Tuesday Recap: webOS Lament, Google Acquires Quickoffice, Virgin Mobile iPhone

Virgin Mobile Iphone 200pxWe were among the few, the proud who lined up outside their nearest Sprint dealer exactly three years ago tomorrow to buy the Palm Pre, the first device to feature the company’s innovative webOS software. While the device went back to the store two weeks later (never could get past that awful chiclet keyboard!), we remained fascinated by the platform, all the way to its bitter end last year with the HP TouchPad. Now you can relive the platform’s entire sad history, along with everything else happening this Tuesday, June 5, 2012.

Quickoffice: Another Day, Another Google Acquisition

Jeez, Google -- slow down, would you?! The Google Official Blog has announced yet another acquisition for the search giant, only a day after Meebo announced its own deal to be acquired. This time it’s Quickoffice, the self-described “leader in office productivity solutions.” It will be interesting to see what the Googleplex has in store for the mobile app maker, whose products can be found on Android, iOS and Symbian platforms (at least for now). “Quickoffice has an established track record of enabling seamless interoperability with popular file formats, and we'll be working on bringing their powerful technology to our Apps product suite,” explains Google engineering director Alan Warren in the blog post. We’re guessing at the very least those apps will soon tie into Google Drive/Docs...

Report: Virgin Mobile Next in Line for Prepaid iPhone

The Wall Street Journal’s MarketWatch is reporting that Sprint subsidiary Virgin Mobile may actually be the next prepaid carrier to land Apple’s iPhone, despite rumors that Boost Mobile might beat them to the punch. According to the report, Virgin Mobile plans to announce the deal this week, with the devices landing “as soon as July 1, according to people familiar with the company’s plans.” The report notes that the move could be part of Sprint’s plan to recoup a $15.5 billion investment to land the iPhone on its network, which investors have given executives heat over, despite having sold 3.3 million devices in the last two quarters. Virgin Mobile would be following in the footsteps of Cricket Wireless, who announced their own deal for the iPhone only last week, with the handset arriving in their stores on June 22.

31 Months: webOS, From Birth to Death

The Verge has posted an epic report on webOS and how Palm’s promising mobile platform fell flat on its face in the course of 31 months. “That’s the number of months it took Palm, Inc. to go from the darling of International CES 2009 to a mere shadow of itself, a nearly anonymous division inside the HP machine without a hardware program and without the confidence of its owners,” Chris Ziegler writes. “Thirty-one months is just barely longer than a typical American mobile phone contract.” There’s already been plenty written about the platform’s crash and burn, which came only a year after Palm was acquired by HP. It’s a fascinating read for anyone who championed the underdog mobile OS, which just never seemed to get the break it deserved.

Is It That Time Again Already? Firefox 13 Now Available

It seems like only yesterday we were installing Firefox 12, which brought a mere handful of modest changes to everyone’s favorite Mozilla web browser. But here it is, only six weeks later and Mozilla is back for more with Firefox 13. The project is actually starting to downplay the significance of the version number with lucky 13 -- the blog entry doesn’t actually mention it once while touting the new features. And what, pray tell, might those involve? Firefox 13 now presents users with a list of their most visited pages when opening a new tab, while the default home page now offers quicker access to bookmarks, history, settings and more. The latest version also promises “general performance improvements” thanks to some JavaScript cleanup work. If you’re ready to take the plunge, you know where to find it for Mac, Windows or Linux.

Cygnett Wants to Treat Your Dad for Father’s Day

Mobile accessories maker Cygnett wants you to have an extra special Father’s Day, which falls on June 17 this year. Instead of running all over town in search of the perfect gift, just head to the Cygnett website and enter your name and email for a chance to win a 32GB new iPad, an 8GB iPod touch and a selection of cases and InSound noise-cancelling headphones offered by the company. The contest is open only to U.S. residents, and the winner is guaranteed delivery of their prize before Father’s Day. Coolest Father’s Day ever…?

Follow this article’s author, J.R. Bookwalter on Twitter

 


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