Former eBay CEO, 2010 California gubernatorial candidate and current president and CEO of Hewlett Packard Meg Whitman took the stage at HP's Global Partner Conference in Las Vegas today. She had some reassuring things to say about webOS and its open-source future, saying HP is committed and that we should expect it to take some time (2 to 5 years worth) to fully play out what impact this will have on mobile's growing "ecosystem." We're right there with you Meg. We want webOS to stay relevant, and we love the open-source aspect. Bravo, and I could just hug you for doing the right thing.
Then something happened. We weren't there, but we expect the lights went dim and eerie music started playing in the background as Meg went on to say that Google's acquisition of Motorola Mobility could lead to Android becoming closed-source and force OEM's to adopt webOS. We can't make this stuff up, kids.
I hate to break it to ya Meg, but it ain't gonna happen. It's against Google's business model with Android, which is to maintain a rich mobile operating system that anyone can install and use for free. This, in turn, puts plenty of eyes on Google products and services, which leads to piles of money. Google doesn't sell Android -- it sells ads. Google makes a ton of money every time a mobile device uses the Internet, because frankly, it's hard to get away from Google. No matter what smartphone brand you're using, Google is making money. Google will make money from an open-source webOS, just like it does from a closed-source iOS. It makes even more money keeping an Android open-source OS available for partners to use.
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