http://www.webosnation.com/open-webos-will-not-support-existing-webos-devices#comments While I don't know many people on BT who used WebOS or ever even got near one, it's a sad day to see something with so much potential to finally be killed..again. It really is, WebOS had a huge potential but truth be told, it was marred by some really baffling decisions. Sad day for the people who've used it before.
That's a real shame, I expect it will just float along in the background with only a few developers working on it, much like the great BeOS! WebOS had real potential, the best bits of Linux, Palm OS and Javascript, but alas it just didn't take off. Of course it didn't help the absolute shambles HP made of it - I'll never understand how they failed so epically with the TouchPad. They didn't even give it a chance to pick up before mercilessly abandoning it and its users
You want to know how? They probably bought Palm for the phone patents and then realized quickly how difficult it would be to make a competitive yet desirable piece of technology and promptly gave up. If it had come out a few months earlier actually, the TouchPad probably would've been huge. But Owing to HP's frankly baffling management (from supporting Itanium, which isn't a bad thing, but baffling nonetheless to axing what was to be one of the better tablet OSes. That's why it died. But the real shame is that they had no foresight or even gusto to really stick with their own damn plans. After using a bit of WebOS (i got myself a 32GB tablet for a princely sum of $200, why wouldn't I?) I realized that had it been optimized properly (which was possible) and had it fully utilized it would've been a wonderful tablet. But as it is, it's a pretty woeful implementation of a frankly fantastic piece of software. Hell Android 4.0 runs better on that TouchPad than WebOS.
I LOVE webos, for actually working, taking notes, pulling up pdf's, doing email stuff, I find it better than android and ios. I use my touchpad a fair bit for work, when I go on site its often in my bag with my laptop as its just easier than using my laptop for a whole number of tasks. AND I got a free 50gb box.net with it, and the way it sync's with box.net and now dropbox if you get the app, its just awesome. But, i don't think its a terribly fun tablet, its good for work, not so good for fun times.
It isn't great for fun. But that's mainly due to the sluggish performance. If it was fast, it'd be miles better than droid or IOS.