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I know for a fact that HP would prefer us to think of IBM, and I will not fall into the trap of thinking it is like IBM or Apple but not both. The way in which HP is like Apple is that its mobile business has a proprietary OS with good reviews but poor market. This does not apply to their desktop business, which resembles IBMs in that they wound up being a tax collector for Microsoft.

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I see the similarity, although webOS is nowhere near the heart and soul of HP that Mac OS is to Apple.

Should HP's management be fighting a two front war against IBM and Apple? Maybe not. Apple dumped Xserve, has nearly dumped the Mac Pro, and pretty much ignores enterprise users entirely despite being on a stratospheric trajectory. WebOS probably means as much to HP's bottom line as Xserve did to Apple's and HP is treading water.

Consolidating on a consistent corporate vision is the first step to being like Apple. HP's vision is all muddled between being a consumer company and being a business company. Hopefully HP can figure out who it wants to be so it can start doing it well.

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