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Motorola Takes Android To China, With Or Without Google
An anonymous reader writes "Google's spat with China could affect Motorola as it vies to crawl back into the mobile market, but recent partnerships will allow it to pursue the Chinese mobile market alone. Circumventing the fallout, Motorola on Thursday introduced its own Android app store for China and a deal with Baidu, the leading search provider in China."
Competition with Android in the Chinese marketplace is always a good thing. So far, even if Google doesn't play, Dell is already on the field, and I'm pretty sure HTC is in the game as well.
What does this mean for Android? Good and bad. The good is that it gains exposure in the most up and coming nation in the world, with a lot of people climbing the career ladder from rice paddy to corner office. The bad is that the Android platform ends up more fragmented. Windows Mobile's weakness for a long time was no central app store where one could buy items for the phone, on the phone.
Time will tell though. If Android fragments so much that apps have to be designed to deal with multiple Dalvik VMs, many hardware configurations, and many phones before the app can run, this will hamstring this platform's future. However, if Android apps are compatible to an extent, where it is almost certain that an app downloaded will run, then this might propel Android into a front runner smartphone platform.
Android's competition isn't stopping. Apple's app store "just works" on all iPhone models (unless there is a specific feature like GPS or 3G an older model lacks.) RIM, Nokia, and Microsoft are not standing still either.
Does this mean, we might possibly see a version of Android that does not build on Google services? I was wondering for quite a time now, why handset-makers do not partner up with competitors of Google and make their own version of Android; or even better: let the consumer choose the services they activate for apps like maps, calendar, or e-mail. Or is there a technical obstacle I do not see here?
You know, the rest of the world is saying "what with their idiotic stance on personal rights and global war mongering, we really shouldn't be exporting to the US". And if we, the people of the rest of the world, had anything to say about it, we'd stop our governments from pandering to your corrupt crony-capitalist bribe issuing regime.
Get off your fucking high horse.
Motorola should send Google flowers, or something.
This horse bleeds red, white and blue sir.
+1, thanks for AGAIN bringing up the USA in a totally unrelated thread about China.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Analysts still don't get that Android is no longer owned by Google. It is now owned by the Open Handset Alliance.
-- $G
I would like to see a distro of Android with Apt, and a repository for Open Source apps.
Gnometris, Kpatience, ScummVM, Pidgin (or something similar), Tango GPS, GPsDrive, the ability to sync with your Linux Desktop, or OSS apps running on another Platform (TB/FF) and a whole plethora of other apps. Use a selector like Add/Remove programs in Ubuntu.
Make America grate again!
And here I thought it would get there by being open source.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification
It was the OP who brought up China's human rights record about an article in an article about Motorola selling Android handsets there.
What I mean to say is: He started it. So ner.
Let's see, late in the TFA it says this:
Motorola stood to lose a significant amount of business if the issue had it waited for Google to enter the country.
(Hey, I didn't edit the thing.) Anyway, that was preceded immediately by this:
Android, developed originally by Google, is open source, meaning partners are free to use it even if Google decides not to support it.
And so this is a story how? I propose a new headline: "Motorola Not Stupid (full story page B13)"
Breakfast served all day!
I see no reason to buy another Motorola. Right now, Google has the right attitude towards China. China's attitude is one of a cold war setting. And Western companies are supporting it.
Assuming that it isn't a simple matter of Motorola wanting to sell more stuff and try not to go out of business, this could be a "Hey Google, thanks a whole fucking lot for getting together with HTC and releasing an even cooler phone, just when you and I and the Droid were looking like a happy family..." thing.
Would Google leave if they were winning the game? Surely not, Communist Party support to Baidu is working as expected.
I was looking at the Droid, but now I have to reconsider. Sadly, with the size of the Chinese market Motorola doesn't care what I or any other American consumer thinks about their business practices. There is so much money to be made and corporations are inherently amoral.
U. S. totally unrelated? Motorola and Google are both U.S. companies. Motorola is in Schaumburg, Illinois and Google is in Mountainview, California. I didn't notice either of them moving corporate headquarters to China. Until they do, get over it. BTW: If you don't like it, there is a Japanese version of Slashdot in Kanji: http://slashdot.jp/ Use it.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
You make a very valid point. Our record of inserting our armies into other countries orifices is well documented. Our history of using money as a carrot and stick to get other countries to tow the party line is also well documented. Our government has initiated assassinations of legally elected leaders in more than one country in South America (and likely elsewhere). Our corporations are well know for murdering thousands of members of indigenous populations who get in the way of the corporations "development" of the areas natural resources, often with the support of our military who are directed by our elected officials. But, at least for now, I can still write this in my country (which I love) without fear of going to prison. Sadly, after yesterdays Supreme Court decision, our government will look much more like the Chinese government within 4 years, operated exclusively (instead of just mostly) for the benefit of those people with money, lots of money.
Google is not the sole owner of Android. The Open Handset Alliance is in control and Motorola is part of that alliance there. This is also the great thing about it being open source. Whether you agree or not with China's activities (I don't), each company should be able to decide what to do and hopefully if western consumers don't agree either they will use their free will to vote against Motorola by not buying from them.