[credit provider=”AP”] Another year is just about done, so we’re looking back at the biggest flops in the tech world for 2011.Our list is made up companies, products, or features that launched between November 2010 and November 2011, and failed to make a dent.

[credit provider=”Flickr/Global X” url=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/globalx/5431350817/sizes/o/in/photostream/”] Hewlett-Packard took charges of more than $2 billion this quarter related to the end of its Palm hardware business.Here are the numbers from its Q4 earnings results:

[credit provider=”AP”] HP gathered a bunch of employees together this afternoon to announce that it’s still not sure what to do with WebOS, the mobile operating system it gained in its acquisition of Palm in 2009.According to The Verge, which first reported the meeting was happening, Meg Whitman told the […]

HP will kill off WebOS, its mobile operating system, the Guardian reports, citing internal HP sources.

[credit provider=”Ellis Hamburger, Business Insider”] An old technology is making a comeback.Largely having fallen out of favour bout the time Palm stopped making the Tungsten T5, the stylus is once again becoming stylish.

A report by VentureBeat overnight quotes an anonymous source saying that Amazon.com is “in serious negotiations” to buy Palm from HP, acquiring assets including the well-regarded webOS software for smartphones and tablets. It’s getting a lot of attention in the tech media this morning.

I know a thing or two about mobile, and also Amazon

HP is laying off 525 employees this week in the WebOS division, John Paczkowski at All Things D reports.

[credit provider=”Dylan Love/Business Insider”] 1. MeeGo, the mobile platform Intel was developing jointly with Nokia until Nokia signed its deal with Microsoft and kicked MeeGo to the curb . (So they told CNET this morning.)2. WebOS, the former Palm operating system that HP is shopping around.

[credit provider=”Robert Scoble”] The head of HP’s consumer hardware business, Todd Bradley, faced a grilling on Bloomberg West last night, and while he didn’t offer much new information about the company’s plans, he did offer one bit of surprising information: WebOS has almost 600 engineers working on it.That’s a lot […]

HP executive vice president Todd Bradley is looking to leave for a CEO role elsewhere, Jonathan Geller at BGR reports.

[credit provider=”Robert Scoble”] HP CEO Leo Apotheker holds his cards close to his chest — even within the company.According to Kara Swisher at AllThingsD, Apotheker went to dinner with HP’s PC head Todd Bradley and former WebOS head Jon Rubinstein last Sunday night.

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HP killed its WebOS hardware business yesterday.

[credit provider=”Nasrulekram via Flickr” url=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/inrime_nasrul/649289457/”] The leader of HP’s WebOS business insisted in a meeting with employees today that the company is not abandoning the software — it’s only getting rid of the hardware.Joshua Topolsky at This Is My Next reports that WebOS head Stephen DeWitt — who took over […]

When HP bought Palm for $1.2 billion in April 2010, it inherited Palm’s hardware division, which created the Pre smartphone, and the software division, which built WebOS.It also inherited Jon Rubinstein, one of the masterminds behind the original iPod, and the Godfather of the next-gen Palm hardware.

[credit provider=”Palm” url=”http://www.palm.com”] HP’s developer relations head Richard Kerris just tweeted this about the company’s shutdown of the Palm hardware business:”HPWebOS is an awesome software platform and now we can explore the best hardware partner for it.”

Now that HP is killing off its WebOS hardware, the question becomes, what happens to the WebOS software?

The future of the Internet is mobile.  Facebook knows this.

[credit provider=”Robert Scoble”] Best Buy is sitting on more than 200,000 unsold TouchPads, and is threatening to send them back to HP. The situation is so bad that a top HP exec is slated to fly to Minnesota to try and make nice with the retail giant.Arik Hesseldahl at AllThingsD […]

With Google’s attempt to buy Motorola Mobility, Android phone makers like Samsung and HTC face a difficult challenge.

[credit provider=”AP”] New statistics from research firm Gartner show how far Microsoft still has to go in the mobile space: last quarter, Windows Phone finished behind Bada.Yes, Bada — Samsung’s mobile phone platform.

Palm just announced on its blog that come this summer, AT&T customers will have the opportunity to snatch up a HP TouchPad with 4G baked in.This means you’ll be able to access the web on the go, like on a 3G-enabled iPad. The original TouchPad that launched a couple weeks […]

Android’s share of the smartphone market is still blowing away all competitors in the U.S. according to new data from comScore. The only company that’s hanging on is Apple, which saw its share of the market tick up ever so slightly.

HP just put up some fun and informative videos illustrating all the best features of its upcoming TouchPad tablet, and maybe more importantly, the platform it runs on called WebOS 3.0.

Almost 1.5 years after Apple announced the iPad tablet, it still doesn’t have any credible competition.

[credit provider=”Business Insider”] HP’s App catalogue for WebOS is pretty limited.

[preserve] [/preserve] The HP Veer 4G is one of the smallest smartphones we’ve ever seen, but is it right for you?

[credit provider=”Ellis Hamburger”] The HP Veer 4G is the first WebOS smartphone branded with the HP name since their big acquisition of Palm just over a year ago.HP knows the smartphone market is dominated by Android devices and Apple’s iPhone, so, it’s really trying to provide something completely different with […]

[credit provider=”Steve Kovach, Business Insider”] HP’s first 4G smartphone, the Veer, was just announced yesterday for a May 15 launch, but I’ve already had a chance to spend some time with the device this morning.Click here to see a bunch of photos of the HP Veer >

[credit provider=”SlashGear”] HP just officially announced the availability of its first smartphone running Palm’s WebOS, the Veer 4G.The Veer will be released on AT&T May 15th.

[credit provider=” via PreCentral.net ” url=”http://www.precentral.net/preview-webos-3-0-beta-1-emulator-exclusive”] Images from a WebOS 3.0 emulator just leaked, and we’ve got all the screenshots demonstrating the best and most essential new features.(In case you missed it, check out this extensive video walkthrough of Web OS 3.0 that we posted yesterday).

[credit provider=”Robert Scoble”] Intel tried to get former Palm CEO Todd Bradley to leave his current job at Hewlett-Packard earlier this year, and may have been considering him as an eventual replacement for Paul Otellini, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.But earlier this month, Bradley told Intel […]

Hewlett-Packard CEO Leo Apotheker hasn’t been known for his fiery presentation style — he comes from SAP, and is well versed in the calm tones of enterprise computing. Which is why it was so refreshing to see him show some fire at today’s HP strategy event in San Francisco.

[credit provider=”HP” url=”http://h30507.www3.hp.com/t5/Data-Central/CEO-Apotheker-s-Friday-at-HP-Labs-lunch-and-listening-tours-Plus/ba-p/82688″] Hewlett Packard CEO Leo Apotheker confirmed to Businessweek earlier today that every Hewlett-Packard PC that ships in 2012 will include WebOS alongside Windows, adding some detail to HP’s surprise announcement last month.The idea is to create an instantly massive userbase for WebOS so developers will be more […]

[credit provider=”Dan Frommer, The Business Insider”] No wonder Research In Motion is planning to move downmarket: statistics released today by ComScore show that Google’s Android just surpassed RIM’s BlackBerry as the number one smartphone platform in the U.S.At the end of January, 31.2% of U.S. smartphone subscribers are using Android […]

[credit provider=”AP”] Apple’s iPad 2 isn’t a massive advance over the first iPad, but with hardware, software, apps, distribution, and pricing combined, it is still by far the best tablet on the market.Despite recent announcements from Google, Motorola, Samsung, HP, and RIM, we still expect Apple to dominate the tablet […]

[credit provider=”Dan Frommer, Business Insider”] The upcoming PlayBook tablet from Research In Motion uses a lot of design elements first seen in Palm’s WebOS, and an HP manager is calling it a “fast imitation.”Although RIM’s tablet will hit the market before HP’s competing TouchPad, it uses the kind of fast […]

[credit provider=”Gizmodo” url=”http://gizmodo.com/#!5756251/palm-galleryyy//gallery/6″] HP’s TouchPad tablet could go on sale this June for a starting price of $699, according to a report in BGR.That’s high, but not outrageous.It’s $100 cheaper than the latest rumoured prices for Motorola’s upcoming Xoom, which which runs Google’s Android 3.0 “Honeycomb.”

[credit provider=”Finviz.com”] Engineers who worked on Nokia smartphone platforms Symbian and MeeGo are probably thinking about their next job moves since Nokia announced its move to Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 this morning.Google and HP were both quick to make offers. This morning, Google’s Aidan BIggins posted to Twitter asking if […]

Earlier today, HP unveiled its TouchPad – but is it a threat to Apple’s iPad? No. “This is just not better than the iPad,” says our very own Dan Frommer.

Hewlett-Packard’s upcoming TouchPad may not unseat the iPad in the tablet market, but it has a better chance than the crop of Android-based tablets coming out from Google partners like Motorola.

[credit provider=”Palm”] HP has just taken the wraps off its entry into the tablet market, the HP TouchPad.From a design perspective it looks fine. It’s just like an iPad, or Motorola’s Android tablet, the XOOM.

One of the only ways that HP’s new TouchPad tablet can survive is if key developers start making apps for it, the way they already do for Apple’s iPad, and are increasingly doing for Google’s Android.

[credit provider=”Engadget” url=”http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/09/live-from-hp-palms-think-beyond-webos-event/”] HP just took the wraps off two new Palm smartphones, the Veer and the Pre3.The Veer’s big claim to fame is that it’s tiny, as small as a credit card, says Palm chief Jon Rubinstein.

[credit provider=”Business Insider”] We’re live at HP’s TouchPad unveiling in San Francisco.The tablet looks pretty great — the UI recalls Android 3.0, but more polished (and Android may well have taken some of the key concepts from Palm) and the hardware is fine. But so far we haven’t seen anything […]

Palm’s tablet is called the TouchPad, according to Pre Central, via CrunchGear. As you can see from the leaked spec image below, it’s basically the same as Apple’s iPad in characteristics. (It also has a front-facing camera, which Apple’s iPad 2 will have.)

[credit provider=”AP”] Apple’s iPad is a huge consumer hit, with almost 15 million purchased in its first 9 months of sales.And after analysing the market, we believe Apple is likely to dominate the tablet industry for years to come.

HP will unveil its revamped webOS platform on February 9th and in the process reveal what has come from its Palm acquisition. There is also an evening event planned for that same day for developers interested in the webOS platform. HP faces many challenges as it jumps with both feet, […]

The first photos of HP‘s forthcoming Palm tablet have been obtained by Nilay Patel at Engadget.

Rather than letting its cash just sit around growing mould, just about every major tech company made big acquisitions last year.

[credit provider=”Flickr/trioculus” url=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/trioculus/sets/72157624801350339/with/4977634504/”] The technology industry is littered with the carcasses of once-hot startups and obsolete giants.As 2010 ends, several tech companies face once-in-a-lifetime challenges.

Editor’s note: We first ran this post two Christmases ago, but given how nostalgic we get for old gadgets, we thought we’d republish it. Enjoy! And happy holidays!

The tech world will be hit with another year of disruption in 2011, producing new winners and losers.

[credit provider=”Fox News” url=”http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/12/21/exclusive-ipad-competitor-palmpad-hp-ces/”] HP is going to unveil three new Palm tablets all running WebOS at CES in January, Clayton Morris of Fox News reports.Here’s what we can expect, according to Morris:

Goldman Sachs analyst Sarah Friar continues to sound the alarm bells for Microsoft.

[credit provider=”Microsoft” url=”http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/presskits/windowsphone/imagegallery.aspx#channel_contentListTop”] Don’t count Microsoft out of the mobile game: Windows Phone 7 is selling better than expected in Europe and Australia.According to a report in Digitimes based on reports from Taiwanese manufacturers, stocks of HTC’s HD7 are currently gone at German carrier O2, and Australia’s Telstra is out […]

HP is going to be releasing a tablet in the “near future” that runs on Windows, says Todd Bradley, head of the computers and mobile division (and possible future CEO).

The race to buy Palm earlier this year was fast and hot, with the company’s bankers contacting 16 companies about the deal, including five serious potential suitors.

[credit provider=”Flickr/TysonGoodridge” url=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/4443447016/sizes/o/”] Good Morning! Here’s the news: Foursquare is about to close a round of funding at an $80 million valuation, after coming thisclose to selling itself to Facebook. Kevin Rose of Digg started a big rumour this weekend saying that Google will take another stab at social networking […]

Good morning! Here’s the news:

Flash developers and anti-Apple crusaders are likely still furious at Apple for not including Adobe’s Flash animation and video software on its iOS products like the iPhone and iPad.

Palm executives are heading for the lifeboats after the company was acquired by HP, TechCrunch’s MG Siegler is hearing.

[credit provider=”LinkedIn” url=”rich-dellinger.jpg”] Palm is losing another one of its big designer/UI guys. Rich Dellinger is leaving the company to join Apple where he will be a Senior UI designer, according to 9 to 5 Mac.Rich worked for Apple from 1999 to 2006, when he left to work at Palm. […]

Here’s a big blow to HP, which just acquired Palm.

HP will produce a tablet running on Palm’s OS in the third quarter of the year, according to Daryl Deino at the Examiner. Daryl cites industry sources and an “insider” at HP for his information.

Click here to see the weeks charts as a slideshow →

Last week HP announced that it is buying Palm in a $1.2 billion deal. At the time we wrote that HP was buying Palm to reduce its reliance on Microsoft’s Windows operating system, and to turbocharge its efforts in the tablet and smartphone markets.

Microsoft’s plans to enter tablet computing just took two steps backwards, and now it has no obvious challenger in the race with Apple’s iPad.

Ah, memories. 

Make no mistake: Palm’s $1.2 billion buyout by HP is not something to celebrate. (Unless you bought Palm shares at $1.14 in December ’08.)

Apple’s iPad team doesn’t have to worry about the HP Slate tablet for a while, if it ever did, anyway.

Why is HP spending $1.2 billion on Palm?

Hewlett Packard is buying Palm for $1.2 billion, the company announced today.

Update: HP just bought Palm.

Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein is considering licensing his WebOS platform to other hardware makers, he tells the FT. This after his turnaround effort has stalled and Palm’s best hope appears to be an acquisition — if it can find a buyer.

Palm’s CEO Jon Rubinstein maybe forced out, Erick Schonfeld at TechCrunch reports, citing “Industry sources.”

It seems the leading candidate to buy Palm is Lenovo, according to Reuters. This would make sense: as we’ve said before, Palm’s last chance is an acquisition, and Lenovo, having acquired IBM’s PC business years before, likes to acquire big but troubled US brands to gain a foothold in that […]

There’s an article on Gizmodo today about Palm’s effort to retain key execs during its sale process. The headline says:

Harbinger Capital is rolling the dice with Palm. In an SEC filing, the hedge fund disclosed that it purchased 16 million shares, or 9.48%, of Palm.

Palm approached Chinese telecom company Huawei about a possible sale, Reuters reports.

Anybody out there looking to gamble on Palm’s sale price may have missed the boat. The stock is up 20% today to $6.16 as of this writing. That’s only a dollar. A week ago the stock was only $4 or so. That probably would have been the time to buy.

After the failure of its new line of Pre and Pixi smartphones, there’s only one escape for Palm (PALM)–a sale of the company.

Palm’s shares are up 8% today spiking on rumours that HTC is looking to acquire it.A Taiwanese publication started the rumour mill going last night saying “HTC has started assessment of work, from the legal, financial, brand marketing and research and development at all levels to assess the feasibility of […]

Palm’s CEO Jon Rubinstein sat down with Adam Lashinsky at Fortune to talk about Palm’s problems.

Palm has fired it ad agency, Modernista, Kunur Patel at Ad Age reports.

Google’s Android operating system continued stealing smartphone platform share in February, according to new mobile subscriber share numbers from comScore. These are based on user surveys, and reflect subscriber base — not simply market share of a specific quarter’s sales.

Here’s another way to put Apple’s iPad opening weekend in perspective: Apple has already sold more iPad units than Palm sold of its flagship Pre smartphone last quarter.

Click here to see the week’s charts as a show →

Smartphones like BlackBerries and iPhones aren’t just for yuppies, corporate suits, and early adopter-types anymore. But the majority of people in the U.S. still own feature phones — the “dumb” phones that are primarily used to phone calls and do text messaging.

Dan Primack of PEHub defends U2’s front-man against 24/7 Wall St’s charge that he’s hopeless at investing:Is Elevation Partners “the worst run institutional fund of any size in the United States?” That was the assertion of a Wall Street 24/7 post earlier this week, and a bunch of readers have emailed me […]

Check out this fan-made ad for the Palm Pre, via Engadget. Contrary to their creepy-woman ads, this very slick homemade ad actually showcases the Palm Pre’s best features: its sexy hardware, multitasking, applications, etc.

[credit provider=”AP”] Bono is famous not just for being a rock star, a philanthropist and a wearer of weird glasses, but also for being a big investor.Problem is, he’s not very good at it. He’s so bad, that today, 24/7 Wall St named him “The Worst Investor In America.”

Bono, the Irish rock star, has put significant money into Elevation Partners, arguably the worst run institutional fund of any size in the United States. Bono is listed as one of the five members of the firm’s investment team.The fund claims that its “mission is to help media and entertainment […]

Recently I commented on why Palm’s (PALM) patents were an overlooked asset and why this strengthened the case for an acquisition. Since then Palm reported earnings and provided guidance that scared the crap out of investors; sending the stock on another nosedive to around $4. It’s not clear the whether […]

Palm’s Pre and Pixi smartphones are going to be available at AT&T for $149 and $50 each, AT&T announced today.

No one is going to save Palm, says Jean-Louis Gassée in a blog post. We think he might be wrong.

Engadget’s Joshua Topolsky pens a lengthy article on what has gone so terribly wrong at Palm over the last year. His solutions aren’t perfect, but it’s worth reading. —Ed.

Apple’s iPhone App Store is still crushing its peers, especially in the number of applications available to consumers.