Failbook phone: AT&T, already is looking to ditch the HTC status, says source

Greg Kumparak — editor of MobileCrunch.com, the mobile industry blog TechCrunch network. Greg writing for TechCrunch network since May 2008. Greg was born on the outskirts of San Jose, California and currently lives in East Bay. ? Read More

Surprise! Even a clever little trick as custom button Facebook cannot save a bad phone from an early death.

After only 36 days on the shelves of a trusted source, close to AT&T tells us that the carrier had already prepping to ditch HTC so-called "Facebook phone" status. The Reason For This? Things just don't sell.

Since the original tipster forward, we have confirmed with several sources of sales status much lower than expected. AT&T declined to comment.

To say that we foresaw the fate of status will be something of an understatement. The status was originally launched as ChaCha back at Mobile World Congress, where I stated that Chacha (real-time response companies) likely will not be too kindly name — and of course, Chacha turned around and filed a lawsuit against HTC over the weekend. When AT&T announced plans for the device (now called status), we predicted fail due to lack of exhausting and we're here just over a month post-launch rumor that the death knell for this time to prepare for the melody.

For those who may have missed status update state is Android phone in the same vein as the classic BlackBerry (2.8 touchscreen on top, with a QWERTY keyboard below) — design, which, if we are honest, probably most of the status of weak sales. The status of one of the potential saving grace was its context-sensitive button Facebook — a small, dedicated key placed next to the bottom edge of the tube strictly built one click Facebook sharing. At any time the user was browsing the content that could be shared on Facebook (photos, videos or website), the button will automatically light up. When pushed, the content will be packed and pushed into the Facebook user profile.

For what it's worth even Facebook never seemed all that interested in HTC'S efforts. Mark Zuckerberg called it in with the HTC initial announcement, providing a short, versatile video instead of the actual appearance. Even with a fair amount of time spent on Facebook headquarters in no time any of us here at TechCrunch have seen Facebook employee carrying status. They all seem to use iPhones.

Update: AT&T now decided to go on record with the comment, saying "the status of the HTC is a great product and have not changed our plans to be a part of our portfolio.

HTC Corp. (TAIEX: 2498) produces smartphones running Android and Windows Mobile for yourself and as OEM for other manufacturers. Since the beginning of your own brand in ...

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AT&T is the largest provider of local and long-distance telephone and DSL Internet access in the United States and the second largest wireless service provider in ...

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LinuxCon: the open source ecosystem is not a zero-sum game

Linux and open source development is not a zero sum game. This was a clear message from the Ubuntu technical architect Allison Randal in speech at LinuxCon, but sentiment had been formulated in several ways-week round of all here. Processes in which the company makes a great open source a better world for all.

"Free software is fundamentally superior model for software development," Randall repeated several times. In addition to the classic Linus Bill ("given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow"), Randall made the claim that people long to be part of something greater than themselves, and free software development met, in spades.

According to Randall, the future of technological innovation is not theft limited resources away from each other, but the creation of new resources and new opportunities for the creation of new resources — together in a rich ecosystem. The term "ecosystem" made several times in my chat with Dr. Irving Wladawsky-Berger, Chairman Emeritus, IBM Academy of technology and Dan Frye, Vice President IBM open systems development. FRY, it is clear that the efforts of IBM Linux should be a "solution" as opposed to a product company. IBM does not make their own Linux distro, but they work hard to make the kernel and other key open source projects that bring value to IBM customers.

It's all about collaboration and working together with other members of the open source software. Sometimes this means cooperating with direct competitors, but IBM "gets it" that this collaboration on open source creates new resources for all, and they are cutting the throat of competition for a finite number of clients. Of course they strenuously compete in various markets, and sometimes they strenuously compete with companies with whom they collaborate with open source. But this is not a zero sum game.

Wladawsky-Berger continued the explanation of "solutions", indicating that the skyscraper ever built by a single company. Legions of small companies specializing work together under the leadership of the project manager to coordinate and implement their specific tasks in the correct order. This ultimately how IBM provides yourself as a leader in the ecosystem of open source work to enable new workloads for their clients.

There are many ways to thrive in the open source ecosystem. Whether his continued commitment to excellence of the kernel (a la Linus Torvalds and Greg Kroah-Hartman) or commitment to the preparation of viable, use tools for all users to avoid reinventing the wheel. Yocto project works on this for the embedded space, like SUSE, under the leadership of fresh Attachmate, allocates them open build services help people roll packages for several distributions. SUSE also exchange their SUSE Studio to enable ISVS and companies to develop and maintain their own Linux for use in devices and a "golden master" to create images. You do not need to be SUSE customers use these tools.

But all this cooperation is not always natural. Companies are still beholden to shareholders and their bottom line, after all. So sometimes it takes a neutral third party to get together the parties concerned, neutrality and Shepherd communication channels. It is here that the Linux Foundation comes into play. They provide most of the framework and management of communications between competitors, which have led to unprecedented technological progress in many industries.

"Free software is fundamentally superior model for software development," said Allison Randal. Eucalyptus systems Marten Mickos took it one step further: "any company with the strategy IT should open source strategy. It is important to recognize and embrace! is a large ecosystem of Linux and open source software and find a way to work within it to increase the number of available resources, for which to compete.

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