Google’s groundbreaking model for selling Android phones from a single Web site is about to become history.
Google has just announced it’s pulling the plug on its Nexus One Android Web store. The Nexus One Web store, launched in conjunction with the Nexus One device in January, was designed to give users a one-stop virtual shop to pick up the latest and greatest Android phones. It was meant to mark the start of a new kind of distribution model — one where you base your decisions on devices rather than on carriers.
An image on the Android Dveloper site (click on “Dev Phones”) is apparently the HTC-made successor to the Android Dev Phone 1, and is already in the hands of select Google employees.
Back in November Michael Arrington of TechCrunch reported we would see a super-powered, Google-branded phone in early 2010. Arrington’s reports appear to be getting some serious confirmation as Google employees are tweeting they’re testing new devices running Android 2.1.
LOADING Google Mail on to a phone can be like forcing toothpaste back into the tube. Both tasks are time consuming, frustrating and ultimately pointless.
That is unless you are using Australia’s second Google phone, the HTC Magic. Arriving in stores this week, it’s a much slicker handset than its predecessor, with a reactive touchscreen, a slim profile with no keyboard-related bulk, and an attractive, curved exterior that will slip unobtrusively into a pocket.
New vendors are lining up to deliver an Android phone in 2009, while Google is planning an update to the software — and gave around 18,000 of the first-generation phones to its staff as a Christmas present. Google gave 85 percent of its staff (around 18,000 people according to reports) customized, unlocked versions of the HTC Dream, the first commercial Android handset, which is sold by T-Mobile as the G1.
