Ross Rubin (@rossrubin) contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.
Palm's webOS certainly faces strong competition as it vies for attention from manufacturers, carriers, developers and consumers. But Palm was able to knock out at least one ailing offering by making webOS the replacement for the old Palm OS. For others it may not be so easy. In fact, with the barriers to entry now so high and the commitment to existing operating systems so great, webOS may be the last major smartphone operating system launched for the foreseeable future.With webOS taking the baton from Palm OS, the number of major smartphone oper
