Palm's webOS lives up to hype, early developers say
Palm's new operating system is designed with the mobile Web in mind — Underneath the sleek exterior, the multi-touch display and the sliding keyboard of the upcoming Palm Pre smartphone is the real innovation: a new kind of operating system designed with the mobile Web in mind.
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the payoff moment for a bet Palm made well before webOS had a name: the company's 2007 open letter to customers, partners and developers acknowledged it had fallen behind and promised a rebuilt platform, and the March 2009 quarter results were weak enough that the Pre is effectively the turnaround vehicle.
The developer praise lands mid-pitch: Palm CEO Ed Colligan has framed webOS as bigger than a single device, promising a roadmap of smartphones and an application ecosystem beyond the Pre, while early hands-on time with Pre apps found them hardly lightweight but looking great. Early developers now corroborating that the mobile-Web-first design delivers gives Palm its first independent validation of the platform.
First-order effects
- Palm enters the Pre's first-half-2009 launch window with credible third-party developer testimony, strengthening its pitch to Sprint and to the developers it needs writing apps before day one.
- Colligan's claim that webOS is bigger than just the Pre gains substance — early positive builds make the multi-device roadmap easier to sell to partners and carriers.
Second-order effects
- If a Web-standard-based SDK genuinely lowers the bar for building apps, Palm can court developers who have skipped iPhone development, forcing Apple and the nascent Android ecosystem to compete on developer accessibility rather than installed base alone.
- Sprint's exclusivity becomes more valuable if the software delivers: the carrier is betting its Everything-plan positioning on the Pre being the must-have device of the year.
Third-order effects
- A positive reception would validate the broader industry shift toward operating systems where the browser runtime is the primary application layer, pressuring incumbents whose platforms treat the Web as secondary.
- For Palm itself, the structural question is whether one well-reviewed OS on one carrier can rebuild a developer ecosystem fast enough to sustain hardware sales — a race against its own cash position.
The trend: Smartphone platforms are reorganizing around the Web as the application runtime, with Palm's webOS the clearest attempt yet to leapfrog native-app incumbents by design rather than by installed base.