantage.
HP has a great opportunity because they bought a great product. The odds are better than even that they will blow it.
[+] [-] SingAlong|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jdavid|15 years ago|reply
* pre 3 will be fast, really fast
* touch-to-share WebOS enabled devices can touch and share files.
* somehow drobox is tied into WebOS 3
* Unity Union - Unity Technologies will help you port your game.
* TouchPad - WebOS does multiple apps better than iOS.
* WebOS is way better than ChromeOS. HP will use it on Netbooks.
[+] [-] philthy|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] todd3834|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zmmmmm|15 years ago|reply
At least that was my experience.
[+] [-] cheez|15 years ago|reply
I really hope WebOS gets a decent second chance. When will the tablets be out?
[+] [-] rbanffy|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] philthy|15 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unwiredben|15 years ago|reply
HP Veer planned availability this spring. HP TouchPad and HP Pre 3 planned availability this summer.