Google’s Project Ara modular smartphone project is arriving soon, at least if you’re in Puerto Rico. At its Project Ara Module Developers Conference today, Google said that it plans to launch a pilot in Puerto Rico in the second half of this year, selling phone chassis and modules through local carrier partners, as well as through a fleet of small trucks.
I like this project. I have no idea if it’s going anywhere, but at least someone is having the guts to try and experiment with new and/or different ideas. That’s science, and that’s how we move forward.
Nope, that’s not science.
Well, maybe social science.
Exactly. It’s just trying something new.
Someone needs to look up its definition
I would have an interest in a Project Ara phone if can buy one configured without baseband (Wi-Fi only) and GPS modules. Using the right apps, one could possibly have a “secure” communication device.
Why don’t you buy a very small tablet?
A small tablet is to big (some “phones” are to big) and not the right form factor to make a call even if it was a 5″ tablet. All tablets have GPS in them also…
The iPod Touch is still available.
There are clearly 3, if not 4, different designs here. Which is actually the most recent and nearest to final design? Which images are renders and which are real photos of a real product?
Hint: look at the electromagnetic “pins”? Are they on the chassis, or are they on the module? Are they laid out in a square pattern or in a rectangular pattern of 12 pins? Or a rectangular pattern of 12 pins but only two of the pins “copper-y”?
Edited 2015-01-14 21:39 UTC
I do like the idea of a modular mobile phone (and why not a modular tablet too?), but I’m having a bit of a hard time believing this will be the same price in a like-for-like comparison with a normal one-piece phone.
If they can get it anywhere near close to the price of one-piece phones, then it might garner some interest, but otherwise it’ll simply not sell.