Stand by for the gPhone
Updated on 05 November 2007
As gadget lovers in Britain prepare to get their hands on the iPhone, America's techheads have already moved on to the next big thing - the gPhone.
The search engine giant, Google, recently became America's fifth-largest company. It has been launching new internet services almost every week, but this represents its first major venture into phone hardware.
The online rumour mill has been whipping itself into a froth about the gPhone for months.
In particular, Google filed a patent for a mobile payment system, which sent technology bloggers into a frenzy of speculation.
Today, the company unveils the first details of the phone publicly.
It won't comment ahead of the official announcement, but the consensus among newspapers and other well-informed sources is that Google won't unveil a device of its own.
Instead, it will just unveil some software, which can go on any phone.
Search has been very popular in the far east, particularly Japan - but in Europe and the US, they have never taken off. One of the difficulties is the sheer number of different devices on the market.
Google will give this to phone manufacturers for free, in the hope that they will be able to use it as a platform to build really useful mobile versions of their popular PC offerings - like search, video (via Youtube) or pictures.
Google will then make its money by charging for those services, or advertising against them.
The appeal of a really easy-to-use search facility which you could use from a handset is obvious. How helpful it would be to quickly look up the address of a restaurant where you'd arranged a hot date, but forgotten to note the address?
These services have been very popular in the far east, particularly Japan - but in Europe and the US, they have never taken off. One of the difficulties is the sheer number of different devices on the market.
Designing a service for the internet is easy - you have to make sure it works on Windows, Apple Macs, and two or three different browsers, and then your service is available to hundreds of millions of potential customers.
On a mobile phone, you have to re-design the phone to work on every different model of phone from every different manufacturer.
Microsoft and a company called Symbian have already tried to develop mobile software platforms to try and go some way to solving this problem.
As the paucity of compelling mobile services testifies, they have been less than entirely successful.
Will Google, as a company with no experience of developing an operating system, be able to do a better job?
