Google 'clamps down' on world of Android partners

Tempest in a teacup

The whole thing will be open in due course. In the interim this is a good thing because there are really well funded, connected and motivated people who will stop at nothing to ruin Android tablets. They want desperately to ship a Honeycomb spin that breaks security, ruins the customer experience and, if possible, implicates Google in some perceived wrongdoing. This very article illustrates how desperate and shrill they are becoming.

I doubt Google likes this necessary defensive posture either and is working diligently to correct it. In the interim you are free to select from any of the other available free and open source tablet operating systems, and install that on your Android tablets. Google is under no compulsion to open source any more of this code before they are ready to do so.

Google/Android = Welcome to the new Steve Jobs and Apple/iOS

Bloody Freetards!

makes me sick!

This is why I buy into the Apple zoo

Better closed and honest about it than closed and dishonest about it. Not to mention interested in your money rather than your data.

Skyhook

Skyhook turned out to be bs-ing; the judge booted their preliminary injunction against Google, saying that emails revealed in the pretrial showed that Google was trying to work with them to achieve a situation where Skyhook's software could coexist properly with the rest of Android, but Skyhook didn't want to play nice and Motorola eventually canned their contract. Surprisingly I didn't see this covered in the Reg, not anti-Google enough for you?

The rest of this is nothing new; Google has always had an Android compatibility program, and has always had a two-tier ecosystem of Open Handset Alliance members and the rest of the world when it comes to receiving open source dumps. I would take with a huge grain of salt the vague FUD about new "fragmentation" requirements from anonymous sources.

Apologists

I can't believe how many Android Apologists there are reading El Reg.

Imagine the spleen being vented if this sort of thing was being done by Apple/MS/Sony. You lot are pathetic.

brilliant

Whether or not Google are doing the right thing (and I think they are in some aspects, are not in others), one thing is hilarious:

All the manufacturers thinking they were going to get a free ride into Tablet-Land are paying the price of admission into the greatest Cargo Cult of the early 21st Century. There really is no free lunch, is there.

Kiss android goodbye

Honeycomb has only got 50 apps, And what, one very expensive tablet. Now I find that google is playing random favorites with the source code and may find that I have unsupported hardware in the near future.

I can see why WM7 is projected to go from 5 to 20% market share. I think I can deal with MS's bullshit as at least I know there is an upgrade path.

Might get an N8 after all

We've got the original dumbed-down locked-down phone OS, Microsoft's copy, and Google pretending to be everybody's friend but just playing power games and slurping more data then the other two put together.

Something's up when Symbian 3's a dead end and there's only going to be one more MeeGo phone but even so both look infinitely more appealing as a next phone than anything based on those three.

A salutory lesson...

This, once again confirms that corporations care not a jot about FOSS beyond turning a profit from it.

Without a doubt the android model from here will be the same as OSX.

Take a solid open source project, apply a few saps back to "the community" and then build the UI and other services on top in a nice closed manner.

Mark my words, Google Android (as opposed to any forks that may or may not happen) will have a nice tight closed App Store within 12 months, because that's another income source for them as a for profit corporation to think any different is madness..

Open source Android will be to Google Android what BSD is to OSX - a marginalized irrelevance. Pains me to say it, but thats what I see.

FRAGMENTATION!!!!

OH NO! THE UI IS DIFFERENT!!!!

But guess what... your application still work.. replacing the launcher application or changing some graphics in the framework doesn't break all existing applications. Seriously, this really gets on my tits. You have idiots (including Steve the great) saying "Look at these companies like tweetdeck.. they have to make millions of versions of their app to cover all the Android devices".. no, they don't, you can choose not to support older platform versions or some screen sizes.. but no, HTC's changes to the stock apps and changes to framework graphics DO NOT RENDER THEIR PHONES INCOMPATIBLE WITH A "STANDARD" ANDROID DEVICE.

And FFS, how many times does it need to be pointed out that Maps ARE NOT PART OF THE ANDROID PLATFORM. Google's market IS NOT PART OF THE ANDROID PLATFORM. If you want to use Google's extra APIs you have to define that in your application's manifest.. Lets repeat that MAPS IS NOT PART OF THE ANDROID PLATFORM. If you want to use maps and the market you have to keep google happy. You could build an Android device with your own market and value add applications... but I doubt many vendors want to do that when A: consumers want the google apps B: the google apps are fairly good C: the rules google have aren't all that insane.

Too many AppleTards within Google if you ask me. The signs were all there.

I became alarmed at the signs that Google were turning towards thinking in an evil and controlling "Jobsian" way last year when Google announced that all of its employees must use Apple computers. That was the start of the end...

Google is just ...

Learning now what Microsoft learned 20 years ago.... That giving your stuff away with no restrictions is no way to make money. Once you give away the fruit of your engineering, there's no reason for people to come back to you. Companies can't be supported by banner ads alone.