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Comment by hinathan | Hacker News Reader

That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault.

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"That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault."

Google controls Android 3.0 completely. They very intentionally did not make a source release. Google entered the relationship with Motorola and it damn well had control over who was going to ship a 3.0 device. They knew what they were doing. They HAD to beat the iPad 2 release date at all costs.

So now all we have is a buggy as hell 3.0 OS with no source release and we're still waiting for them to fix stuff. I hope the early release to beat the iPad furthered some other business goal because it didn't further Android as a great Tablet OS.

The flaws I've seen in the device are clear OS and Software issues. So unless your point of view is that it's up to other people to fix Google's fuckups... eh...

The box says Motorola. That means they signed off shipping it. Even if any problems with it can be placed firmly at Google's door, it still says Motorola on the box. I think that was the previous commenter's point.

"The box says Motorola. That means they signed off shipping it. Even if any problems with it can be placed firmly at Google's door, it still says Motorola on the box. I think that was the previous commenter's point."

Fair enough. Motorola definitely shares blame.

But at the end of the day all that is Android ends at Google's feet. Why play games with holding back the 3.0 source if you don't at least feel you have some responsibility for how Android launches on tablets?

The box says Motorola AND Google.

The device has both logos on the back, and they're the same size.

did Google order manufacturing of the device? did Google order printing of the manuals and the box? did Google stack the boxed up devices onto palettes and ship them out to shops? Is it called the Google Xoom? No no no no. All of the above are Motorola, and more. It's a Motorola product which uses hardware and software components from probably dozens of suppliers. One of those suppliers is Google. They may have supplied a shitty component, but Motorola shipped the device instead of saying "this isn't ready, don't ship it".

How are you actually arguing with this point? Is it just because this is the internet and fingertips are a renewable resource?

No, you're right. It's not Google's fault that someone at Motorola didn't have the balls to say, "This just isn't ready for prime time" and put it off until it really was done. But Google is still dragging its feet on making Android ready for tablets. They've had a year with an already successful model to look at. Building an OS isn't trivial, of course, but their commitment is clearly not behind producing great tablet software.

> They HAD to beat the iPad 2 release date at all costs.

I doubt they had to. They chose to, and blundered with the entire world looking at them.

If I were Moto, I would have red-lighted the project some months before deadline, when it was readily apparent that Google wasn't going to deliver a quality stable release on-time.

Competing with the iPhone (and it's carrier exclusivities and high ASP) is one thing, but if you have shoddy product, the iPad is going to wipe the floor with you unless you really offer something unique (ie, eee transformer looks interesting).

Here is the installation document for Honeycomb. http://developer.android.com/guide/practices/optimizing-for-... It clearly talks about using the Xoom for testing purposes. So, Google released Honeycomb as a finished product, used Xoom as the reference device and you are telling us that somehow Motorola shipped a product while google was looking the other way. The software is clearly a huge part of the problem (blocke mentioned some). Things which were working fine in Froyo/Gingerbread suddenly did not work on Honeycomb anymore - Flash not working until a month after release, the entire back/home/menu interface was broken. Market place not working, no apps optimized for tablet, no SD card support etc. etc.

To their credit Google recognized they messed up and are exerting more control but there is no question they share a lot of the blame on the software side here.

Motorola on the other hand messed up with pricing and the late introduction of the wifi only model but I suppose they felt confident after a good showing in CES and good reveiws.

I'm guessing Motorola had the hardware ready, they've got an investment hanging over it which they need to recoup some of, and perhaps Google offered to cover some of their costs. Who knows.

Motorola also got some good exposure and definitely some experience in channels that will be critical in the future.

I don’t think that Motorola had the hardware, or the software, ready at all. That’s why the LTE upgrade will require mailing the tablet to Motorola and a one week turnaround time.

Apparently, it’s a software issue, but the SD card doesn't work at all. However, this isn’t a Google issue, as other Honeycomb tablets have working SD card slots.

I don't see how it's entirely Motorola's fault, honestly. At best, both parties are equally at fault. Google could have refused to release the source, forcing Motorola to go with Gingerbread instead of Honeycomb.

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