Android, as an operating system created by Android, Inc. and incubated and promoted by Google, is not "charitable" per se, but that's not the point that martythemaniak is making. As a free, open-source piece of software, it effectively acts as a lubricant in the consumer electronics market. By eliminating the manufacturer's cost of building a device's operating system, Google have made it more affordable for both device manufacturers and consumers to effect smart mobile device transactions. So while it may not be strictly financially "charitable" for Google to do this, if we account for the non-financial value of these transactions, I think it's fair to say that an enormous amount of wealth has been created above and beyond what would otherwise have happened in a market that was only dominated by devices running non-free software, especially in countries that have populations that are generally too poor to afford the iPhone.