Google Tightening Control of Android

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_15/b4223041200216_page_2.htm

by Athtar • 15 years ago

59 85 15 years ago

Athtar• 15 years ago

Here is the most interesting snippet for me:

Facebook, for example, has been working to fashion its own variant of Android for smartphones. Executives at the social network are unhappy that Google gets to review Facebook's tweaks to Android, say two people who weren't comfortable being named talking about the business. Google has also tried to hold up the release of Verizon (VZ) Android devices that make use of Microsoft's (MSFT) rival Bing search engine, according to two people familiar with the discussions.

With Google being direct competitors with Facebook and Microsoft in the online space, they have a lot to gain by knowing their competitor's plans early/by being able to limit their influence.

jkincaid3• 15 years ago

I don't understand how Google can maintain any control over those devices, though. My understanding was that anyone could download the Android source, sans Google applications like Gmail and Market, and install it on whatever they want.

If I were Facebook, I'd just avoid Google entirely and use alternative apps for everything. Amazon Appstore, Facebook Messaging for email, etc.

anon13852• 15 years ago

Google have not released the source to Honeycomb so no, anyone can't just go and download it.

Tyrannosaurs4• 15 years ago

The way in which Android is open differs from many other open projects.

The source to Android is made public at or around the time the final version ships but until that point only select partners have access to the software. It's this approach that Google are going to strengthen - essentially if you don't obey their rules you won't be a select partner and you won't get early access to the new releases.

What this means is that if you don't obey Google's rules you'll be getting the software two or three months later than your competitors (and without all the support they will be getting), likely receiving it around the time they're actually bringing products to market. That's a pretty big competitive disadvantage if you're aiming to compete at anything close to the top end of the market.

So basically while you can use Android as you wish, if you don't obey Google's rules then you won't be able to do so in a way that allows you to be competitive.

The cynic in me says that this is getting mighty close to being open in name only.

rst• 15 years ago

Some of Google's apps are going to be tricky to clone, though, particularly ones like Maps, Navigation, Goggles, and possibly YouTube, which rely in essential ways on Google's back-end services.

How much of a big deal this is would depend on what market segment they're going after, but mapping and location services are awfully handy across the board, and available on pretty cheap phones at this point.

joebadmo2• 15 years ago

Google maintains some level of control now through its "Google Experience" deals which include: access to the Market, Gmail, Maps, and other apps; early access to new versions; but also a share in the ad revenue, which can't be trivial.

Maybe Google didn't really have the clout to exercise control until now, but I'm really glad it's finally happening.

What I hope this means is that Google will control everything on the OS level, and allow customizations by the manufacturers and carriers only on a skinning and app level. In a perfect world they would also enforce access to bootloaders, to allow easy rom changes.

aristidb• 15 years ago

If this means they can force device makers to actually ship updates, I'm all for it.

ShabbyDoo2• 15 years ago

This is my biggest complaint about Android. I have one of the original Droids, and it's already obvious that Verizon/Motorola aren't going to do more than the minimum amount of upkeep from now on.

wewyor• 15 years ago

I have an original droid as well and you should seriously consider rooting it and putting something like cyanogen mod on it, it works well on my end. (Though I seriously doubt me buying another android phone that isn't something like a Nexus phone).

dolinsky• 15 years ago

For those who would like to start on page one, here's a link http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_15/b42230412...

haseman2• 15 years ago

As someone who's been working with Android from the beginning, I have to say: About Time.

This is a required step if Google wants the platform to be taken seriously. The only way to keep fragmentation out is to exert a fair amount of control over the OEMs and Carriers who wish to differentiate (or Fragment) Android for their own purposes.

It's going to be a fine balancing act for Rubin. If he pushes the carriers/oems too far, they'll walk. If he doesn't push them hard enough, the platform will disintegrate Java ME style.

Google is using the only leverage they have (early access and the google apps) to make the platform one worth developing for. I, as someone who makes his living doing it right now, am all for this move.

MatthewPhillips6• 15 years ago

As much as people online complain about fragmentation, there is no evidence (yet) that the general consumer cares that much. "Google experience" devices are not outselling the customized devices.

People need to tone down the rhetoric, in my opinion. Android already is being "taken seriously". Let's not make small problems out to be big problems. Android doesn't have any big problems, as it's being adopted by manufacturers and consumers at a rapid pace.

hollerith• 15 years ago

Would you also said (in 1998 and in 2000) that Windows 98 and Windows ME did not have any big problems, as they were adopted by at a rapid pace?

haseman2• 15 years ago

Perhaps that statement came out slightly more hyperbolic than I meant it.

The fact remains that Android's fragmentation is something I deal with on a daily basis. Any time spent fixing issues that crop up on particular phones is time I don't spend adding features to our application. Keeping customers from knowing the joys of fragmentation is one of the things I spend a lot of thought and work at.

alphamerik2• 15 years ago

Agreed, I don't understand what all of the anger is about like in this highly opinionated and skewed Ars Technica piece: http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/03/android-open...

The source will be released when Google is happy with the product. For people to be up in arms that they aren't releasing the source to an unfinished product is ridiculous. Seems like they are damned if they do, damned it they don't.

recoiledsnake• 15 years ago

>The source will be released when Google is happy with the product. For people to be up in arms that they aren't releasing the source to an unfinished product is ridiculous. Seems like they are damned if they do, damned it they don't

The Motorola Xoom is already out.. so how is Honeycomb an unfinished product if it's in consumers' hands? The basic spirit of FOSS is that users and developers should be able to modify the code. The article you linked to says this:

>The lack of Honeycomb code availability is especially bad for enthusiasts who were hoping to be able to install custom firmware on their Android tablets. Without the code, it will be difficult for the modding community to produce custom builds that fix the software problems that plague the Xoom and other upcoming Android tablets. Users who were looking forward to better Honeycomb builds for the Nook Color and other budget devices are also going to have to wait.

>For now, only a privileged few hardware vendors will have access to Honeycomb while the rest are left with uncertainty about the future of the platform. Even after the matter is resolved, the fact that Google is willing to withhold source code at its whim for competitive reasons is going to continue to cast a dark shadow over the company's increasingly hollow claim that Android is an open platform.

I don't see how the above is wrong.

>The source will be released when Google is happy with the product.

Doesn't Android use the Linux kernel which is GPL'ed (among other parts)? Can they legally withhold code for a shipping product by saying the software isn't finished?

bonch5• 15 years ago

The anger is explained in the introduction to that article. Google presented Android as an open gift to the world in a fight against strictly controlled platforms, yet Google is now withholding source code and requiring final approval over modifications to the operating system.

That they're allegedly holding up Android phones which utilize a rival search engine, Bing, is especially troubling. Is Android supposed to be an open platform or a Google platform?

djacobs• 15 years ago

I don't know if it's anger so much as confusion over why they are closing off the source that (up until now) they've called 'open'.

roc• 15 years ago

> "Google is using the only leverage they have (early access and the google apps)"

Walking isn't such a big issue these days. Which is likely why Google feels secure doing this. Windows CE is dead. Phone 7 is struggling. Nokia essentially gave up, removing MeeGo as a concern.

So where does, say, HTC go if Google pushes them to drop the Sense UI?

They certainly don't have the software expertise to fork and run. None of the Android OEMs do. At the rate mobile is advancing, they'd be irrelevant in 18 months. And there is literally no-one else who is delivering a product they can use to maintain their sales.

I honestly wonder if Google isn't more concerned about Amazon than the OEMs.

As for carriers... they're only a real issue in the US; where Android's growth isn't that strong anyway. I mean, is it even possible for AT&T and Verizon to support Android less these days? I haven't seen a single Droid ad since January.

warfangle• 15 years ago

That's because the ad targeting networks know you already have an android.

/semi-sarcasm.

muyuu• 15 years ago

HTC in particular has a long history of keeping a few different systems in their lines. They can prioritise Windows Phone more. But with Nokia there already they might want to keep it approx. 50-50 anyway.

Others like Motorola and Samsung, I'd expect them to stick to Android whatever happens, at least for the high end. This is why Google is doing this.

drzaiusapelord• 15 years ago

Is fragmentation really the issue? I think the issue is quality. Every android phone I've used was very different from the last. My friends G1 isn't a lot like my Vibrant and my Vibrant isn't a lot like my old EVO. Three different GUIs! Heck, Samsung decided to put in their own filesystem on the Vibrant and all Vibrant owners suffer from random lag.

Each phone has a different camera app, different gallery, different everything. Its annoying. They're all more or less phoned in - if you pardon the pun.

What google really needs to do is address its ugly stock GUI and put some shiny on there. Put in a decent media player. Put in lots of Apple-quality apps so that OEMs don't feel the need to completely redo everything because the stock android looks like something a defense contractor would make.

Maybe they can even make custom GUI enhancements run in userspace so that updates don't require redoing them. There should be a skinnable layer on top of system widgets. Heck, once you have that then google can start pushing out its own updates to phones and OEMs won't need to wait 8 months to port them over.

One can dream, I guess. Or I can buy an iphone again or move to Win7. My little Android experiment isn't really going anywhere. Its just as locked down as an iphone in practice and I suffer with Samsung's or HTC's low quality enhancements.

perssontm• 15 years ago

Agreed, the fragmentation might be caused by the semi-quality of apps and looks. But the mess that the hardware makers are forcing upon arent that much better at the moment.

I've been amazed each time i've put on cyanogenmod to replace the default android that comes with the phone with how much more useful it gets. Smoother, better working and less lag.

I would love to see htc(or any other hardware maker) ship their phones with a cyanogenmodversion that will track cyanogenmods updates. That might even save them some work.

pkulak2• 15 years ago

Good. It's always bothered me that Verizon can take an Android phone and make a bunch of money by whoring it out to Microsoft and anyone else who will pay to have their crapware permanently installed. Carriers and manufacturers have ruined just about every Android phone they've gotten their hands on. Android is really becoming a nice OS, and it deserves better.

dsuriano• 15 years ago

I remember when Verizon disabled Bluetooth file transfer on some of their "feature" phones, forcing users to use send a MMS or e-mail, thus inducing data charges.

cmurdock• 15 years ago

It's still happening with non smart-phones. I had t-mobile and was able to file transfer easily between phones. Verizon purposely locks this functionality out. Bullshit.

bonch5• 15 years ago

But what about "openness?" I thought Android was supposed to be the answer to Apple's tight control?

probablycorey• 15 years ago

Android is still much more open than Apple. A developer can actually view the Android source code, you can deploy an application to a device without Google's permission, you can access much more of the OS features from Android than with the iPhone.

The only people this limits "openness" for is device manufactures, which most developers would probably consider a good thing.

blinkingled3• 15 years ago

I can only hope you are serious - it's still way more Open than Apple, however you can't have it all - no fragmentation, no carrier "crapware" and full openness. So they seem to be doing the next best - if you are Google partner you will get to ship Google Apps, but you would have to agree to reasonable terms that help control fragmentation or UI variances etc. If you are not - then take the open code (it might be released later than you like but still) and do whatever you want with it, just don't say "Google" anywhere.

And as a user - you can still buy handsets that allow you to use Amazon appstore or side load apps. So yeah in the spirit of everything being relative - it is still far more open - just enough to be not a detriment.

ReadyNSet• 15 years ago

Seems Nokia was more than justified in choosing WP7 against Android

daniel_solano2• 15 years ago

I doubt it. I am sure that had it gone Android it would have been a high profile partner with Google.

I am inclined to believe Nokia went with Microsoft primarily because Microsoft needs Nokia more than Google needs Nokia, i.e. Microsoft offered more money.

mberning4• 15 years ago

I'm sure all the android fanboys will consider this a 'good move' since Google is doing it. When Apple does the same thing it is considered draconian and 'closed'.

alphamerik2• 15 years ago

Not exactly the same, iOS is not and will never be open source. Google is only delaying the source release of honeycomb until they are happy with the product.

mberning4• 15 years ago

I really wasn't commenting on the open source nature of the OSes, but rather Google exerting control over what carriers are allowed to do with their Android builds.

The thing that irritates me is the considerable double standard for freedom and openness that is applied to Android and iOS. As it turns out people have an very relative concept of what 'free' and 'more free' is. Some types of freedom are considered good, while others are bad. Hard to tell at times which way the community will go. I come in to these kinds of stories and find people endlessly lauding Google for taking more control over the ecosystem. I know for a fact that if the story were 'Apple cracks down on X' the reaction would be practically the inverse.

MatthewPhillips6• 15 years ago

Please reserve such comments for Techcrunch articles. Let's keep HN at adult-level conversations.

mberning4• 15 years ago

Please let people police the site with their upvotes and downvotes. Your highbrow analysis of my comment adds even less to the discourse.

kenjackson• 15 years ago

This seems opposed to my original impressions of the Android vision. I thought the original carrot/stick was the Android market.

But I guess with the new Amazon market the old Google carrot/stick is no longer as compelling.

lftl• 15 years ago

It's not just the Market, it's all the Google created apps so: Gmail, Voice, Maps, Navigation. Maybe even the Youtube app is included?

nicetryguy• 15 years ago

I am happy about this

Suppose google doesnt approve changes to the source code before the companies release products. Suppose the changes to that source code stop certain apps from working on certain phones, therefore putting it on the shoulders of the developers to make certain their app works on every different phone.

It would hurt the quality of the apps and the platform if Android lost its mostly seamless cross platform ability

laujen• 15 years ago

This is very good news for us developers. Hopefully a fixed set of screen dimensions and expectations can be established so we know what we are writing for. Every time a big name Android app gets released, a laundry list of which devices it works on and which ones it doesn't gets made, too. I hate this. Either our software needs to run on Android or it doesn't.

rbarooah6• 15 years ago

Google makes some of the source available when they want to but restricts what people can do with it using licenses, and now they insist on giving their approval to modifications.

Can we finally stop saying Android is 'open' now when it's blatantly false?

Imagine the headline read 'Apple Tightening Control of WebKit'. How is this any different?

I truly want to see an Open tablet on which the community could realize the Dynabook vision. I thought the Xoom might be a good starting point but with Google capriciously exercising power over the software, it's pretty clear that Android isn't going to give us that.

On the bright side, Moore's law will give us tablets that will run stock Linux pretty soon, and then all we need is a BSD-licensed, community built touch layer.

archgoon• 15 years ago

>On the bright side, Moore's law will give us tablets that will run stock Linux pretty soon, and then all we need is a BSD-licensed, community built touch layer.

Could you explain how Moore's Law is relevant here? How you get from "Number of transistors per IC will double in 18 months" to "Linux on a tablet pretty soon"? Tablet development isn't being limited by processing power as far as I know.

rbarooah6• 15 years ago

I think power is very much an issue.

Most people I know who have an iPad 1 complain that speed is an issue. The iPad 2 certainly fixes that, but Apple's have focussed a lot on optimization and their stack is all built around compiled code.

To me that suggests that tablet performance is only just adequate today.

If we want to realize the dream of a truly open, programmable-on-the-device tablet, we're going to need it to burn some cycles on languages that aren't as efficient as C, and frameworks that haven't been as tuned as iOS.

othermaciej• 15 years ago

> Imagine the headline read 'Apple Tightening Control of WebKit'. How is this any different?

Why did you use this example? Apple isn't tightening control of WebKit. WebKit is a considerably more open project than Android.

rbarooah6• 15 years ago

That's exactly the point I was making.

shareme• 15 years ago

a question:

Can you assuming that you have C skills tell Linus that we all should use a new file system called FUD? NO! Is Linux any less open because you cannot ? NO!

please effing stop with the damn fud

rbarooah6• 15 years ago

Does Linus control what people do with Linux?

naner• 15 years ago

Google has also tried to hold up the release of Verizon (VZ) Android devices that make use of Microsoft's (MSFT) rival Bing search engine, according to two people familiar with the discussions.

Haha, oops! That is kind of funny. I can't believe Google didn't anticipate this type of thing.

ChuckMcM• 15 years ago

Link points to page2, page 1 is here:

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_15/b42230412...

tl;dr version - Google is allegedly asserting greater control over what folks who ship Android can do (presumably as part of the license for the Google apps bit). They are uneven in their enforcement.

Often times articles like this have some base message or meme they are channeling but this one doesn't seem to have much focus. One would guess it was this bold claim:

"There will be no more willy-nilly tweaks to the software. No more partnerships formed outside of Google's purview. From now on, companies hoping to receive early access to Google's most up-to-date software will need approval of their plans. And they will seek that approval from Andy Rubin, the head of Google's Android group."

But its not really backed up by the story line. The story is more a "they are lying about openness, they are really evil" kind of thing that I've noticed quite a few places are picking up. There is insinuations about the justice department and anti-trust. Frankly it reads like something Microsoft would say.

That being said, if Microsoft really is behind articles of this tone, then I'd suggest they take a different approach and offer carriers a replacement for the Google apps package (mail, maps, search, chat etc) and create windows mobile/android that would certainly tweek Google's nose.

protomyth• 15 years ago

At this point, my definition of "open" is an open source license combined with public development.

Google Tightening Control of Android

Related Stories