AndroidGuys

We've Moved!

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 05:20:20 PST

For those of you who haven't noticed yet, AndroidGuys has moved! Earlier this week, we hopped off of Blogger and moved over to our own server. All of your favorite articles are over there, but they look/feel a whole lot better!

Please make sure to update your bookmarks and feeds.

New address: http://www.androidguys.com
New subscription feed: http://androidguys.com/?feed=rss2

It Might Get Dusty

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 13:00:55 PST

Alright, so we decided to throw caution to the wind and make the switch to the new server right in the middle of our Tuesday lunch. So, start updating your bookmarks now. Going forward, you'll no longer need to come to our .blogspot address. Get your bookmarks and feeds set up for the site over at http://androidguys.com and http://androidguys.net! We'll continue to post mirrors of the articles for the next few days before doing a complete redirect. See you over there! Stop and tell us what you think in this article.

34 Weeks of OHA: #9

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:53 PST

Open Handset Alliance Member Profiles (Week #9 - HTC Corporation)
For 34 weeks, each Tuesday, Jordan from fandroid.net will be joining us to offer a profile of each of the 34 members of the Open Handset Alliance.

Company Name: HTC Corporation

How the OHA site classifies them: Handset Manufacturer

What the OHA site says about them: Our mission is to organize all the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.

What they do: Build pretty badass handsets.

I own an HTC S621 (the Rogers-specific version of the S620, aka T-Mobile Dash, aka Excalibur (hell yeah, Excalibur; kneel before me, peon.) Honestly, I love it. It's slim, pretty to look at--I still think it's the prettiest full-QWERTY candybar I've seen. The rubberized plastic gives it a pleasant smoothness in the hand, and nearly eliminates the creak of plastic-against-plastic that cheapens the feel of many handsets. The keys are nicely restistant and easy-to-use; despite the realtively small size thumb-typing is easy. It's only a 200mhz processor, but feels peppy enough for most apps. And, I use the hell out of it; I browse my feeds, I read eBooks, I listen to my music and podcasts, I receive both work and personal emails, I keep lists, etc., etc., etc. I also make phone calls – not just over the conventional cellular connection but also using VOIP over the WiFi.

It's not perfect. The JOGGR touchpad slidy thing is just silly. The battery life is not great, which is not helped by the Direct-Push email sucking juice. It doesn't have a touchscreen, which I know is not the norm for this form factor but is still is on my wish list. The EDGE data connection is poky. The 1.3 megapixel camera gives a slightly purpleish hue to everything. Oh, and there's the Windows Mobile part... I'll get into that in a bit.

In the end, I'm proud to lay this thing down along side my friend's Motorola Q or the Blackberries that are so common in the corporate environment in which I swim daily. People admire it, ask to hold it, make nice comments. And then the inevitable comes out: “Who is HTC? Never heard of 'em.”

Unfortunately, in the electronics business the unheard-of brand carries a stigma, that of the cheap-knockoff, Made in China (which these days is actually a sign of quality), Radio-Shack no-name crap.

So who is HTC?

The High Tech Computer Corporation of Taiwan, founded in 1997, was originally in the market of building stuff for other people: T-Mobile, Verizon, Dell, HP. A lot of the folks I work with don't realize that the Palm Treo 650s they were still using until just a few months ago were built by HTC. Recent indications are that Palm is actually going back to HTC for some manufacturing, and Engadget Mobile has rumoured that the new Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1 that caused so much stir at the World Mobile Congress (and which, as well as being pretty-as-hell, has a feature list that reads like smartphone version of a Penthouse letter) is an HTC design. HTC are ODM leaders.

It was the decision to produce HTC-branded Windows Mobile handsets, however, that brought the company out into the open. It was a smart choice for both Microsoft and HTC: HTC got Microsoft and the recognizeable Windows brand behind them, and Micrsoft got probably the best smartphone maker on the planet.

Truthfully, Windows Mobile sucks. In my experience, it's buggy, ugly, and hard to get around in. At least once a week I have to do a hard reset on my phone 'cause something's locked hard. There are a couple of good points...okay, not a couple, one: there are plenty of folks out there building apps for Windows Mobile, so its relatively easy to find programs to do almost anything I want (an SSH client, eBook reader, a better media player). But, basically, Windows Mobile is ass. Really.

It's a good thing that the elegance of the HTC hardware is there to save the day.
To an unsuspecting public, however, the Windows name is a selling point, and that has served HTC well, to the tune of $3.7 billion in revenue in 2007. The HTC touch, which saw the company's TouchFlo interface apply a serious coat of paint to the Windows-Mobile-interface-of-the-devil, has sold 2 million units, which ain't too bad at all.
What they bring to OHA and Android: As I said above, these guys are likely the best makers of smartphones in the world. The problem is Windows Mobile. If we take WM out of the mix, and replace it with a sexy, open, LINUX-based mobile OS, the results just may be brilliant.
The buzz is that HTC will produce 2 or 3 Android phones in 2008. Let's conjecture that we'll see a candybar full-QWERTY sans touchscreen (a la my S621), a primarily-touchscreen-interface job with a small form factor (like the Touch), and a slide-out or clamshell full-QWERTY + touchscreen ultra-handset (The Kaiser, the XPERIA X1).

Are you telling me that thought doesn't get you excited?

zzzPhone To Run Android?

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:54 PST

I have to admit up front that I had never heard of the zzzPhone prior to this morning, but they are preparing to release a handset that my be running Google's Android in the near future. You can read the complete article here on gearlog.com. The author is expecting his phone to arrive soon, but it will be running a proprietary OS, not Android. Be sure to check out the email the company sent to it's customers pending the handsets release. It's good for a chuckle. Here's a direct quote from the email.

Please understand that most of the initial orders were placed during the Chinese New Year Holiday, which also happened to coincide with one of the worst nation-wide snowstorms in history. (people dying, power outages, ect.)

Yeah, I'm thinking that guy should be fired, or seriously reprimanded for making light of such a tragedy. Sheesh. Stay tuned to Android Guys or news on the ZZZPhone and all things Android.

Google Gears Is Here!

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:54 PST

If you own a Windows Mobile 5 or 6 device you can now try out Google Gears. What is Google Gears? Well, its an add on for your browser that allows you to launch some web based applications while your device is offline. These apps have to be written to take advantage of Gears, but the idea seems very promising. Imagine being able to check your bank account balances with or without a connection to the internet. How soon before we see a version for other platforms such as RIM, Symbian and Apple's iPhone? Stay tuned for an update on Gears once we've had a chance to install it and try a few of the apps available for it.

How The RAZR Cut Motorola

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:55 PST

Not long ago Motorola dominated the US and world handset markets. The name alone seemed synonomous with cell phones and pagers, and even as a child I have fond memories of playing cops and robbers with my Motorola "walkie talkies". Anybody else remember those things? Now, Nokia dominates market share worldwide, and Samsung is a distant number 2. So what happened to the once mighty Motorola? I think their most recent struggles can be summed up by one word, albeit a misspelled one: RAZR. When the Motorola RAZR debuted in 2004 it was among the hottest properties in any industry. The design was unlike anything we'd seen before in a cell phone. Instead of the bulky styles we had all become accustomed to, the RAZR introduced a sleek design that actually looked sci-fi and cool. It was something you wanted to be seen carrying. The introductory price was $599 to $699 with no contract and it quickly became the must have item of the year. Motorola was back on top, but this success would be short lived.

Motorola made the huge mistake of devaluing the hot property that was the Moto RAZR. They did this in a couple of ways. It was selling extremely well, but they wanted to cash in by getting this phone into the hands of more people. Obviously for this to happen the price had to come down, but in order to lower the price Motorola had to first find a way to decrease production costs. Lower production costs did lead to a cheaper RAZR, but it also resulted in more defective units being sold. Some will have you believe that because the RAZR sold so well it stands to reason that there would be more defects reported. While this does hold some merit, I sold this phone for several years and to be honest it was my most troublesome, and most returned handset in my inventory. Motorola should have taken a cue from Nokia and the way it handles it's N Series line of phones. You will not find a Nokia N Series sold for peanuts, and having owned 4 different models I can say with some level authority that they are very well put together units.

Other than being made by Motorola can you guess what these handsets have in common? PEBL. KRZR. ROKR. RIZR. SLVR. W490. They all share striking design similarities to the RAZR. The W490 with it's strange name bears the most resemblance to the once iconic RAZR, and coming in at $19.99 with a 2 year contract it is priced for the masses. If you want to make sure your once hot item becomes just another cell phone on the shelf, take bits and pieces of it and use them in your other line of phones over and over again! Such a lack of originality on Motorola's part has had more to do with them sinking than anything their competitors have done. Is it too late for Motorola to regain the prominence it enjoyed years ago? Things aren't looking very good, but as a member of the OHA who knows? Stranger things have happened.

FCC Auction Winner Announcement Due Soon?

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 13:44:09 PST

The 700MHz auction is 5 weeks old now and starting to show signs of wrapping up. Today marked the 140th round as last Friday the FCC ramped up to 8 rounds per day. So it's still going hot and heavy right? Wrong. Today companies bid on only 17 licenses. That's out of 1,089 licenses total.

So let's assume there comes a round this week where nobody bids a thing. Then what? Auction over. It's as simple as that. According to RCR Wireless News, within about 10 days of ending, the FCC will likely announce the winner(s) of each block.

T-Mobile Snubs Nokia's Ovi

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 10:30:58 PST

In August of last year, Nokia announced a new service initiative called Ovi. Through this branding and portal, Nokia made plans to offer games, music, mapping, GPS and other services to their phone users. This move would skip right past the network operators who really enjoy cashing checks each month based on those exact services. You see, companies like Verizon and AT&T love to force users to go through them to get access to internet, news, music, and whatever other services they can bottleneck you into. It was only a matter of time before the carriers started fighting back.

Word is spreading that T-Mobile is dumping all of the Nokia handsets with Ovi software services. It's not known whether it specifically will affect T-Mobile Germany or if the move is part of a larger worldwide initiative. Not only are they dropping Ovi phones, but it's also being reported that they are offering 10 Nokia handsets in all as opposed to the 15 they offered a month ago.

Source: WirtschaftsWoche magazine.

Sprint Quietly Offering $89.99 Unlimited Plan

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 06:38:13 PST

With everyone talking about the $99 unlimited plans being offered by the 4 major carriers, Sprint has one-upped the competition. For $10 less than the competition, you can get unlimited voice, messaging, and push to talk use from the #3 carrier. Although it doesn't offer any data use or other goodies such as Sprint TV or GPS navigation, it still bests T-Mobile's unlimited talk/text plan.

Will any of the other carriers respond? Do they even need to? T-Mobile is picking up customers left and right where Sprint seems to be losing them at a pretty modest clip.

Intel 'Atom' Likely to Power Android Phones

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 05:27:56 PST

Going by the codename 'Menlow' for quite some time, Intel has pulled the curtain back on what will now be known as the Centrino Atom. These processors will use the Core 2 Duo instruction set and get clock speeds up to 1.8GHz! The processors, using an architecture designed for efficiency, are geared for Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) and possibly high-end cellular devices. How do we know that they'll be used for Android phones? Well, we don't for sure. We're just being hypothetical today. Intel is one of the founding members of the Open Handset Alliance. Besides that, we're not aware of any other mobile chip sets being worked on by them.

"This small wonder is a fundamental new shift in design, small yet powerful enough to enable a big Internet experience on these new devices. We believe it will unleash new innovation across the industry." -Intel chief sales and marketing officer Sean Maloney.

Sprint to have WiMAX Phones in 2008

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 10:20:36 PST

New CEO, Dan Hesse mentioned yesterday that later this year Sprint will introduce dual-mode CDMA/WiMAX devices. This is a good thing for them as they need to do what they can to be the first company dropping 4G on us. Another great headline in a short span of days for the third ranked company after announcing their Simply Unlimited plan earlier this week. If they end up signing a slew of new customers with their rate plan, they'll need to build up the network to support it and WiMAX sure would help!

Kind of ironic to think about #3 doing so poorly and thinking ahead to 4G technology while company #4 keeps reporting better numbers all the time and they have yet to launch their 3G stuff.

Apple to Keep iPhone Restricted After All?

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 09:59:03 PST

With the SDK being released next week, many fanboys and wanna-be developers are expecting the doors to blow wide open and enter a world of possibilities. A world full of mashups, new apps, and new ways of harnessing the technology within the device. How awesome things will be a year from now when people can freely create programs for their phones, and making money along the way! Not so fast.

Word is coming to us that next week's SDK will only be an alpha version with rather severe limitations attached. Most surprising is that Apple’s intention is to formally approve or deny all software releases for the device based off of the SDK. Also, there will be restrictions that prohibit hardware add-ons and accessories. This shuts the door on keyboards and other traditional devices. It's also mentioned that those who jailbreak their phones and develop for the device might even be an advantage over those using the official SDK. According to iLounge, the beta version of the SDK will bow in June, in time for the WWDC.

Changes to AndroidGuys

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 13:29:38 PST

Attention loyal readers and subscribers! AndroidGuys will be switching servers next week and will be moving off of Blogger. Get ready to update your bookmarks. AndroidGuys.com and AndroidGuys.blogspot.com will be forwarding to our new location soon. Keep a close eye on the site as we'll give the official launch date soon!

Apple COO: "Apple Not Married to Single Carrier Model"

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 10:57:09 PST

In somewhat related news, Apple's Chief Operating Office, Tim Cook, said that the single exclusive-carrier model is not something that Apple is married to. That's news to us. How else would you explain selling a phone at full, non-subsidized price to one carrier per country?

Somehow we get the feeling they don't care a bit about people jailbreaking the iPhone either. At some point someone paid full price for that thing. AT&T would be the company taking the hit if/when the user jumps ship to use the phone on another network.

New Video of Android Shows Up

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 06:46:40 PST

Things are moving along swimmingly in the land of Android (Landroid?) and there's new stuff to prove it. BBC's Darren Waters was able to get a first hand experience with the man himself, Andy Rubin himself. He was able to get some video for everyone to see. This incarnation of Android was running on some unknown 3G prototype with a touchscreen.

Check out the bottom, there's a track ball down there! Web browsing looks very nice and has an intuitive feel which should be easy to learn for most folks. Andy also teases us with a mobile version of their 'Street View' mapping. You know the one, panning back and forth from eye level. Considering this hardware was only 300MHz, we're stoked at just how smoothly it ought to run when it hits the newest hardware.

Sprint Answers The Bell

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:55 PST

Sprint has upped the ante in the bidding wars for your cellular business. A week after Verizon and T-Mobile matched their offering for unlimited rate plans, and in T-Mobile's case bested it by offering text as part of the package for $99, Sprint counters by including everything but the kitchen sink.

They call it "Simply Everything," which includes Voice, Data, Text, Email, Sprint TV, Sprint Music, GPS navigation, Direct Connect, and Group Connect. A key to the store will also be given to the first 500 customers that sign up. After hemorrhaging another 1.2 million customers the company is pulling out all of the stops in an effort to slow down the bleeding. Now if they could only address their customer service issues. You can check out a complete article here courtesy of Kansas City.com

T-Mobile Ends 2007 On A High Note

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:55 PST

T-Mobile reports that it added more than 951,000 new net customers in the 4th quarter of 2007, which brings their total customer base up to 28.7 million. You can read the complete article here on Mobile Tech News.

The company also reported a decrease in churn coming in at 1.8% for the 4th quarter, which is down from 2.1% for the 4th quarter of 2006. T-Mobile's CEO Robert Dotson attributes the company's recent successes to innovations such as My Faves, Flex Pay, and it's @Home Services. Good for you T-Mobile!

What's Under The Hood of Google's Android?

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 16:53:54 PST

For all of you "techie types" here's a pretty good article on what's under the hood of Google's Android. This comes courtesy of PC World. It's an interesting read if you're into developing and programming. The rest of us will wait for the actual phones. Enjoy!

Capitol Hill Working for Us Today

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 12:56:12 PST

Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-MA), chairman of the House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet has started a hearing today that will look to rid us of 2-year contracts for handsets that do not have to be subsidized. Are you listening iPhone owners? Your full price phones could potentially save you money and headaches down the road. And why shouldn't it? The carriers have no money to make up if you are paying full ticket. Would definitely be worth the $100-$150 you'd pay up front, wouldn't you agree?

The bill would require wireless carriers to offer consumers the ability to purchase subsidy-free wireless equipment without a long-term service plan at a price no higher than comparable plans offered with subsidized equipment. The bill would also require carriers to prorate early termination fees to ensure that the carrier recovers the cost of the subsidy, but no more.

Windows Mobile Virus Alert

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 09:19:54 PST

Since there are no true Android phones running around yet, we figured that a bulk of our audience is using some other form of smart phone. Here's a little something you Windows Mobile users might want to be wary of. A trojan virus (WinCE/InfoJack) is currently making its rounds which sends the infected device’s serial number, operating system and other information to the author of the trojan. McAfee has been able to trace the program back to a web site whose maintainer claims it was designed to track what type of devices people are using to run applications. We smell something fishy. Have a look at some of the things this app is doing.

Installing as an autorun program on the memory card
Installing itself to the phone when an infected memory card is inserted
Protecting itself from deletion, copying itself back to disk
Replaces the browser’s home page
Allows unsigned applications to install without warning

Respect knuckles to TechBlog for this one

iPhone SDK Delayed?

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:56 PST

Much like the update to the Google Android SDK, the iPhone's SDK seems headed for a similar fate with delays pushing the release beyond the end of February as previously announced. Based on this article on Guardian.com the issue appears to be security. The last thing Apple needs is a bunch of applications released that make it easier for hackers to gain access to your iPhone data.

Google Laying Cable

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 13:18:52 PST

Along with 5 other companies, Google will be helping to put down 6,200 miles of cable linking the US to Japan. At a cost of $300M, the project will begin immediately. Dubbed The Unity cable, it will connect Los Angeles and other sites on the US West Coast to Chikura, which will then be connected to other cable systems that serve other Asian countries.

Consumers Will Emerge Victorious in War of Providers

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 12:09:38 PST

It's been said before that 2008 will go down as the year of the mobile device. Cell phones are getting smarter every generation and the rate of adoption is skyrocketing. Many of the smart phone buyers will probably tell you that they never pictured themselves buying one. Why is this happening? What has spurred this trend? One can't really point the finger at one particular reason as it's a combination of many things happening in the industry.

Everyone knows that customer satisfaction is what drives people to buy or use certain products and services. Now, more than ever, these satisfaction rates are climbing. There are three things that have happened over the last year within the cellular industry that have started changing things forever. Commitment to being open, pro-rated early termination fees, and the price war of 2008 are going to be looked at as the events responsible for the sea-change.

Lately each company seems to be mimicking the next, afraid to get left behind. After all, if 3 out of 4 companies are providing something you're not, then your customers will be looking to go elsewhere. Taking a look at what Sprint did two weeks ago with their announcement of the $119 unlimited plan. While I am not an expert in the field, I can still add a few things up. Sprint was essentially forced to do something dramatic to keep from hemorrhaging customers. Maybe by dropping their prices and offering something so unique, people will forget their less than stellar customer service.

Sadly, that idea will never come to fruition as Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile all announced similar, if not better deals within a week. My thought is that Verizon and AT&T made the plan announcements just because they'd rather not be beat at a game they are currently winning. T-Mobile is in no position to jump Sprint anytime soon if things continued at current pace so maybe that is why they were so aggressive in their plans to offer unlimited calling and texting for $99 a month.

How will Sprint combat these other plans? The latest rumor is that they are considering a $60 unlimited calling plan. This could not come at a better time as early termination fees are set to be prorated if they are not already. Customers will be able to switch carriers without that $200 hefty cancellation cost. The burden to retain customers gets heavier every day.

By offering an open network, users have the capability of switching to other carriers without being forced to buy a new phone. On top of that, they don't have to wait until their 2 year contract is up. It's not out of the realm of possibility that you could be switching providers every few months. That is at least, until the dust settles a little bit.

Techfaith Wireless To Develop Google Handset

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:56 PST

Coming off of a record 4th quarter for earnings, the Chinese handset manufacturer announces it will produce a smartphone using Google's Android platform in the coming year. You can check out the complete article here on Forbes. Techfaith specializes in "dual mode" smartphones. The bad news is that originality isn't exactly their strongest suit, as they blatantly rip off designs of other well known handsets. You can check out some screens here courtesy of Engadget.

34 Weeks of OHA: #8

chewie77@gmail.com (AndroidGuys.com) — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:24:56 PST

Open Handset Alliance Member Profiles (Week #8 - Google)
For 34 weeks, each Tuesday, Jordan from fandroid.net will be joining us to offer a profile of each of the 34 members of the Open Handset Alliance.

Company Name: GoogleHow the OHA site classifies them: Software Company.
What the OHA site says about them: Our mission is to organize all the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.

What they do: Cackle gleefully as the money comes rolling in. The Wikipedia entry doesn't quite seem to do it justice:

“Google is an American public corporation, earning revenue from online and mobile advertising related to its Internet search, web-based e-mail, online mapping, office productivity, social networking, and video sharing as well as selling advertising-free versions of the same technologies.”

Kind of an inadequate description, because the thing about Google is this: it makes a sh!tton of money, and is worth an insane amount. Current Market Cap? According to Yahoo, $159 billion dollars. This site claims that $160 billion dollar bills stacked on top of one another would be 55,333,200 feet high, which wouldn't quite get you to the moon or anything but is still a whole lot of one dollar bills.

Most of this money comes from ads attached to search results. Google does other things, some well, some not so well: Gmail, Google Reader, Google Docs, etc., etc. It's the search stuff that made Google what it is, however – 75% + market share worldwide, such a dominant position that were Microsoft to acquire Yahoo its combined market share wouldn't even be a third of what Google has.

Everything else Google does can be seen as an attempt to add other profitable ad platforms to their core search functionality. Their in-browser email, document editing, RSS feed reader, chat, etc., are not only cool bits of cloud computing produced by an engineer-centric corporation, they also offer Google the opportunity to build a profile around you and more effectively target ads.
What they bring to OHA and Android: Well, they own the thing.

They bring clout, the will to innovate, and a suite of web-based apps that, in many cases, seem custom fit for the mobile platform.

The more interesting question is: why are they producing Android? The easy answer is: “For the potential ad-revenue, of course.” But they already have mobile apps that are widely used, why go to all the trouble of doing the actual OS, an area they have never attempted to infiltrate before?

Well, there is this concept that it gives them more hooks into the user. If they own the OS they can access the SMS subsystem, the GPS subsystem, the Contacts subsystem, and the Browser subsystem, so that when you text message a friend asking where the two of you should go for lunch they know that you have 5 pizza places in your contacts and are currently standing at the corner of 5th and 134th, so that when you go online to try and find a place to eat they can offer a custom answer -- Pagliacci's Pizza is two blocks away and a favourite of yours -- and thereby get a few bucks from the Pizza Place owner for their trouble. Of course, the user can opt-out if they so choose; its an option Google must offer if they want to avoif doing evil. Check out these quotes a USA Today article from a few weeks back, in which they interview Cole Brodman, T-Mobile's chief development officer:

By combining "unique information about consumers from the Web," he says, with "other information" from mobile devices, such as location, "Google believes search responses can be much more targeted for Google, and that the value they can bring back to advertisers can be quite a bit higher." ...Android won't favor Google over Yahoo and other search-engine rivals. [Brodman] says consumers also can "opt out" of Google's "cookies," used to track their movements on the Web.

In my heart of hearts, however, I don't really believe its all revenue motivated. Google is an engineer's company. It's a bunch of folks rather like me: coders, hackers; they're just a lot smarter and a lot better paid. Google's folks are, in the end, into cool-ass tech. The ad stuff is placed on top to keep the money flowing, but many of these guys come up with this stuff just 'cause its a cool idea. Android as we know it, the open source OS, running on Linux, rocking its own Java virtual machine, promising to free up phones everywhere, is the product of a bunch of Google geeks sharing the cool toy they built.

But then, I'm a Google apologist, which is why I write these articles. If you feel so inclined, just ignore my hippy-happy, love-and-clean-code, Richard-Stallman rantings, and go ahead persisting in the belief that it's all motivated by money.

I feel sorry for you, you sad, cynical person.