I really wonder where your assurance of Palm's implosion is coming from. Palm has been an innovator in the handheld space for years. Yes, they've fallen behind recently, but they fell behind before and got back up. Palm was nearly dead before they bought handspring for one product that was still in development. That one purchase has sustained them for the last five years.

Palm knows how to build a mobile device. They understand usability. They understand battery life. They must understand marketing to be able to sell as many Centros as they have. Palm understands how to support a mobile developer community.

The apparent subtext of palm's "bring 'em on" statements seems obvious. How many patents does Palm own that the iPhone infringes on? How many patents does Google own that the iPhone infringes on? I don't know the answers to these questions, but my bet is "a significant number" and "zero" respectively.