HP couldn't solve the chicken vs egg problem. An upstart OS from an established company is still an upstart OS. With MS launching their Windows tablet in the near future, HP will have to run very hard to establish their positions before the MS onslaught.
The journey to iPad started with iPods and iTunes, then iPod touch apps, then iPhone and finally iPad. Steve's brilliant insight is that a music device with a computer is a computer, and outflanked the music industry and Microsoft in one fell swoop.
Even today, MS still can't ship a music store on the PC.
PS What Google did right was to give away the OS early on, and that allowed the Shenzhen manufacturers to produce the iPeds that swamped the low end markets. I don't know if this is going to work out in the long run, but installed bases is important if you want a developer ecosystem.
The journey to iPad started with iPods and iTunes, then iPod touch apps, then iPhone and finally iPad. Steve's brilliant insight is that a music device with a computer is a computer, and outflanked the music industry and Microsoft in one fell swoop.
Even today, MS still can't ship a music store on the PC.
PS What Google did right was to give away the OS early on, and that allowed the Shenzhen manufacturers to produce the iPeds that swamped the low end markets. I don't know if this is going to work out in the long run, but installed bases is important if you want a developer ecosystem.