May a thousand Google phones bloom! That must have been Google’s intent when it recently unveiled an ambitious strategy that will make cell phones cheaper, and speed up internet surfing with its new ‘open’ platform called Android. Android includes a new browser and Linux operating system (OS) which will compete with platforms such as Apple’s OS X on the iPhone, the BlackBerry OS, Microsoft’s Windows Mobile, and the Palm OS. It is an “open” platform, which means the source code can be altered by developers for use on handsets. While the hardware costs of cell phones are dropping steadily, software functionality is becoming increasingly complex and costing more. Open source reduces the cost of the software, which comprises a major chunk of the cell phone’s cost. Google expects Android to reduce the prices of today’s $500 (Rs 20,000) phones to no more than $100-150 (Rs 4,000-6,000) in a year or so.
Google also describes Android as the “world’s first mash-up platform which bridges the island between the internet and cell phones”. Mash-up is a web application that combines data from more than one source into a single integrated tool. A typical example is the use of cartographic data from Google Maps to add location information to real-estate data from Craigslist, thereby creating a new and distinct web service. This is expected to enrich the web experience on mobiles.
