I've been thinking a bit about how the tablet game plays out over the next few months. Just for fun, here's some speculation:
1) Apple sells a crap ton of iPads. Their biggest problem will be that they can't make them fast enough. Don't whine to me about "openness" or the notifications system. They'll sell lots of them and we all know it.
2) HP gets the TouchPad into stores. There are no queues to buy one on day one, but it does OK in the first few weeks. Sells maybe a million units in the first three months.
3) Consumers shopping for a tablet are now faced with a choice: I can buy an iPad and wait four to five weeks for it to arrive (those are the times Apple's website is currently quoting), or I can buy a HP TouchPad and take it home today. For some, that'll be enough to bring them over to HP.
4) HP's TouchPad gets some traction. Enough to justify a version two. Nowhere near enough to knock Apple off it's perch.
5) HP does something badly wrong. One of the MBAs gets in the way, makes a decision he has no place making, and hands one of HP's competitors a major competitive advantage. Maybe they decide the TouchPad should be US only for the first year. Maybe they piss off developers in some creative way, so no-one writes apps for the platform. I don't know what they'll do, but I can't shake the feeling that they'll fuck it up somehow.
6) Android tablets come out too. Nerds like me buy them, while our grandmothers buy iPads and TouchPads. There are many more grandmothers in the world than nerds. Android tablets do badly. Attempting to explain this, reviewers looking at 2011 retrospectively will cite a confusing UI, a flash implementation that was promised but never materialised (or materialised in a broken state), and many of the same compatibility issues that we see now with Android phones.
7) Microsoft announces Windows 8 with a completely redesigned UI based on Metro. This UI will try to work just as well with the keyboard and mouse as it does on touch devices. Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot.
I thoroughly enjoyed reading that -- spot on. Just for kicks, here's my more optimistic vision for the future:
1) HP/WebOS focuses it's marketing message on using "open" tech (HTML, CSS, JS). Some iOS/android developers convert apps, some web devs convert websites, most don't bother.
2) People pick these up as they are in stock and get to the sites people need with flash as a big selling point as well (news, mail, youtube, hulu, entertainment, etc).
3) Google releases a ChromeOS Tablet, using point 2 above to their advantage by claiming compatibility with all internet sites (even flash!). They sell quickly and cheaply, as google takes a loss on each tablet in hope of gaining market share and increasing google search usage (it's the default home-page on this device).
4) More hardware / software manufacturers follow Google's lead, and momentum shifts towards using tablets mainly as dumb web-clients (with offline storage, better graphics, and other "native" features provided by HTML5 APIs).
5) Apple raises the bar by releasing an extremely-polished-at-this-point itunes.com and a super-cheap "air/cloud" tablet (similar to chromeOS's offer), allowing you to buy and sell "cloud" apps (HTML CSS JS) with existing app store rules and credit cards on itunes.com or in the "cloud" app store. Buy once, use on all your iOS and Mac devices (includes apps, music, video).
6) Tablets aren't bought and sold based on whether angry birds runs on them (its a web-app and runs everywhere), but instead on hardware features and performance (battery-life, screen size/resolution, heat, weight, etc.). Forced to compete on these grounds, hardware manufacturers invent better batteries, hybrid color e-ink/lcd screens that can be used in the sun, better speakers, and maybe even something crazy like user-replaceable batteries, RAM, and hard disks.
As your speculation hints, maybe WebOS is something to watch for the future, but at this point, it's probably financially a waste of time to develop for it. A lot of chips have to fall into place before that changes.
"Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot." LOL that's comment gold right there. I jumped over to brianwillis.com to see if you blogged, but no luck. You should think about starting.
Looking at current sales of Android smartphones, I think there would be a lot of people buying android tablets.
A lot of people just want a cheap tablet and Android is going to step up and fill the void. These would have slower hardware and older software but most people won't worry much over it (looking aback t PC vs Mac era).
I think something you have to take into account is that a lot of people are simply buying these android smartphones because they either can't afford the iPhone or their carrier doesn't sell it.
Also regarding the price of Android tablets, none of them seem to be able to challenge Apple's $499 price point. I'd love to be proven wrong but it seems like for whatever reason—likely their ability to get extremely cheap components—Apple will be ahead for a while yet.
You're only thinking of the good ones (and for the record, I love my xoom). You can get crap ones starting at $99.
On the iPad level, Samsung's coming in hard with equal pricing ($499 16gb/wifi) and at-least-as sexy hardware. I think they're likely willing to take a hit on profit to get market share.
Also Apple has many retail stores of it’s own to sell the iPad to those that are curious enough. Other tablet manufactures will have to fight it out for retail space with other competitors.
Over the coming years prices will drop, the gimmick will wear off and the market of rich guys who want a third computer for browsing and reading on their sofa will become saturated.
I remain thoroughly unconvinced by the long-term success of tablets.
1) Apple sells a crap ton of iPads. Their biggest problem will be that they can't make them fast enough. Don't whine to me about "openness" or the notifications system. They'll sell lots of them and we all know it.
2) HP gets the TouchPad into stores. There are no queues to buy one on day one, but it does OK in the first few weeks. Sells maybe a million units in the first three months.
3) Consumers shopping for a tablet are now faced with a choice: I can buy an iPad and wait four to five weeks for it to arrive (those are the times Apple's website is currently quoting), or I can buy a HP TouchPad and take it home today. For some, that'll be enough to bring them over to HP.
4) HP's TouchPad gets some traction. Enough to justify a version two. Nowhere near enough to knock Apple off it's perch.
5) HP does something badly wrong. One of the MBAs gets in the way, makes a decision he has no place making, and hands one of HP's competitors a major competitive advantage. Maybe they decide the TouchPad should be US only for the first year. Maybe they piss off developers in some creative way, so no-one writes apps for the platform. I don't know what they'll do, but I can't shake the feeling that they'll fuck it up somehow.
6) Android tablets come out too. Nerds like me buy them, while our grandmothers buy iPads and TouchPads. There are many more grandmothers in the world than nerds. Android tablets do badly. Attempting to explain this, reviewers looking at 2011 retrospectively will cite a confusing UI, a flash implementation that was promised but never materialised (or materialised in a broken state), and many of the same compatibility issues that we see now with Android phones.
7) Microsoft announces Windows 8 with a completely redesigned UI based on Metro. This UI will try to work just as well with the keyboard and mouse as it does on touch devices. Ballmer will use the phrase "bridging the gap" a lot.