Speaking at the Web 2.0 Expo, Palm’s senior vice president of Applications Software and Services Michael Abbott also highlighted some of the most exciting aspects of webOS -- including a new branded service that lets developers create apps that push live content across the Internet -- and invited the audience to apply for the early access program at the Palm Developer Network website.

The power of webOS lets developers rethink how they develop for mobile devices -- and creates opportunities for new kinds of apps. Abbott highlighted several key features of webOS that open up new avenues for the creative ingenuity of the developer community:

• a cards metaphor that simplifies multi-tasking
• Palm Synergy to unify information from sources like Google, Facebook, and Exchange
• a user-friendly approach to notifications that ensures the user is up to date without distracting them from the task at hand.

An often-overlooked aspect of webOS is that Web applications run natively on the phone. They don’t depend on access to a server, and can run even when there is no access to the Internet. But the full power of webOS is unleashed when the device works together with “the cloud” – the combination of all of the Web sites and services that a user interacts with.

Abbott noted that webOS encompasses software that runs both on the device and in the cloud. He also announced that Palm is creating its own cloud service -- the Mojo messaging service -- that will enable developers to have live interactions between users and applications both on and off the cloud.

You can get a taste of several upcoming apps for the Pre -- including Pandora and Fandango -- in a new video on Palm’s website. As the first mobile OS based on standard Web technologies (like HTML, JavaScript, and CSS), webOS is also accessible to developers comfortable with Web development, even if they’ve never created mobile apps before.