Nokia moves ahead with plans for a low-end Android handset

In my opinion, it strengthens it. This is precisely why I love Android and not iOS or Windows Phone. Android being open-source, means forks are possible. It also means that if Google's stewardship goes awfully awry, then a community or some company can take over their leadership, so Google has to play a lot nicer than other companies, as the lock-in they achieved is weaker.

Amazon forking Android is a great thing. People don't view Amazon's devices as being Androids (except us). It also enabled them to deliver cool devices for cheap in a small amount of time. If it weren't for Android, Amazon would've had to come up with their own proprietary OS, completely incompatible with everything else. Who wouldn't prefer a forked Android, rather than yet another half-baked proprietary OS? Amazon forking Android is THE proof that Android is an open platform, because that's what openness allows one to do.

And the way that Google has been consolidating functionality into Play Services makes me question their stewardship of the platform. Android has been advertised and sold as an open platform. In my country, I remember commercials for Android phones mentioning the word "open-source". My freakin taxi driver asked me about it.

Android has been sold to everybody as being an open platform, from day 1. Openness is a doubly-edged sword, but on the whole I think it's worth it. If you don't like it, then you can take your pick from the competition.

> Samsung is making most of the profits from Android

So what's the problem? They make most of the profits because (a) they are big and have a big distribution network and (b) they have been making the best Androids.

For both customers and developers, it's actually irrelevant whom gets the most profits. People used to say that Apple makes more profits than the whole Android industry combined, therefore Android is not relevant. But it doesn't matter, because (a) the pie is freakishly big and growing and you don't have to be number one and (b) things change fast, especially because phones have a short life, much shorter than PCs.

> Maybe they should do Plan B with Ubuntu Touch and/or Firefox OS

Judging by Nokia's past history, they have a tendency to make their own thing. Therefore, if they used Ubuntu Touch or Firefox OS, they would fork those too. I'm rooting for Firefox OS, therefore I don't wish for Nokia's hands on it.

And everyone will be contributing core OS improvements to the same pool, it's the open source dream.

Excuse me, what do you think would happen when Android was released as open source?

Forking is essential to the health of open source code. The interesting part is when features from FireOS and this supposed Nokia OS are lifted and put back into Android.

Yes, Play Service is definitely Google's attempt to keep up with Apple while at the same time not closing up the Android source. We'll see how well that pans out.

Perhaps "Android" as a marketing hype term will die, just like "RSS" - in the sense that it dies like Obiwan Kanobi and just moves into a higher plane of existence.

Wouldn't that be a goal for Nokia Handset Division as part of MSFT?

Thats just a trick from old MSFT except with their monopoly.

I think Google and others are doing a pretty good job on this without Nokia's help. With all the different versions of Android, different hardware specs and the lack of updates to current phones, it's PITA to create an app which works reasonably well on most of the devices.

And because of that, Android starting to look more and more as the new Symbian.

Here is a demo for Timescape: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cD2PECP2AaQ

Apparently it is addicting; my wife got upset about it, now that I got her another phone she is missing this feature.

(disclaimer: no inside knowledge from either Microsoft or Nokia)

And yes, they are too late. They were doing their thing, and suddenly iOS and Android happened. But WHEN they decided to go down the MS road, they were already too late for Android. They would have ended fighting for the scraps, as you call it. At least now, they have a differentiating factor to them.

Microsoft has earned more money from android (by lawsuits) then it earned from WP8. Maybe it is trying to earn some more by embracing and extending.

And another approach would be like, Samsung Crapwiz will look the same even if it switches to tizen or stays android. Similar to that, the latest Symbian phones already resemble androids both in UI and UX. So changing the underlying software would cause minimal attention. Nokia would only profit from this more mature and capable technology.

It doesn't make sense however, as the hardware needed to run android well outstrips that needed to run windows phone well. It would make more sense to make a stripped down windows phone. So, i see no way this plan survives the acquisition.