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It's not clear why Android would be any more interesting on a Netbook than Linux or Windows. Seriously, why?!? What can't I run on Linux or Windows that I can run on Android?

Because, frankly, Linux on netbooks currently sucks. Every cheap Asian brand uses it's own semi-proprietary Linux distribution that is a fork of Linpus, Xandros, or something else. There is no compatibility, no consistency, whatsoever.

That's fine for our tiny contingent of the population who can install/roll our own stuff and put Ubuntu or what the heck we want on it, but that's not going to work for the majority of users out there. So, if they can choose between Windows XP (which they know) or a private distribution that requires typing commands in a terminal, even for installing basic functionality, they will use Windows.

Another thing to keep in mind is, is a netbook a small computer or phone-ish gizmo? Linux on a netbook as a small computer is not really interesting for most consumers: Microsoft dropped the prices on XP for netbooks, hardware specs are going up, and people can install pirated/non-pirated Office on their netbook. Why would they not use the same system as their home computer? Whereas, if we see a netbook as an mobile gizmo (forgive me for using that word), it does not need to be functionally equivalent to a home PC. But it requires a consistent interface, an easy manner to get or purchase applications, and a single consistent API for game and application vendors to write applications for the platform. Think iPhone, but differently. Android is a good contender for providing a software layer for such products.

Consistency is also one of the reasons why I, even though I am a daily C++ user, prefer to see Android restricted to Dalvik-based languages (Java, Scala, etc.). Having multiple runtimes, widget toolkits, and package managers is not going to help anyone in that space.

Edited 2009-01-03 09:06 UTC

Google has become the Microsoft Monopoly and taking PRIVATE DATA from willing sheep to install their software.


Has anyone ever thought what Google is doing with YOUR personal data that you are being willing sheep and installing it.

What about Communist China, Google turned over server logs to the Communist Gov to track down people wanting to learn the truth about stuff however Google stepped in like 1984 and helped out Communist China...


NO thanks,

I will use MY Linux Distro of choice and NOT use Big Brother 2.0 on my stuff.

Are you even reading what you are saying before you force out unto the world? If you do not like the fact that Google are taking information to make your search queries in Google Search better, turn it off and shut up. If you do not like that Google takes info when using Google Desktop then that is no ones fault but yours, there is an option to accept or not accept this when first installing Google Desktop, if you made a mistake then go into the settings and turn it off.

Everyone criticize Google on how they handle privacy and are mostly unaware that the option is there to turn it off, instead they like yourself blabber on the internet like blind duck. For the record, your privacy only stays on the Google servers for a maximum of 3 or 6 months before they are completely deleted.

People like yourself should probably go ahead and start a damn religion on privacy or something.

China is not communist - it is state-capitalist. Obama is a capitalist too. Communism is not about authoritarianism - to say it is amounts to a deductive fallacy. Communism is about sharing - such as sharing source code in FOSS projects.

That begs the question: what exactly do you think Google should have done instead? Cease operating in China altogether? Or maybe stage a coup to overthrow the Chinese government?

To be fair, isn't the development phone ( http://code.google.com/android/dev-devices.html ) fully unlocked (both simlock and bootloader), and the relevant platform code now available open-source (though I seem to have misplaced the link)?



Not sure if it's an `actual platform', but Android sure is a hack of a lot more than just a Java app: they wrote a somewhat-complete `J'VM for use in resource-constrained environments (Dalvik), quite a feat!

That said, I feel Android's advantage is that it runs well in little resources. Netbooks will be much less resource-constrained, so I'm not so sure if Android would be so valuable there. It would be nice if applications would be portable between Android and whatever will run on those netbooks, though.