Now, I’m not saying that Meg Whitman reads my blog or calls me for advice, but I’m glad to see they followed my suggestion last month to make WebOS an open source project.

Open sourcing WebOS and HP’s statements of continued financial support to the project, really gives WebOS one last chance to fulfill its promise.  Although it’s hard to really know what the plan is from Whitman’s and Andreesen’s recent comments.

When HP originally bought Palm, I thought it would give WebOS a chance to be embraced by the developer community.  I figured the combination of HP’s resources to both take the product to the next level and make it a mainstream alternative in the enterprise (both via HP’s market position in desktop and mobile devices) plus the strong developer relationships it had accumulated via its other software products would push WebOS into a viable competitor to Apple and Google, or at least to the top of the second tier among RIM and Microsoft.

If I were a handset manufacturer, WebOS could give me cover in case the litigation between Oracle and Google or Apple and the Android OEMs goes the wrong way. Or as a way to differentiate its devices from the other OEMs instead of developing it’s own OS as Samsung has done with Bada. I’m not sure however, as some have suggested, that WebOS would provide any leverage for an OEM in discussions with Google or Microsoft.

Personally I hope the open source community throws its efforts behind WebOS. I think it is at worst the 4th best platform alternative out there (iOS, Android, WP7, WebOS, then QNX). But one of my favorite quotes is “Hope is not a plan” (h/t @michaelombardi), so I hope that Meg and Marc have a plan.

What’s your POV?

Recently new HP CEO Meg Whitman announced that the company will keep Personal Systems Group as a part of HP’s core, undoing the decision that caused great consternation about the technology giant’s future and essentially led to former-CEO Leo Apotheker’s ouster and Whitman getting the job in the first place.

What’s a little disappointing is that it looks like WebOS may not survive, even if the computer and peripherals business does. And that’s too bad.

I used to have a Palm Pre and thought very highly of WebOS, even if the hardware disappointed. When HP decided to buy Palm last year, I immediately thought it was a great decision and that HP had the ability to make WebOS a force in the mobile community — something that Palm couldn’t accomplish on it’s own — because if HP’s place in the enterprise.

I still think that WebOS has a lot going for it. If HP does abandon it, I hope that they might donate the code, to an organization like the Apache Foundation, and see whether developers would build off a strong core and create a TRUE open source mobile operating system.   It’s clear by speed at which WebOS tablets sold at $99 that it’s not a matter of the quality of the OS, just the opportunity it was provided.

What do you think?

Well you may notice the new headline. Trying to find 10 stories that were really interesting was sometimes a challenge. And sometimes it made it hard to then find one or two others to give a little more perspective on. So I’m shrinking the list.  Here we go:

1. I’m not sure why I’m so riveted by the patent fights between Oracle and Google over Java and Apple v. Samsung and HTC. Well maybe it’s because they may have industry-altering implications. Nobody covers it better than Florian Mueller. This latest post on Google’s flawed stance on patents is gold.
2. I love visualizations. I think that they can be very powerful. Here’s a new app that provides a visual interpretation of your Facebook friends social graph. It’s not 100% perfect, but it does a nice job of clustering real social circles. Automatically creating or suggesting to add friends to ‘circles’ in this way would be a cool, easy to use, feature for Facebook and operate much closer to real life than G+ Circles (IMO)
3. AirBnB, fresh off their big fundraising round has a PR disaster (aka #Ransackgate) as a “host” house is trashed. CEO Chesky quickly pens an article about safety for TechCrunch, but it’s easy to look concerned in retrospect. The apology that came on Monday doesn’t make me feel much better either. But this is what creeps me out about their model.
4. HP joins OpenStack along with Dell. Big, big win for the open source PaaS, which now seems destined to be the leading private/hybrid cloud stack.
5. Google launches Hotel Finder, a new “experiment” to help users find the perfect hotel. What I like about the tool is the more exact, visual way you can create a search area that’s not simply a radius around a particular location. I’m not so sure that the rate discount comparison feature is something that hotels will appreciate however.
6. Cloud Computing and SOA: 2 great tastes that taste great together. JP Morgenthal pens a nice article about what Cloud can learn from SOA and vice versa.
7. Lastly, I’m sorta sad to see Borders go (not that I ever bought books there; but the idea of fewer bookstores in general), but this is a great article written from a branding point of view.

Image courtesy of Kevin Dooley via Creative Commons.

1. Airline cutovers are challenging and fragile projects. So it’s not surprising that there are often hiccups, but the problems during the cutover at AeroMexico had some fairly significant impacts to travelers.
2. Building airline systems is hard work too as HP is reportedly working through some challenges with their Agiliare Passenger Service System which is the basis of American Airlines’ Jetstream product. HP reportedly let go upwards of 200 contract developers. But conflicting sources make it hard to know whether this is just growing pains or something more significant. The only thing for certain is that many people are watching.
3. There’s a lot that I like about the OpenStack cloud platform – it’s been built by real rocket scientists and can be deployed on any infrastructure. Citrix has taken the platform another step ahead by launching Project Olympus – the first commercialized distribution of OpenStack which will include a Citrix-certified version of Open Stack along with a cloud optimized version of Citrix XenServer as hypervisor. A shrewd move by Citrix to counter the momentum that VMWare is creating.
4. Software AG buys Java performance specialist Terracotta with the stated goal to build a cloud application platform that would compete with the big boys – IBM, Oracle and VMWare. Perhaps it’s a little ambitious of a goal given its current enterprise application lineup.
5. After a period of rumors, Twitter officially buys TweetDeck. One hopes that Twitter leaves TweetDeck alone, or at least doesn’t make many significant changes. Here’s a story from the inside on how it all went down.
6. Getaround…the Airbnb of car rental wins TechCrunch Disrupt. Getaround is an alterative to ZipCar and traditional car rental agencies allowing customers to rent personal cars by the week, day or hour.  Besides winning the $50K, the must be real happy about this next story.
7. Can Airbnb really be worth $1B or are we just partying like it’s 1999? At least the folks at Andreesen Horowitz thinks so as they lead a $100M investment into the alternative lodging startup.
8. Choosing between developing native apps or going down the mobile web route is a decision that companies struggle with all the time. This article points out two key considerations for commerce companies – native apps have significantly higher conversion rates and can deliver better performance than mobile sites, also impacting conversion. Just something to keep in mind.
9. PayPal files suit against Google and some former employees, specifically recent hire Osama Bedier who joined Google to help create Google Wallet, a direct competitor to PayPal’s mobile payment platform.
10. Kayak reports stellar results in advance of its planned IPO.

HP Cloud plans unveiled, OTA earnings reports and more:

1. At HP’s analyst day last month, CEO Leo Apotheker laid out HP’s plans to remake the company with three main legs to the stool: Cloud, Mobile & Big Data. Well it looks like a fourth trend – social – is how HP’s cloud plans got leaked before a formal announcement. I will say this is a more aggressive push to remake HP as a cloud platform provider than I expected. If we can believe the LinkedIn posts.
2. A recent darling of the travel industry and the pages of TechCrunch, Gogobot, the social travel recommendation engine, have now added content from Foursquare and Facebook Places. This will not only add a ton of content to Gogobot, enhancing the quality of their recommendations, but may also provide users a good reason to check in…something that has been missing since the novelty of the check-in has worn off. If you’re interested in this story, you may also want to read Joe Buehler’s PhoCusWright report entitled “Social Media in Travel Planning” [subscription required].
3. For some reason it seems I’m hearing a lot about loyalty programs recently. Here’s a study that shows that travel & hospitality gave out $17B in rewards points & miles and is the 2^nd largest industry in the $48B loyalty sector, behind retail.
4. Mobile is continuing to impact just about every part of business. Oracle announced enhancements to their BI platform that provides iPhone and iPad users with the software’s full range of capabilities, with no need to rewrite existing dashboards and reports.
5. Mobile apps in travel are only hitting the tip of the iceberg in terms of potential. Sabre Holdings Director of Mobile strategy expects that in five years “…mobile will account for the bulk of travel changes and in some cases travel bookings too”. I think he’s not aggressive enough.
6. Priceline released very strong Q1 earnings with revenues increasing by 38% and net income nearly doubling compared to the same period a year ago. International saw the strongest results with 80% revenue growth. In other Priceline news there was some executive re-shuffling, ostensibly as part of a planned succession plan.
7. Unfortunately, the news is not as positive for Orbitz who saw its quarterly loss double to $10.8M from a year ago.
8. Keeping with the OTA trend, Expedia continues its international gains with a partnership with South African Airlines to distribute hotel inventory, displacing GTA.
9. When an Open Source version of .NET known as Mono appeared on the scene in 2004, some expected Microsoft to crush the project swiftly and definitively. They did not. However, seven years later, it looks like Attachmate, Mono’s new owners, may have done just that.
10. Has the cost-benefit story behind public cloud supporters been de-bunked? Is it even the right question? Be sure to read Forrester analyst James Staten’s blog post on cloud economics too.

Can’t think of anything pithy to lead off with, so without further adieu:

1. Infor, the third largest ERP vendor, who also has a growing hospitality software business, it trying to strengthen its position and broaden its vertical ERP offerings with a $1.8B unsolicited bid for Lawson Software (the 6^th largest ERP vendor), backed by private equity firm Golden Gate Capital. Golden Gate is an investor in Infor and SSA Global (which has been rolled up under the brand along with Baan, GEAC and Softbrands). How this bid moves forward should be interesting to watch given that Carl Icahn (who I once personally pitched for VC money) and Romesh Wadwhani are Lawson shareholders and shrewd negotiators. Constellation Research Group’s Ray Wang provides analysis. If you’re interested, you may also want to check out this look at the finances of some mid-cap ERP vendors, including Lawson.  .
2. HP unveiled their new strategy at their analyst summit: public cloud, big data analytics and mobility (via WebOS). They must have spent months coming up with the top 3 hottest segments in tech as their platforms for growth. But seriously they have a lot of challenges ahead to create differentiated offerings in these sectors. Also, they have to decide what they’re gonna do with the legacy hardware (computers and printer) businesses, which drive a lot of HP’s brand and revenues, even though it contributes less to their margins (except for the printer ink business). What’s a bit worrisome to me is that acquisitions will play a key part in the execution of the plan. I still wish that Leo would have tried to recreate the focus on innovation that was pervasive at HP when Bill and Dave were in charge.
3. One set of Expedia alums tried to launch the next big travel startup under the TravelPost moniker, but that didn’t work out so well. But another group of ex-Expedia “braniacs” (Dennis’ words, not mine) hope their venture works out better.  The Montreal-based start up called Hopper is a new natural language search engine for travel. Beyond the natural language angle, speed seems to be very impressive. I hope to get a closer look soon, but it seems to be a company to keep an eye on.
4. Remember when Kayak said they weren’t in the direct booking business, then they were and then they weren’t again? Well they changed their mind again, at least for the hotel sector as  they decided to take direct hotel bookings using the Travelocity Partner Network to handle the booking process.
5. There has been a flurry of activity in the tours and activities sector in the past few weeks. The latest is the launch of Pocketvillage, a new meta-search engine focused on the tours and activities sector at ITB/Berlin.
6. As someone who’s traveling more and more, but having my mileage spread across multiple carriers and typically flying steerage, er,  Econcomy class, having access to a nice airport lounge via an affordable day passes seems like a good idea.
7. Synxis had a fairly significant outage (24-30 hours by most accounts). It’s not the first to happen in the travel sector, and certainly won’t be the last. It’s not completely reasonable to expect 5-Nines uptime, but these days that’s what we do expect and, sadly for Sabre/Synxis, we now have Twitter and Facebook to voice our displeasure. But the one thing that is disturbing to me is that so far they haven’t been able to identify the root cause of the problem. Not terribly confidence inspiring.
8. Travelclick acquired Rubicon to extend their offerings for hotels. The companies will merge the products under the Hotelligence360 brand. The acquisition may also help TravelClick extend its services to the airline and car rental segments.
9. JetBlue – the musical…well sort of. JetBlue is becoming the “official and exclusive airline” of Catch Me If You Can, slated to open at the Neil Simon Theatre on Broadway April 10. Lisa Borromeo, the airline’s manager of brand and partnerships says this dovetails nicely with JetBlue’s mission “to bring humanity back to air travel, resurrect the glamour and joy of flying in the 1960s, the industry era created for the Broadway show”. Another nice move for one of the few companies that realize that branding does not equal advertising, but part of creating an emotional connection with customers that engenders loyalty.
10. I know a number of people who struggle to figure out how to measure the impact of their social media activities (me included). To those folks, this “open research” report from Altimeter Group’s Jeremiah Owyang, should prove useful.

Lots of mobile platform announcements this week and that’s even before the Mobile World Congress kicked off. But some big travel industry news too, leading off with…

1. ITA Software renewed its agreement with Orbitz thorugh 2015. This is the first contract that was renewed since the announced acquisition by Google.  This should definitely help clear the way for DOJ approval.
2. Nokia chooses Microsoft for future smartphone OS platform in a move that wasn’t all that surprising.  Well except maybe to this ex-Nokia guy who is more bitter than 4-day old coffee grinds. Some may argue that Nokia should have licensed Android as WP7 has a teeney-tiney market share, but could Nokia have competed on an even field with HTC, Samsung and Motorola selling a modestly different version of the same phone?  At least being one of the few with a WP7 phone gives them a chance to appear different in the marketplace. Scoble agrees. Then again, what HP unveiled the other day makes this an even more difficult task.  Either way, the markets didn’t react well to the news.
3. Many people, including myself, have been advocating for HTML5 and promoting the mobile web over apps. But TechCrunch’s MG Seigler points out that while it all sounds nice, apps are still where the action is.
4. HP re-launches the WebOS platform it got when it bought Palm. All of the elements that make WebOS a delight (I do own an original Palm Pre) are there and improved upon. The only problem is that WebOS has almost no apps to speak of (see previous item). Getting developer mindshare is going to be a problem. And while they brought on a high-powered guy to take on the challenge, it might only be enough to leapfrog RIM. But that’s a pretty low bar. BTW, in retrospect, I think my first take on the HP/Palm acquisition was pretty on target.
5. Traditional web search is increasingly important and feels more and more like a system to be gamed – fairly or not. Here’s an interesting article in the NY Times that delves into the ‘black hat’ shenanigans that JC Penny used to dominate search. Fair tactics? No. But great results as Penny had one of its best recent quarters. The most interesting question about what happened is posed on the last page of the article: “Is it possible that Google was willing to countenance an extensive black-hat campaign because it helped one of its larger advertisers?”
6. Daring Fireball’s John Gruber looks into his crystal ball and sees what Apple will do next in response to the recent announcements from Google, HP, Microsoft and RIM.
7. Cloud provider Rackspace bought Anso Labs, one of the key figures behind the open source PaaS project known as OpenStack, also championed by Rackspace. Many rushed to wonder whether Rackspace will dominate the OpenStack community the way some complain Oracle and IBM have done with Java. Personally I don’t think so. I think Rackspace sees this as a way to maintain leadership in the cloud space and create mindshare with developers.  I believe OpenStack could be a really valuable platform for those looking to move to the cloud, especially those that may deploy on different IaaS providers across multiple geographies.
8. Mary Meeker who was the stat queen while at Morgan Stanley keeps the info flowing at Kleiner, Perkins. Check out her latest presentation.
9. After much pomp and circumstance, Amadeus finally sells Opodo to private equity firms AXA and Permira in a deal valued at €450M.
10. Google touts their new WebM CODEC as the open source future of web video…until MPEG-LA questions whether WebM is based on patents they control. It’s telling that thus far Google hasn’t agreed to indemnify others who use the WebM codec. As an old Vorlon friend of mine used to say: “And so it begins”.

Lot of important stuff last week, but the most awaited announcement…of maybe the past 2 years…leads the list:

1. Many prayers have finally been answered as Verizon announced that the iPhone will be coming to their network in early February. It is anticipated that legions of dissatisfied AT&T customers will switch, but the bigger potential is with the millions of feature phone owners on the network.
2. There’s no way that GDSs can support airlines ancillary services until they do. For all of American’s posturing that GDS (and specifically Travelport) technology isn’t up to the task and the economics of working through intermediaries no longer make sense, Travelport and Air Canada strike a deal.
3. Google, in the spirit of “open”, decides to drop support for H.264 in their Chromium browser in favor of their own WebM CODEC. The move is pretty self serving, a direct competitive move against Apple as they try to hide behind fears of never-yet-levied royalty payments from MPEG LA. All while H.264 makes up two-thirds of video on the web. Yet for all Google’s posturing for “Open” they continue to prop up Flash, a decidedly closed technology.  But not to worry, plug-ins are here to save the day (Really? Plug-ins? In 2011?). WTF. MG Siegler pretty much covers it.
4. After 23 years, Bob Muglia seems to have been forced out of Microsoft. Josh Greenbaum believes that the changing of the guard is very much tied to the changing of Microsoft’s business and move to Azure-based services and the rise of importance of the Dynamics ERP suite to Microsoft.
5. Concur buys TripIt in a deal worth up to $120M.
6. In a somewhat surprising turn of events, the DOJ looks like it’s going to file a challenge to Google’s acquisition of ITA Software. Does that mean the deal won’t go through? Not at all. A similar process was followed with Google’s acquisition of AdMob. But interesting nonetheless.
7. In related news, American has chosen ITA’s Inventory Control solution, which will get folded into the overall Passenger Service System, Jetstream, that HP is building for the airline.  So ITA has one piece of HP’s PSS and HP licensed Pegasus’ RezView system for another. Hmmm. I’m not sayin’, I’m just sayin’.
8. MySpace cuts almost half their jobs and is officially on the block. The only question…who would buy them?
9. Intuit continues its push into mobile payments and focus on small business, offering their GoPayment system for free for a limited time.  The mobile payments space is estimated to exceed $600B in 2014. PayPal is the current leader in the space having processed more than $500M in 2010.
10. Intel and Nvidia finally settle their patent dispute with a cross-licensing agreement that will pay Nvidia $1.5B over the next six years.  That just added the bad news at AMD which culminated in the firing of their CEO.

Sorry for the delay, but I was traveling to Phoenix for the PhoCusWright Conference on Monday and then time sort of got away from me. But enough with the “dog ate my homework” excuses and on with the items I hope you didn’t miss last week:

1. A major shift in the technology analyst world as Ray Wang leads a “constellation” of star analysts to form Constellation Research Group. Ray leaves analyst supergroup Altimeter Group and is the second major defection in the past 2 months (mobile guru Michael Gartenberg left to join Gartner). Ray is joined by industry luminaries Phil Fersht, Sameer Patel, Vinnie Mirchandani, Frank Scavo and Oliver Marks among others.
2. Airbnb raises $7.2M from Sequoia Capital and Greylock Partners to accelerate product development and accelerate global expansion.
3. The standoff between Orbitz and American Airlines escalates. Travelport raises one lawsuit and the war of words continues.
4. HP continues to move away from being a travel services provider to being a direct technology provider with the licensing of RezView NG hotel distribution platform from Pegasus Solutions. Certainly a shot in the arm to Pegasus, but technology companies who have viewed HP/EDS as a reliable implementation partner should now be wary and begin to view them as a competitor. And perhaps clients should wonder whether they’re being offered the best in class solution or just the HP one. Anyone have a view?
5. On a related note, 2 days later, Amadues launches their new SaaS hotel platform. Let me use acronyms to shortcut the story: AHP = CRS + PMS + GDS. The question is whether it will equal new business and help Amadeus create a beachhead in the hotel sector in the US.
6. Oracle and Apple team up to bring Java to Mac OSX. While this will play well to many developers, I believe the real target of the announcement was Google, who is increasingly being cast as the only major tech company who is not abiding by Oracle’s rules regarding Java. Of course in the same week Google ratchets up the stakes with their latest response to Oracle’s lawsuit.
7. Norm Rose tries to cut through the rhetoric in the direct connect v. GDS ‘discussion’. Unfortunately, the truth is that both sides seem as likely to propose a compromise as the Democrats and Republicans.
8. The Silicon Valley talent shortage redux.  So far no free Porsche Boxters.
9. The money is starting to flow into tech startups again and competition for top tech talent is rising again and as a result so are salaries. Now for many these are signs of optimism and excitement. But star-VC Fred Wilson urges people not to get too excited.
10. There was a lot of buzz about Rockmelt, the new social-savvy browser, backed by Netscape wunderkind, and Silicon Valley VC savant, Marc Andreessen, but as I read what was written in the blogosphere, I didn’t see what the big deal was about. Neither did ZDNet’s Phil Wainwright.

Navitaire crashes (plural), mergers, executive changes and a movie premiere. Here’s your weekly recap:

1. LCC Consolidation: Southwest acquires AirTran for $1.4B. Expect SWA Bag Cops to be patrolling the AirTran routes as soon as the acquisition is completed. With SWA committed to moving off their TPF-based reservation system, the combined airline now ups the stakes for the reservation systems providers who are jockeying for the business.  Forrester’s Henry Harteveldt expects that SWA will pull AirTran routes out of the OTAs in continuation of their direct booking strategy.
2. Microsoft releases a new Bing iPhone app introducing more travel feature like flight search and flight status and enhanced maps functionality.
3. Navitaire system failure at Virgin Blue grounds 50,000 passengers and 400 flights, was the second failure by Navitaire in the past 3 months.  I think we can safely say that the conversation between the two companies was not for “virgin ears” (no apologies for the bad pun.
4. A stunner: TechCrunch bought by AOL. Funny, never saw such glowing praise of AOL before from @arrington   Even funnier…best commentary so far on twitter: @AdInfinitum: My take on AOL/TechCrunch: Grandparents across the globe will soon become well versed in cloud computing and mobile apps.
5. Navitaire has its second failure of the week. This time the victim is RyanAir. All told, a 9-hour outage.  It just goes to show that it is important to understand your software provider’s technology…which was the subject of my series in Tnooz (Part 1 and Part 2).
6. Is LodgeNet the Blockbuster of the travel industry? LodgeNet withdrew its $435M debt offering due to declining sales, blamed on the growth of free WiFi in many hotels. Like the one-time king of video rentals, LodgeNet may have become the victim of technology disruption  and too emotionally wedded to their business model to make changes to stay ahead of the curve.
7. HP hires ex-SAP CEO Leo Apotheker as their new CEO and brings in KIeiner Perkins partner and ex-Oracle executive Ray Lane. Several leading analysts feel this is an excellent move for HP and is a sign of a renewed focus on enterprise software to enhance margins.  And of course there are the immediate rumors that a bid for SAP, Leo’s old company, may be in the offing.
8. The United-Continental merger finally closes.  Looks like it will be at least a year until it starts to feel like a single airline from the outside…other than a new paint job.
9. On the eve of launching Windows Phone 7 (October 11^th)  – perhaps Microsoft’s final chance to be relevant in the mobile space – Microsoft sues Motorola for patent infringement related to their Android-based Droid mobile phone series.  At first I was going to lampoon Google’s lame defense of the suit: that Microsoft shouldn’t be trying to enforce ‘older patents’, as if they don’t carry value. But then I found out that Microsoft was suit covered patents regarding email synchronization, and notifications of signal strength and battery levels, which is lamer still. Both sides should go to bed without their dinner. (Ed note: Microsoft settled similar issues with HTC who manufacturers Android phones, but also will be manufacturing Microsoft WP7 devices).
10. Finally, the much anticipated (by people other than me) and critically acclaimed movie, “The Social Network” debuted at the top of the movie charts, grossing $23M in its opening weekend. If the Fall TV schedule really ends up sucking, I will add it to my NetFlix queue.