The rumours are flying at the electric pace of instant syndication: google is digging into the cell phone market. Until reading this blog from zdnet I didn’t think to consider a bad angle to this news. Google taking over the internet is bad enough, do we want them monopolizing our pockets as well? With the google suite of applications there would be little room for 3rd party applications, even if google’s “do gooder” conscience open the hardware to competitors. Is this the start of a M$ Windows style takeover? Here are some random thoughts on the gPhone:
The credit card commercial’s title song “hand in my pocket” keeps replaying over and over in my head. Google’s extensive database now will know where I am, at any moment! The google logic is to have free phones, paid for by advertising. Does this mean if I walk by a McDonalds I’ll see a BigMac fly by my screen? Do I care? With the world of advertising changing, moving dollars from traditional mediums into more experimental, this happening wouldn’t surprise me in the least.
It’s funny and sad, my first concern was… looks. Imagining linux marrying google puts an image of what Sarah Jessica Parker and Robin Williams’ baby would look like. Neither company has been known to put out products with style although that seems to be mattering less and less to people, at least with web 2.0. It’s such a contrast to the iPhone it is incredible.
I think all the nostalgia surrounding this idea tells more of the lack of current phone systems than anything else. I had a motorola Q and returned it within a week. I am dieing to see a cheap, SIMPLE, well made phone I can actually use.
