“We told you the Google phone was confirmed. And now some Googler’s seem to be confirming it, too,” Michael Arrington reports for TechCrunch. “There is a lot of chatter on Twitter about Google employees with HTC-built unlocked Google Phones running Android 2.1. And the devices look to be coming out in January.”
Arrington reports, “It looks to us like Google may have handed out a lot of the new Google Phone devices today to employees, and naturally they’re showing it to friends.”
Full article here.
John Biggs writes for CrunchGear, “What if Google starts to sell this thing? This is “a big deal” on the level of Neo learning Kung Fu in The Matrix. This means Google is making hardware.”
Biggs writes, “For nigh on three decades computer manufacturers have been secure in their positions of power… But suddenly service providers are doing hardware. Amazon has the Kindle, Barnes&Noble has a lumpen Nook, and now Google has a phone. What’s next? The Credit Suisse Fondue Set?”
Biggs writes, ” When Dell launches a phone, it’s news. When Google launches a phone it’s a Moon Shot.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Puleeze. Potential users of fake iPhones rejoice (maybe), but enough with the massively overblown hype already. “Moon Shot,” our asses. All we ask is for at least a little bit of perspective.
[UPDATE: 5:45pm ET: Mario Queiroz, Vice President, Product Management, Google, explains via The Official Google Blog:
At Google, we are constantly experimenting with new products and technologies, and often ask employees to test these products for quick feedback and suggestions for improvements in a process we call dogfooding (from “eating your own dogfood”). Well this holiday season, we are taking dogfooding to a new level.
We recently came up with the concept of a mobile lab, which is a device that combines innovative hardware from a partner with software that runs on Android to experiment with new mobile features and capabilities, and we shared this device with Google employees across the globe. This means they get to test out a new technology and help improve it.
Unfortunately, because dogfooding is a process exclusively for Google employees, we cannot share specific product details. We hope to share more after our dogfood diet.]
MacDailyNews Take: That doesn’t sound like an imminent Google Phone to us.
This will be a big deal. If they do a good job, there will be another Gorilla in the room.
Google isn’t building anything. Tje article specifically says it’s an HTC phone. The only thing google does that’s different from other Andriod phones is they probably won’t muck up their own OS the way other carriers have. Oh and an unlocked HTC is gonna cost in the area of $400 to $700. When google actually designs and builds the phone then maybe some hype may be in order.
Naturally it will run on the cloud, which will crash and lose all data.
Apple doesn’t actually manufacture the iphone yet we still call it the apple iPhone and not the foxcon ( or whoever makes it) phone with iPhone os
Google’s not making a phone. Google had HTC make a phone that met Google’s requirements. Not very different than Moto making the Droid.
If the carriers sell the thing without an overpriced data plan AND another $0 for texting I may but it.
Apple designs and has a company build to spec. It is a lot different than a company asking for hardware to look a certain way and to run software.
Apple designs and then has companies build it. That is the reason they leaped ahead.
If this thing is on Verizon- that could bring me there. I’m still hoping Steve and Verizon can play “Let’s make a deal”.
I’d hate to give up my iPhone- I’m still using the 1st Gen- I haven’t upgraded; don’t want to marry AT&T;for another 2 years. Please Steve- hammer something out with the “can you hear me now?” guys.
This could be the first phone that runs Android the way it was meant to run and be very good, but what does that do to the relationships with other vendors using Android? Does this give Google an unfair advantage over their partners? That could be messy.
I love my iPhone and will not use anything else. One, because it creates a seamless computing and mobile environment for me as a Mac user. And two, maybe the biggest and best reason, iTunes. Even for Windows users, iTunes will be the sticking point for anyone who would consider switching to the Google phone.
Apple doesn’t need competition to innovate at an incredible pace, but more competition could stoke the fires a little bit more over in Cupertino. We all know Steve-O loves him some competition and doesn’t like to lose. Especially to those people that rip off his ideas. I believe Google is biting off more than it can chew.
No one has posted “bloodbath” yet. but I have to admit I am worried a little about my AAPL shares. What will monday bring? How come this was kept secret until now?
Microsoft’s products make me laugh. Google’s scare me.
A Google branded phone!? Oh my God! That’s like… Who cares?
Okay, aside from all the companies selling Android phones. They probably care, since they’ve just been stabbed in the back. Google must be taking lessons from Microsoft.
U can’t tell me that the google asshat on the Apple board didn’t have access to all kind of priviledged info.
Google schmoogle…
There will be Google phone in my hands only after you pry my iPhone from my cold dead ones.
Everybody is recongizing the power of a vertical integration. Sooner or later (the day after Ballmer is fired, err retires) MSFT will forego all of its partners and do the same thing.
LOL! Love how the writer pumps up DELL! Hilarious!
Kitch,
There is a big difference Apple designs it’s products and has them contract manufactured to it’s specification.
Simply OEM’ing yet another HTC android phone with “Google” embossed in the back is hardly revolutionary (barely even newsworthy).
If google had actually designed and specified unique hardware that would be different, but that is not the case, it is just another HTC android phone…
Yawn….
Isn’t it just another HTC phone that runs Android? If this was the first and only phone with Android, it may be a big deal, but at this point (and going forward), it’s just one of many devices fracturing Android’s market share.
There’s a feeling of Deja Vu here.
Google looks like it’s trying too hard to be like Microsoft in the 1980’s. “Hey, Apple jumped into the smartphone industry 2 years ago and it’s doing well. Let’s copy what they did! Let’s have an App Store too!”
http://no-spamming/
This is anything but a big deal… what we have is yet…another…also ran. But now you have a choice: pedophiles & porn addicts will gravitate towards the Android. The rest of us will stick with our iPhones…
‘Moon Shot’?
Sounds like a pain in the ass….
@Spudly
You got that right.
Let’s assume for a moment that Google has worked with HTC to actually construct a great mobile phone. Let’s even go so far as to say it is comparable to the iPhone.
Now to use this fine device, you need a wireless carrier. Oops, that’s where things head south fast.
If Google signs up with one carrier, like Apple did with AT&T;, then the other carriers are no longer going to be excited about Android phones. In fact, this would smell like another MS PlayForSure fiasco.
If Google allows the phone to be used on multiple carriers, then each carrier will “customize” the phone for their system and hence screw up a good phone.
Therefore, no matter how good the Google phone is, either Google or the wireless carriers will be doing their best to f_ck it up.
What this means is that Apple will now have a sense of urgency to sell the next version of the iPhone through multiple carriers.
Think about the ipod. Mac only, then Windows, then the Mini (now Nano) and eventually the Shuffle. Apple took every opportunity to expand the user base and didn’t allow any other company to swoop in the way MS did with the OS.
Apple realizes they already have millions hooked on iTunes which provides a natural upgrade to the iPhone. They’ll just need to speed up the adoption rate with all the copycats coming to the market.
Sense of urgency? Not a chance in He….
Slow and stead, slow and steady.
As soon as you let your competitors decide your next move for you, you’ve lost the game.
This is in NO way a game changer…. time to ignore the hype.