The eBook Test

Ah, the true colors are emerging. And they are not the happy hues of their logo!

Google open-source boss comes clean on Android

This is going to sound really cynical, but the only thing that really matters is how many of these we ship – how many Android phones.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

And:

Google to mobile industry: ‘F*ck you very much!’

Today, some of the biggest tech companies in the world, who thought they were Google’s closest partners, will begin to understand how, say, copyright holders have felt for some time now. For the first time, I suspect, they’ll be enjoying that recurring tingle of amazement and disbelief that (as Chris Castle explained here), Google would even try and pull off such a stunt. It took EMI Publishing six months to realise that Google had claimed digital rights to its songs, for example. But even if the decision to shaft its closest Android partners and biggest customers is an aberration, a one-off, a fling that Google will later regret – then the size of the parties involved means it’s going to have lasting repercussions.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

If you’re scratching your head wondering what the big deal is, then I suggest you do a quick news search on the number of stories containing the phrase ‘Google superphone’. Imagine how this looks to a punter. There are over a dozen Google phones. Only one is a real Google phone. Only one is a Google superphone. And you can only get that from Google. Won’t Sony Ericsson, Motorola, Acer and Samsung be feeling pleased today? Sony Ericsson’s X10 has a fairly identical spec (plus Sony branding) or better – but it’s not a ‘superphone’. And not the ‘real thing’.

Boldfaced emphasis added by me.

Thanks to Scoble, I saw the Google Nexus One launch via UStream.

That “superphone” appellation was calculated for maximum PR and positioning effect.

It wasn’t a shot against Apple — it was a shot to the head of all of Google’s sucker partners.

And you still want to trust Google with all of our books?

This company is quickly making the greed and hubris of Microsoft in its heyday look like cheap hucksterism.

Google has been very, very clever not to have one person — a Gates, a Jobs — as a face, as a single and recurring public spokesman. By not having one point of evil to focus our wrath on, we can’t get a handle on who is doing any of this. In that respect, they have learned well from every human bureaucracy in history. Anonymity disperses accountability.

Perhaps this is why there hasn’t been the expected flood of Android mini-tablets at CES. Word has been spreading around the alleyways of tech that partnering with Google is not a contract — it’s a suicide pact.

Previously here:

Now Google Can’t Be Trusted To Be Google!
I Don’t Like The Future Apple And Google Are Creating
The Authors Guild Leadership: 21st Century Chamberlains
Writer Ursula K. Le Guin Nails Authors Guild
And You Will Trust Google With All Of Our Books?
This Is Print Publishing’s Final Warning
Mark The Words Of Dave Winer
Sergey Brin: Also Absolutely Inexcusably Clueless
Google Thinks It Owns Our Books!
The First Step Towards A Google Book Search Solution
Google Always Had POD Planned
God Bless Marybeth Peters Of The Copyright Office!
Google Books Settlement Notes #2
Tomorrow: Google Books Settlement Deadline For Writers
Cooler Adds Google’s One Million ePubs Of Crap!
Google Books Settlement Notes #1
Google’s Great Writer Rip-Off
Google’s One Million eBooks Of Crap!
The Capitulation Of Print Publishing
Reject The Google Book Search Settlement!