Palm announces $1 million Hot Apps program for PDK apps 37
Wed, 09 Jun 2010 8:24 am EDT 
If there’s got to be one disappointment for EA, Gameloft, and the handful of other PDK developers currently in the Palm webOS App Catalog, it’s that they can’t participate in the Hot Apps program. For those in need of a refresher, Hot Apps was set up to dole out one million in rewards to the top free and paid apps, with prize amounts ranging from $1,000 all the way up to $100,000. The current Hot Apps competition was only open to SDK-developed apps, as when Hot Apps launched the PDK was still in private beta with only the aforementioned handful of developers.
The current SDK-based Hot Apps competition ends on June 30. The next phase kicks off on July 1st (you know, the next day) and runs until August 31, 2010 and is putting one million dollars on the line for PDK apps. The prize breakdown is a bit different, and was clearly influence by the impending overlordship by Hewlett-Packard. As before, the most-downloaded free apps and the highest-revenue paid apps during the Hot Apps period will be ranked on the snazzy Hot Apps leaderboard, with the prize breakdown as follows:
- #1 Free and Paid apps: $25,000
- #2-6: $10,000
- #7-431: $1,000 store credit at hp.com or an HP Envy 17 (MSRP $1,399.99+)
For the rules and minutia, check out Palm’s Developer Center posting. In the meantime, developers, get coding. There are some good apps to be made, and if you have a shot at your chuck of a million dollars while you’re at it, so much the better, eh?
As an aside, this seems pretty indicative of webOS 1.4.5 with proper sandboxing of PDK apps arriving by the end of this month.
Source: Palm Developer Center
Thanks to Markus for the tip!
37 Comments
Looks like Gameloft is gonna have 10 or so extra laptops to play around with. The HP Envy 17 sounds like a beast of a laptop. (I'd rather have the cash, but hey, free laptops aren't bad)
Probably, Gameloft does rock the PDK arena!
Either way, the HP Envy 17 sounds fantastic, nice system and great GFX from ATI.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LUAN1gCC9E&feature=player_embedded
Sorli...
In other words:
WebOS isn't dead and HP wants to make sure it stays alive. Exccccellent.
Do the download counts start on that date or do they take whats already been downloaded?
Great news..
Yezz!
I put my bet on
i hope angry bird is released for webos
What this also means is that we won't see any new PDK apps or games in the catalog until July 1st... They'll wait to release when downloads can count towards the contest.
I am encouraged that the PDK is enroute and hope the update will preceed the PDK. Looking forward to any update for the Pre that will indicate HP/Palm are still committed to WebOS, whether on the Phone or on another device.
Does anyone know when we might see non-game pdk apps in the catalog?
@acmartin
After the 1.4.5 update which puts security measures in place so PDK apps can't run amuck on your phone.
Hybrid PDK-SDK apps are still being baked to a golden brown finish. :)
Oh ya....I can't wait.
Way to go HP!!!
Sorli...
if nothing else this indicative of HPs intererest in the mobile market.
I am no mathmatision, but it looks more like $500,000 then 1 million. Just saying.
Looks like it is right to me and maybe your not adding up both columns.
Either way, I'm excited! Sorli...
You're no speller either (mathematician). Just kidding -- sorry, I couldn't resist. :-)
You have to multiply the prize money by 2. One set of prizes for free apps, another set for paid apps.
okay, that makes more sense, but there is no way they will have 862 PDK apss by the end of this contest. I guess it's free money for anyone willing enogh to try and make a PDK app and submit it.
No English major either :)
Interesting!! I was thinking about just this yesterday (that PDK apps developers are disadvantaged).
Considering I am now resorting to writing my own low level APIs to workaround Ajax.Request/XMLHttpRequest limitations/bugs.
Cool stuff!!
As smart as it is to plug into HP's system for prizes (where it costs them less than $1,000 to give us $1,000) I'm not sure how much value HP.com store credit means for Mac and Linux based developers.
Yes, HP makes printers and sells other peripherals on their website, and free is free, but I do think think PC-based Devs have a much sweeter deal.
So if you are a Mac developer just take the $1k cash and purchase 1/2 a Mac. If you are a Linux developer just take the $1k and purchase two Linux machines ;-)
Let me conditionally correct one thing I said: as long as HP.com allows you to order a machine without an OS installed, then Linix Devs get the full advantage of the $1,000 store credit.
But, as the $1,000 prize is locked into the HP.com store, and I very much doubt it sells Mac desktops and notebooks, I think Mac Devs may be at a loss on what to spend a full $1,000 on.
A mac developer would probably buy whatever could be sold for the most on eBay and then re-spent at the Apple Store. Or, perhaps Dev relations would be kind enough to offer Apple dollars if the winner is of the Mac-only persuasion.
They could always make the HP machine into a Hackintosh(install MacOS on it)...
More evidence of WebOS 1.4.5 release being imminent.
Several WebOS Internals apps just got new versions published in the Homebrew catalog ('WebOS Internals Feed' in Preware).
These are apps meant to execute one time only and then they uninstall themselves. They are typically used to manage/diagnose any hiccups related to patches as a result of an OS update. So you usually don't need them unless something goes wrong after an OS update.
It's pretty sweet that the WebOS Internals team has thought of almost every possible exception scenario and has provided a simple way to recover.
In the past these types of app updates have been indicative of an impending WebOS update.
The apps just updated were:
Emergency File Verification
Emergency Migration Helper
Emergency Patch Installer
Emergency Patch Recovery
Emergency Reconstruction Utility
Emergency Service Enabler
Are you excited yet?
I hope we see a flood of non-game PDK apps. I love games more than the next guy, but after paying for 10+ games on my Pre and only playing 3, I'm full up on those for now.
Can I just get me some Peggle???
This is so they port iphone games.. I'm guessing 1000 covers the cost, thats why they are giving out 850 $1000 prices.
I gotta be honest. I'm glad to hear that HP and Palm are doing this. This is a good start in showing the WebOS community that HP is serious about making WebOS better in the smartphone market.
With all the smartphone goodies coming from HTC, Motorola, Samsung and Apple, we need to hear more good news coming from Palm.
If they can port iPhone games with the PDK, they can also port other iPhone apps such as iTerminal, Encamp, FlightTrack Pro, mbPointer, WhitePages Mobile, LinkedIn, Quickoffice, ClockIn, eBay Mobile, Evernote, Mobile News Network, Local city real time traffic reports, CardSnap and more.
Not necessarily. Apps on the iPhone use cocoa for the UI, which is not on the WebOS platform.
I hope Plants vs Zombies comes to webos!
Hopefully this means more 99c sales.
They should also give a "web connected" printer to every winner, because they may have a lot of extra if the don't sell many. I haven't yet figured out why someone would purchase them. If that's the case, they can seed the market and clear out a warehouse and make room to stock the next Palm smartphone - and launch on multiple carriers! w00t!
...just sayin'
I think it is sad that "The Weather Channel" app is sitting securely in second place on the Free Apps list... They used their name recognition and lack of other decent web applications to jump into such a high slot and stay there. The App itself is crappy with misuse of UI elements and severely hampered functionality compared to their iPhone app. I guess they just don't think there are enough WebOS users out there to warrant programming a decent app for the easiest mobile development environment available. Maybe the $10K will kick their developer team into gear and we can soon have animated, pinch-to-zoom weather maps like our iFriends.
So cool and amazing!
Exccccellent.
i hope to see yahoo messenger on the palm. 1.4.1 only has aim and google talk. I cant run the homebrew patch to get yahoo messenger.