back to article Official: Samsung spurns WebOS

Samsung will "never" bid for HP's orphaned smartphone OS, WebOS, according to the company's CEO. HP canned its WebOS development a fortnight ago, and said it was considering licensing options for the erstwhile iPhone-killer it acquired with Palm last year. Speculation has been rife that Samsung – which has never seen a phone …

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  1. petur
    FAIL

    Yeah...

    Why would I develop for this open (linux based) system that makes porting existing code dead easy, when I could be developing for this closed system with proprietary API's, non-POSIX that makes me rewrite everything from scratch.

    You guessed it, the latter is Bada. Good luck Samsung...

    1. DrXym

      One good reason

      Money. Not to say there is money to be made in Bada but if there was then you'd do it.

      I'd note too that the ideal you speak of really only exists in Meego. Android has a BSD user land on a cut down non POSIX compliant C runtime called BIONIC and to use it you would have to implement your app from the ground up (i.e. no Dalvik). Same of iOS - it's BSD based. You could write a large chunk of portable code if you stuck to the subset of common / similar APIs but chances are that this is not an option for any app which has a sophisticated native GUI or wants to use higher level functionality of the phone such as to integrate with other phone services.

    2. Rob Dobs
      Thumb Up

      That and millions of willing customers

      I know WebOS, I like WebOS I and at least a few million WebOS Palm hold outs like myself will end up going to whomever buys it because its familiar.

      Granted if the purchaser screwed it up enough, I'd have to consider android, or maybe even Bada though. You are dead right on the code.... hell if the new purchaser just revived Classic (that ran all the old PALM apps, you could add thousands of decent (and 10,000 not so useful) apps to the phone for FREE right off the bat. Would be great for company like Samsung that makes good money off of good hardware.... not so great a deal for someone like Apple/Google. though

      Also as much as I like open, Palm and WebOS were for the most part closed GUI environments very apple-like in their ownership. Didn't like this AT ALL, but the features and benefits outweighed it by far.

    3. asdf
      FAIL

      all moot anyway

      Neither platform is worth developing exclusively for as both ecosystems is basically a small number of hobbyists geeks at this point. Objective C should have died long ago but $ is a powerful motivator.

    4. Dan 55 Silver badge

      Even Symbian has POSIX on Symbian

      Which was abbreviated to PIPS (PIPS Is POSIX on Symbian) instead of something more unfortunate.

      There'll be a POSIX API for Bada eventually.

  2. Armando 123

    Not surprised

    They already have three options, and WebOS, nice as it is, didn't really seem to give them a leg up over Bada, Android, or Windows.

  3. Paul Shirley
    Pint

    another G baiting plan fails then

    To be honest I didn't see any sign they were interested. I saw a lot of mouth frothing reporting by 'the usual suspects' on speculation by the 'usual' Google hating trolls. And so soon after the Motorola acquisition failed to generate the universal outrage (and pretty much the same story) those same G baiters were trying to sell.

    I mean, you couldn't even stir much response from the normal G supporters when el Reg tried stirring the pot. The news would have been that they were considering it!

  4. I Like Heckling Silver badge
    Joke

    warning... incredibly bad joke ahead.

    Are Samsung going to join forces with Microsoft and offer their 'Bing' search platform with Bada?

    I said warning... do you not read the subject. :)

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Facepalm

    Bada Bing

    So the rumor is that since Samsung is working on its own OS, Bada, it will not use Google as the default search engine, but will rely on Bing instead.

    Industry pundits expect that if this is the case, instead of strengthening Bing, this decision will ultimately lead Samsung down the HP path, and their OS will fail.

    In a nutshell,

    Bada Bing, Bada Boom!!

  6. The Envoy
    Meh

    He said that Samsung was working on Bada, its own platform, "harder than people outside think"

    As an owner of Samsung Jet running Bada I must agree that Samsung is hiding its developement of Bada extremely well. I haven't seen a single update since I bought the piece of plastic a couple of years ago.

    The lack of support from popular sites like Bambuser coupled with the distinct lack of apps for the very basics of web 2.0 is amazing.

    Bada. For users who prefer things basic and half-heartedly executed. (TM)

  7. Bad Beaver
    FAIL

    Awwwfugettaboutit

    I just put my money on Symbian. Yes, it's a dead end, but for the next couple years, Anna and Belle look just delightful. At least Nokia – as much as I am disgusted by their pitiful decision to move to WinMobile – is not only willing and able but actually making an effort to maintain their installed user base. So long webOS, we could have had a great time. Maybe I'll see you in a year or two, in the company of someone who actually gives a damn about you.

    What is this Bada thing and why should I care?

  8. Levente Szileszky

    Ummm yeah because your abandonware phones are selling due to Bada, let alone...

    ....being a complete iOS-ripoff I'm sure it's well-patented like WebOS,...

    ...right.

    I guess after all Samsung is still just a dumb Asian copycat consumer electronics company it used to be for long years, led by the classic el-cheapo Korean approach except they are willing to build their own copycat version now as opposed to flat-out stealing everything like Chinese ones do.

    Good luck with your proprietary crap that nobody will ever buy a phone for - people buy your phone because it's cheaper and/or runs Android, nothing else. I personally hate theat stripped down, un-Flashed crap called iOS but Bada is nothing but a downright 1:1 copycat, even its UI looks the same, it's truly pathetic, classic example of the good ol' Korean copycat machine.

  9. nyelvmark
    Boffin

    Chillax, Levi

    Indeed, Samsung is very much a "copycat" company. They see someone else making billions out of a product. They attempt to make a product which does all the same things, but cheaper, and compete. Usually, they make money. They are even helped in the process by US/Euro companies hiring them to do the production engineering on their products. Samsung are very good at productionisation.

    That's evil, of course. You can tell just by looking at them. Real engineers don't have those evil slitty little eyes. And they're stealing EU/US jobs not because they are trying to make money, but because they are part of a grand conspiracy to destroy the western world and finally install communism.

    The ultimate proof of just how evil Samsung are is in the fact that you don't need any form of identity proof to buy and use Samsung products - this is plainly an invitation to perverts, recidivists, terrorists, anarchists, spammers, scammers, stammerers and students - anyone, in short, with no moral compass - to use Samsung products. In other words, Samsung doesn't even CARE who you are, unlike friendly western companies like Google, Microsoft and Apple who (for perfectly understandable reasons) need to know the name of the guy who took your maternal grandmother's virginity and your inside-leg measurement to the nearest micron before even speaking to you..

    Samsung? Bastards, I say. Let's boycott all consumer electronic devices containing components made by Samsung.

    Oh, wait...

    1. Levente Szileszky
      Facepalm

      RE: Chillax...

      Not sure what meds you've missed to take in the morning or how did you get access to the internet without having to confirm it with your nurse first but hey, it's all cool, we like you, don't worry, the nurse is coming, when I say I couldn't make any sense of your harping I don't mean to be rude, I' just telling you...

      ...so one more time again, only for you, dear magyar paisan: if you have ever used a Bada phone for more than 5 seconds - no, holding it in your hands in a store does not count - you know exactly what I'm talking about. (Of course, you didn't hence your utterly nonsensical - and long and boring and lame, I must add - gymnastics above, with no meaningful point whatsoever.)

      FWIW I'm the last person to ever defend Apple - they are not an inventor powerhouse either - but at least they always come up with something custom on their own and while I couldn't care lesss about abandonware phones by Samsung Bada is the most pathetic copycat OS ever. It's such an obvious ripoff of iOS that's just downright hilarious: even down the icon styling, size, everything is matching iOS, proportions, everything.

      They even wrote their own junk iTunes-copy - apparently too stupid to realize iTunes-based sync is the biggest grip even among the most faithful...:D yes, truly pathetic, zero innovation, not even the slightest thought anywhere, in a classic Korean copycat manner.

      And then come the cheaptards like you who have the chutzpah to claim Samsung "attempt to make a product which does all the same things, but cheaper, and compete" ergo copying an entire UI 1:1 is fine...

      Err, no, that's called a ripoff in my book and according to my experience it gets zero respect anywhere in the world regardless its nationality (though it's a fact that historically Chinese and Koreans are the most unabashed copycat nations when it comes to electronics.)

      Now get back to your bed or you will get the shackles again...

  10. Confuciousmobil
    Coat

    Ownership

    One thing Apple have that no one else (except, to an extent, Google) is ownership of the revenue stream.

    For example, Apple can sell the iPad at a price where they can't be undercut by the competition as they don't make 'much' money on each device. But they do have a continuous revenue stream thereafter from the App store.

    If you licence an OS or make your OS open so anyone can sell apps for it then you have no additional revenue source and need to make all your money on the hardware.

    People might not like Apple's control freakery but as a business model it works very well.

    That is what Samsung is trying to emulate with Bada - wether they succeed or not remains to be seen, but it's all about the downstream revenue. Licensing someone else's OS doesn't cut it as you don't get the revenue.

    I might be wrong but.....

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