Google's Definition of 'Open'

An anonymous reader writes "One of Android's biggest draws is its roots in open source. It enables a broad range of device manufacturers to work from the same code base, and provides app developers with more insight into the platform they're building on. But openness isn't a binary condition — there are many shades of gray. While Android is technically very open, from a practical standpoint it's much more difficult for device makers to distance themselves from Google, if that's their preference. 'Phone manufacturers and carriers that want to use Google's services must conform to Google's device standards, a stricter requirement than what basic AOSP requires. For some, this is a catch. For others, it's merely the cost of doing business. ... [Dianne Hackborn, one of Android's tech leads,] defends Google's right to include proprietary services, and to keep them proprietary, saying that its no different than any other proprietary app on Android. That's not entirely true, since Google does keep some API development to itself, but to its credit the company does open-source most of the new APIs introduced to Android.'"

Comments

Excelent read on Ars tech.

[Anonymous Coward]

Google’s iron grip on Android

Great story how Google gets it grip on Android.

So, don't use Google Apps

[Virtucon]

You can use other apps and app markets on your android device. You don't have to use Google Search, Maps or Mail because there are free or very low cost alternatives to them and they don't have the clingy, Google scam you out of your data smell. Getting rid of them is a snap in most cases and there's literally dozens of websites that can help you do it. Sure when you get an "update" from your phone maker you'll probably get them all back again but it's easy enough to remove them or you can go with something like Cyanogenmod and never worry about it again. There are alternative AOSP based distros out there that don't have that Google smell so look around, It's really not that hard. If you've never rooted your phone or sideloaded an app or changed the OS it can be somewhat intimidating but you can also find help out there online and via local phone store kiosks (forget the pimple crowd at the Sprint, Verizon or AT&T stores) who can set you up in no time.

I do have to say that the nicest thing about Android based phones is that there are alternatives. For example, I don't have Google Apps and use Skobbler for the navigation. It uses OpenStreetMap and I recently downloaded a couple of countries and really like the fact that I could navigate, offline.