Let’s take a brief journey through history. In early 2011, HP tried to gain a foothold in the nascent tablet market with the TouchPad, using the WebOS acquired from Palm. In those days, there wasn’t much competition beyond the iPad, so some industry pundits expected HP to make a big splash.

Only it didn’t happen, and, within weeks, HP decided to cut their losses, and dump the remaining stock for $99 each. Within short order, HP was out of the smartphone and tablet business yet still trying to figure out what to do with the Web OS. Stung by this unexpected, to them, failure, HP didn’t have any more faith in pushing the WebOS platform. In contrast, Microsoft will often ignore huge financial losses for years hoping to make a product or service successful. It worked with the Xbox, though the modest profits will never compensate for the previous losses.

Now HP is trying yet again to become a contender in the tablet market with the forthcoming Slate 7 tablet, which uses the Android OS. At $169, it may even be competitive with existing low-end gear, particularly the Google Nexus 7 and the Amazon Kindle Fire series. But it’s also clear that HP doesn’t really have anything special to bring to the table.

Aside from the usual meaningless specs using generic hardware, in this case an ARM Dual-Core Cortex-A9 1.6 GHz processor, HP boasts the use of Beats Audio to enhance the sound from the small tablet. As with existing Android competition, the Slate 7 has a widescreen display, which doesn’t deliver a credible amount of screen real estate when viewed horizontally.

But you have to wonder why HP is even bothering, since there doesn’t appear to be much, if anything, that’s new and different with the HP tablet. Specs are par for the course, the price clearly won’t deliver decent profits for the company; at best, HP will break even or earn a few dollars. Since the Slate 7 is intended to be an introduction to a full product line, perhaps future models will offer something more compelling, but don’t bet on it.

All HP is doing is jumping onto the Android bandwagon with generic hardware, hoping the brand name will count for something, anything. For a while I’ve been wondering whether the latest CEO, Meg Whitman, has a clue about how to take the company forward, and it’s clear she doesn’t, if you consider the Slate 7 as an example. Why on earth would anyone consider this tablet as a worthy alternative to any other commodity Android tablet, let alone an iPad? HP’s excuse: “HP is the number one PC manufacturer in the world, and we want to be the number one computer vendor in the world. That means we need to be in the tablet space.”

OK, I’m looking for a strategy, but I don’t see one. Indeed, regarding HP as number one depends on accepting their traditional definition of what a PC really is, and their definition makes a tablet a computer but not a PC, if you can accept that distinction. Based on that definition, Apple is the number one computer maker on the planet right now. How does HP expect to make a dent?

HP’s excuse, also from their press announce, is that it’s their “intent to have a broad set of products on the market.”

That statement appears to mean lots of barely-differentiated models, hoping to flood every nook and cranny of the tablet market with different display sizes and configurations, in the hope that something might stick.

But that’s nothing new for PC makers. There’s a long history of building loads of models that look and work the same as supposedly competing products from other companies. I went through HP’s information on the Slate 7, and wasn’t able to find anything that truly makes it stand out among loads of Android-based tablets. Minor spec and feature differences aren’t sufficient, and it appears to me that HP still doesn’t understand what made it great, and why the company has floundered for several years.

And Whitman, a failed candidate for governor of California, is destined to fail at fixing what ails HP. Sure, maybe the company will flail around, continue to demonstrate no appetite for innovation with me-too products, and still make a profit. Perhaps the HP name will, to some, be sufficient to choose a product with that brand name over a mostly similar product with someone else’s brand name. Or maybe not.

As to the failed WebOS, instead of being open sourced, the technology and the remaining employees have been acquired by LG, who will use it to power a new line of “smart” TV sets. I suppose among TV interfaces, that may actually be a good thing. But it’s interesting that LG will not embed that OS in their lineup of smartphones and tablets, where the WebOS failed miserably. But they are certainly following Microsoft’s lead in taking a failed OS and trying it out on a different product hoping things will be different.

This past weekend, we took a long drive from Arizona to Southern California, spending a large portion of the trip on Interstate 8, which skirts the border between the U.S. and Mexico. It had been a while since we decided to just use up an expensive tank of gas to see where it would take us, and this particular trip produced a very surprising, and frankly irritating, result.

During the course of the trip, I received a text message from AT&T leading off with the phrase, “Welcome abroad!” It went on to tell us the great rates we’d receiving for international roaming, such as 800MB of data for a “mere” $120. When I got home, I rang up AT&T to ask them to explain. After all, I hadn’t gone beyond the borders of the U.S. in a number of years, and certainly not on this occasion.

AT&T’s explanation, or excuse if you prefer, had it that, even though I never left the borders of the U.S., my wireless handset had apparently been in the range of a cell tower in Mexico. No, I didn’t face any unexpected charges, since I had turned data roaming off. But at the same time, I can almost imagine how many customers of AT&T and its American competitors might find themselves stung with potentially exorbitant charges for which they are not responsible.

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So there’s a report this week about a new patent application from Apple for a wearable watch-like device, which some are taking to demonstrate the reality behind Apple’s alleged plans to deliver this so-called iWatch in the very near future. Add to that the recent report that Apple has some 100 people working on the project,and you can almost believe you’ll be able to place your order for one in the very near future.

Now the technology described in that patent does appear to refer to some sort of accessory wearable device that will require a wireless connection (presumably Bluetooth) to your iOS gadget, such as an iPhone or an iPad. In other words, it won’t be able to do much by itself beyond displaying the date and time, and that may not take this particular concept very much beyond existing smartwatches, such as the i’m Watch, which starts at $399.

Aside from the price, my personal wish list for such a device includes device independence. It will contain the phone, the iPod capability (similar to an iPod shuffle), GPS, etc. In other words, a cool feature phone, without the niceties of the iPhone. It will probably not need Wi-Fi, and you won’t be able to browse and run apps on it, beyond Contacts, for example. Obviously the face of a watch, even a fairly large face, would not be suited for many iPhone functions.

Such an iWatch might use a speakerphone, so you can use it in the same fashion as Dick Tracy, the comic book character. I would think might also come with a Bluetooth headset, for more flexibility, so you aren’t forced to constantly bring the watch to your face to talk to someone.

But that’s just me. I do not pretend to have any insider information on whether there will be an iWatch, or on the feature set. But if it’s offered as a gussied up feature phone, at $299 per copy in several colors, it might just be the sort of low-end iPhone concept that would deliver an elegant Apple user experience, and become hugely popular around the world. That is, assuming people care about watches anymore. But having it depend on linking to another device is, to me, a non-starter.

The larger issue, however, is what to make of any new patent filing from Apple. The best you can determine is that the company is working on a host of new technologies in those world-famous secret test labs. But even if a product using those technologies never arrives — or is forked into a different product — it’s important for Apple to apply anyway. It’s a defensive act that ensures Apple will be given rights to their new inventions, assuming the patents are granted, and they usually are. Indeed, the new U.S. patent law will grant a patent to the first filer, even if that party isn’t the first to invent or use the technology.

But I’m fascinated by where the speculation about future Apple gear has moved. Last year, there was a whole lot of talk about a large gadget, an Apple smart TV set. Where Apple will take the initiative to conquer the living room is still a question mark, though it appears the Apple TV set top box is the most popular product of its kind right now.

Without any confirmation on where Apple moves next, the conversation turned to a much smaller gadget, low-cost iPhone, fueled by supposed reports from alleged informed sources. What sort of low-cost iPhone? Well, if you count the carrier subsidy, the “cheap” iPhone is the iPhone 4, because it’s free with a two-year commitment. But if you want to buy an unlocked version, prepare to pay from $400-450. Not so low-cost after all. If Apple could build one from scratch, using 2013 technologies rather than 2010, perhaps it would be possible to deliver a credible product for a “mere” $299 or so.

Or maybe the smallest gadget of all, the iWatch, would be designed to fill the demand for a cheaper iPhone by creating a whole new category of smartwatches. And considering that possibility does not for a moment depend on what sort of patents Apple has been issued or applied for lately.

Consider, for example, Apple’s filings on haptic feedback technologies for virtual keyboards. Haptic feedback in its raw sense, such as found on many Android smartphones, delivers a little vibration or “buzz” when you tap a key on a virtual keyboard. Supposedly this is designed to give you a semblance of the feeling that you’re actually typing on a physical keyboard. It even seems neat for a few seconds, until the endless vibration becomes annoying. It’s not as if it makes you a more accurate typist. In fact, when I tried the feature on a Samsung Galaxy S III, it didn’t survive more than a day before I switched it off — for good. But if Apple could somehow make you feel that you are really pressing a physical key, more or less, that would be a terrific development.

But it isn’t necessarily going to happen because Apple filed some patents applications.

So as I write this column, Apple’s stock price continues to decline, though not quite as quickly as it did earlier this year. In case you forgot, it all started when an as yet unconfirmed report from Asia claimed that Apple had severely cut back on orders of displays for the iPhone 5, indicating what was believed to be a sharp falloff in demand. Early in January, the mainstream media, including the Wall Street Journal, picked up on the story. Since Apple doesn’t typically respond to reports of this sort, far too many so-called journalists and commentators took it seriously without doing actual research.

Indeed, there has been a procession of reports attempting to explain what Apple needs to do to right the ship. That Apple’s profits, though more than 50% higher than Samsung’s, were relatively flat in the December quarter, caused further downgrades. So what has gone wrong with Apple?

Or has anything gone wrong with Apple?

Well, you have to wonder what’s really happening amid reports that the iPhone 5 was the world’s most popular smartphone in the December quarter, followed by the iPhone 4s. The highly-touted Samsung Galaxy S III took the number three spot. So much about iPhone 5 sales flagging, and it appears it got a big start in China during that quarter when over two million units were sold the first weekend.

And once again, you’ll want to pay close attention to the world “sold,” which Apple intends to mean that the unit was delivered to the buyer. It’s not “shipped,” where a company sends boatloads of product that end up on a warehouse somewhere or in the stock rooms at a dealer. That doesn’t demonstrate how many people are actually buying the things.

Another rumor: A report that Foxconn had stopped hiring factory workers because of the falloff in demand for the iPhone 5, hence reduced production. That report, however, was denied by Foxconn. But in the real world, you expect that sales are going to be less in the March quarter, but that’s nothing more than a seasonable trend, not an indication of reduced interest in Apple gear. Beside, it’s also reported that sales of the Galaxy S3 had begun to fall off in the December quarter since the product has been out for a while. A new model, the S4, is expected to be announced in a few weeks and go on sale some time in the spring.

But Wall Street isn’t paying attention to Samsung’s claims about falling profits in 2013, or that Amazon, though reporting good sales, continues to barely make a profit. How does that benefit the market anyway?

So we have here the peculiar situation of bad news about Apple, real or imagined, triggering huge declines in the company’s stock price, whereas good news is causes little or no reaction.

Now I’m more interested in solid journalism and reasoned speculation rather than simply shooting from the hip, and making wild guess that may get lots of attention, but have little basis in fact. I’m also under no illusion that Apple is perfect, or that they can’t do things better.

Anyone who has used Apple products over the years can produce huge lists of software features that don’t work properly, or could be improved in usability, or hardware issues that can be extremely vexing. I’ll only cite my son, Grayson, and his sad experiences with a 2008 Black MacBook, which he received as a graduation present. It has been returned to Apple dealers for major repairs, including the hard drive, LCD panel, logic board and various and sundry other components. In a sense, he has a new computer there, but the optical drive is dead. After doing a couple of favors after AppleCare expired because of the computer’s unfortunate history, Apple will not pay for any more repairs. So my son will simply save for a new computer when the one he has ceases to work. He is not going to throw good money after bad to fix the drive.

While I’ve had no problems with iPhones or iPads, I can count a couple of iPods over the years with failed hard drives, including my son’s 160GB classic. But mechanical hard drives on a small music player are clearly subject to worse abuse than even a note-book, so it stands to reason that the iPod is almost all flash memory these days, except for a single classic, essentially the same product my son has, that continues to appeal to folks with huge media libraries, and a willingness to take a chance in questionable longevity.

Going forward, the quirky situation in the financial markets has only put heavier pressure on Apple to deliver financials for the next few quarters that meet reasonable expectations. If those expectations are exceeded, even better. But it’s also true that some of those so-called industry analysts have gone way overboard in predicting huge sales for Apple, and when their unreasonable hopes and dreams were dashed, the people who screwed up weren’t blamed. Apple was blamed. But the numbers will nevertheless have to tell a good story to begin to overcome all that bad news, however false that bad news might be.