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Second Google Android Phone Revealed
KrispyDroid writes "The world's second Google Android phone has been unveiled — by an Australian-based electronics company called Kogan. It will ship worldwide on Jan 29. It looks like a surprisingly nice form factor, not unlike a Blackberry Bold. The phones will be sold without a contract at low prices — $A299 ($US192)."
For all the hype that Android was to be an open platform, there's no sign yet of a phone that is completely hackable by the end user. The docs are out there, such as The Busy Coder's Guide to Android Development , so we could see a utopia of community-driven apps, but it seems like Google is uninterested in the end user's extendibility of the platform, which was supposedly it's raison d'etre.
Follow the money - manufacturer makes the phone, sells it for x to the network. If and only if network sees a potential to earn at least x/2 from services (internet / sms /mms etc etc ) will it then allow you to buy the phone for x/2...
If the OS was fully open, then there would be no incentive for the network to buy the phone and subsidize the price - i.e. if you want a truly open phone - you'll get it but at a price.
Shameless plug: I've got both the iphone sdk and the android sdk - I find the google sdk 20x easier to get stuff done and the marketplace puts your apps up *instantly* (upgrades and all). However, the marketplace is suffering from kids abusing the comment capability but when that's nailed (and of course the ability to actually charge for apps) I think we will see very high quality apps coming out for the google phone. Or at least I hope so - I'm writing a game in progress which I hope to earn a bit of cash. (Even more shameless plug : http://www.barcodebeasties.com/ )
The phone you speak of is sold in the US under contract or at ridiculous retail prices without contract. This phone is unique as it's one of the few phones with excellent functionality that can be purchased at a reasonable cost without a contract.
Most consumers actually like getting their phones at very low subsidized cost through their wireless carrier but I'm a firm believer this has an astoundingly negative impact on competition. The wireless carriers dictate to the device manufacturers which features are allowed.
Separating phone functionality from the control of the carriers will TREMENDOUSLY improve competition and have a very beneficial impact on end users. I'm a little surprised the FTC hasn't stepped in already on behalf of consumers. Wireless plans in the US have gone up dramatically in cost over the last 15 years. The phone companies like to quote cost:minute rates because it makes them look cheaper. The fact is, the cost of text messaging has gone UP and data transfer rates are still prohibitive for most end users to really use the full capacity of their phones.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
The N810 already runs Linux with a Nokia UI. There's no reason to install Android.
In addition, Nokia has been shipping phones that let you install anything you want for years, and their phone OS will become open source as of next year. They even provide native Python interpreters.
The main reason Nokia is so unpopular in the US is that they refused to cripple their phones as much as the carriers wanted. Unfortunately even nerds in America are apparently too dependent on force fed advertising.
My Sig: SEGV