Palm is paying companies to write apps

This has caused a bit of a stir on various tech message boards.

Question one: Palm is really paying companies to write apps for the Pre? Yes. How much? All I got despite truly obnoxious questioning was “under $500,000.”

My question is: Why the outcry? Sure, I guess in a perfect world Palm would have thousands of developers writing applications for webOS and the Pre that runs it without having to ask (or pay). But kudos to Palm for realizing they are not Apple and the Pre is not the iPhone (which, by the way took FOREVER to get any apps but is now obviously a hugely-popular platform developers want to write for).

I suppose if I was a Palm investor I would want to know details of the program, though looking at it as a long-term investment I would be happy that Palm is doing everything it can to make sure the very good new webOS operating system has a following. (The OS in my mind is the best part of the phone, and good enough that I hope it lasts even if Palm doesn’t.) But as a user, I just don’t see the downside.

So please Palm, keep paying developers and continue to crank out applications. And if anyone disagrees, tell me what I am missing.