We’ve been waiting a long time to hear from Google about its mobile plans and the so-called Gphone or Google-powered phones. According to one report, that wait may be over soon.
The Wall Street Journal today said Google is expected to announce within the next two weeks advanced software and services that would allow handset makers to bring Google-powered phones to market by next summer. Google’s goal is to make applications and services as accessible on cellphones as they are on the Internet.
To compliment the WSJ’s story, Reuters noted that Google is in active talks with Verizon, the No. 2 carrier in the U.S., about putting Google applications on phones it offers.
And in early October, The New York Times posited that the Google phone may not be a phone at all but a mobile operating system.
Google Phone concepts
Obviously speculation abounds, which the tech community thrives on. The WSJ believes that Google-powered phones will wrap together several Google applications like the search engine, Google Maps, YouTube, and Gmail — no surprise there. It makes sense.
The WSJ says the “most radical element” of Google’s plan is its push to make software for the phone(s) open “right down to the operating system” — again, no surprise. It makes sense.
If the Google phones are “open”, independent software developers would gain access to the tools they need to build additional phone features, something that Nokia is already experimenting with. Apple will also be opening up, to some degree at least, early next year.
Of course all of this — and what’s been written the past two months — is speculation. It’s time we hear from Google.
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