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I wouldn't call it brilliant. Its just a way to beat the OEMs when google realized the OEMs were killing android. Android is the OS of the Open Handset Alliance. The idea is everyone would run it, like windows, and just sell different hardware. I don't think anyone was really expecting the massive modifications the OEMs would do and the huge delay in updates. Not to mention handsets being abandoned 6 months after launch while Apple was maintaining updates for years with their phones. OEMs still live in the disposable flip-phone age. Google knows that mentality will never go away. The collusion between carrier and OEM is so rotten, google had to make its own brand to get away from it.

Google freaked out a bit and turned its vanity Nexus brand into a proper consumer brand. Remember, Nexus was the "developer's phone" originally. The situation with tablets was even worse. Outside of the Xoom and the Transformer, the tablet quality was terrible and just couldn't compete with ipad. Nexus branding is an admission that you can't rely on OEMs anymore. Google can't be Microsoft. It needs to be Apple. Hardware and vendor relationships can't just be passed off to a couple Korean and Japanese firms. You need to do this in-house if you want to compete.

> Google can't be Microsoft. It needs to be Apple.

Seems like Microsoft feels it has to be Apple too.

You say no one expected it, but I think everyone who worked in telecom expected it.

Think about how applications got onto phone before the iPhone; all of the money was "pre-loads". In a world where the only access comes from a a proprietary cable in a factory there's no reality of consumers updating.

Moving from that to a agile development cycle turned out to be too great a leap.

"Brilliant marketing play"

Maybe, but where the idealism gone? Both on HN, in tech circles, and, yes, at Google, there was some healthy dose of idealism. You know, this thing that make people do thing for something else than money, for the better good of humanity for example.

Idealism (and anger) brought us Linux, Vim, the Web, etc.

And it is killing me to see Google follow the normal evolution of mammoth corps, doing all for the brand idol, trying to launch a vast fishnet and catch as much fish as they can to feed the idol.

Brands are not bad per se. In the old times, a good label for wine was just the name of a family who knew how to craft wine, and same for clocks, cars, and on. The brand was a simple hook to hang a carefully pampered reputation vis-a-vis your clients. The core was craftmanship.

Now the reputation has become an end by itself, and one spend more time or money building a "reputation" than crafting and selling useful (or useless) tools. And the more reputation you have the more you need, just like power.

>Maybe, but where the idealism gone? Both on HN, in tech circles, and, yes, at Google, there was some healthy dose of idealism. You know, this thing that make people do thing for something else than money, for the better good of humanity for example.

The people who brought Linux, Vim etc.. had a different motive from the outset. A public company spending millions, if not billions, on a project needs to see return on that investment. I'm not saying that the people involved were not doing it for the sake of improving technology for humanity, and they certainly have, but when you're accountable to shareholders profits often take higher priority.

It's a truism that a company will try to make more money. I often find people in comments lecturing this basic in a way that feels a bit repetitive and sometimes condescending. It's not your comment, but it adds up so finally I took to replying.

Too often in these kinds of threads people start with something like "Google should have..." or Apple should..." and arguing from the position of those companies. People play armchair manager and identify fully with a multi billion dollar corporation.

I don't mind studying a business case for education, but I can't cheer on every silly action that a company ends up doing, intentionally or not.

The accountability to shareholders also seems a little like a strawman at times. With regards to Android, a few years ago you could have convincingly argued different product/marketing strategies.

Denying every single "good" action in our professional lifes because it could cheat a shareholder somewhere ... that would definitively be a strawman.

That's a fair comment but stating what makes sense from a business perspective isn't the same as saying you support the actions. Far from it, but when you discuss the actions of companies, you have to see it from their point of view. That doesn't mean you agree with that they're doing but it helps explain the reasoning and rationale behind it.

What's right for consumers may not be, and often isn't, right for the business so it's not a case of "right" or "wrong" (because that can vary depending on who's point of view you're looking from) but a case of explaining why the strategy was taken.

>Denying every single "good" action in our professional lifes because it could cheat a shareholder somewhere ... that would definitively be a strawman.

No one said every single good action can be denied and, in fact, I explicitly said that I don't believe the people involved didn't have good intentions. However, if there was a choice to be made between increasing profits or "being good", a public company would often choose the profit route.

I understand what you mean regarding the accountability to the shareholders but I think it's used more as a euphemism to say that they are required to make a profit. They're more than welcome to have a philanthropic branch to their company but if you're investing millions of investor funds without financial gain, questions will be asked; that's the reality.

Your old impression of google was a result of branding. Google has been heavily reliant on branding from the very beginning. Being nerdy, "don't be evil," even being anti-marketing are all very conscious branding strategies, emphasized over and over again in PR contexts especially. Maybe they were also believed in as ideas within the company, but that's beside the point. They're just changing brand strategy, not suddenly discovering branding.

aka "Selling Out".

Not sure about that. Google is actually pretty bad at PR with idiots like Vic Gundotra and Andy Rubin alienating users left and right. Eric 'creepy' Schmidt wasn't much better and said many stupid things while he was CEO.

-- I'm the security master.

Just a friendly FYI since you're new: around here we don't sign our comments.

http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Yep, put this in your about instead.

What do you mean by Vic Gundotra and Andy Rubin are alienating users? This is the first I'm hearing about it, do you mind elaborating or at least providing a source?

Vic's "Real Names" (TM) policy was bad enough, despite the massive internal feedback he received asking for pseudonymous support.

Andy has embarrassed himself several times by restricting access to the Android code while, at the same time, claiming that Android was open. Granted most users don't care about the source code but it's a punch in the face for all the OSS enthusiasts who believed in Android's open model.

And Android still developed behind closed doors for no good reason. Not only that but the team is siloed from other parts of Google, like some sort of exclusive club.

>>>In the old times, a good label for wine was just the name of a family who knew how to craft wine, and same for clocks, cars, and on. The brand was a simple hook to hang a carefully pampered reputation vis-a-vis your clients. The core was craftmanship.

Completely agree on this point. The over commercialism of brands has killed the idea of good craftsmanship. Add in our "throw-away" society and it looks bleak for people who just attempt to build something that lasts.

If there is one thing which depresses me most on a daily basis, this is it.

It is the cycle. Apple crept up on Microsoft. Google crept up on Apple. Google will have its day to fail... Eventually.

If what's happening to Apple right now counts as "failure", I'd love to see what success looks like.

You're seeing their failure to adapt since Jobs passed. It is slow, but their stock will fall hard soon.

I agree, this is what Google do. They change the game to suit and then play the new game well. In this case they wanted the mobile world to adopt an open, UNIX model OS with a Java stack not owned by Sun/Oracle. Job done. Let the games begin.

Agreed. If you look at the pre-iPhone world the dominant way to access web content was WAP - a closed protocol for accessing strictly controlled services managed by the carriers. Blackberry was working closely with carriers to develop closed, branded services with them and Windows Mobile couldn't run a proper browser and had low market share.

I think Google's strategy was to provide no-name handset manufacturers, without the clout to develop these proprietary services or make such deals, with a cheap platform that could browse the web and access Google services. It was a desperate attempt to avoid a world where all mobile services were carrier controlled.

In hindsight they actually needn't have bothered. Apple had sufficient leverage with the iPhone to avoid having to make carrier on-line service lock-in deals. Still, Google couldn't afford to risk that changing, or Apple locking in users to services of it's own.

This is pretty revisionist. There were lots of years and internet enabled phones between wap and iPhone (eg Nokia symbian devices).

I will just add - I bought a cheap no-name Android tablet and got a great impression. It has a low-res screen, yes, but other than that I can't complain. The system is vanilla android with no crapware, it's easy to use, it's OK for playing videos and basic games.

Good to hear stories like this. Just because something is cheap doesn't mean it's rubbish. A $99 Android tablet has a better operating system and in some cases better hardware than the first and second generation iPads.

I just spent a few days off-and-on Android tablet shopping/researching. It's an exciting and fast-moving market.

The generics have some great selling points - they're always the first movers on new chipsets, so you can get good specs for cheaper. The downside is that they're bad at the device integration and quality control aspects, and that can really burn the buyer. OTOH, average quality seems to be better than it was just a few years ago - I think in another year or two some of those companies might become worthy competition for the big names.

This import reseller has some really interesting articles on recent market developments: http://www.topnotchtablets.com/articles

In the end I gave up on the generics and got the Lenovo A2109. In the past I've biased towards Lenovo for laptops too - they never have amazing specs for the price range, but they're one of the only manufacturers that are willing to advertise the physical sturdiness of their equipment, and that always puts me over the fence.

I don't know about that. You generally need that brand rescue package when the original meaning of the brand (high quality, best bang for the buck, whatever it was) is gone. Companies that dilute that brand just don't have the marketing muscle to promote that many sub-brands.

Compare this:

* http://us.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/models/notebooks

* http://www.htc.com/us/smartphones/

vs something like this:

* http://www.apple.com/mac/

* http://www.google.com/intl/en/chrome/devices/chromebooks.htm...

> Instead of having a 'Windows Phone', a 'Blackberry', an 'Apple', and an 'Android', you now have a 'Galaxy', a 'Droid', a 'Nexus', and an 'Android' (cheap Chinese), etc.

It's brilliant for another reason. Other companies might be tempted to go with another OS. But then they'd be foregoing the network effects and other advantages already established by the Android ecosystem. The competing OS project will have to compete internally with Android.