Is The Google Phone A Sham? 7 Reasons Why

by Jason Wilk on September 24, 2008

Hyped to be the most open platforms for a mobile phone we have seen yet, there certainly seems to be many ‘closed’ restrictions. Here is a quick outline.

  • Instand Messaging/ Voip
    • As Om point’s out, Google GTalk will launch as the default IM client, but no VoIP will be supported through it. TMoblie will allow third party VoIP apps to work over Wi-Fi, but no 3G support
  • Marketplace
    • Google will be approving applications to the the Android Marketplace much the same as Apple has done with the ‘Guilty Until Proven Innocent’ approach.
  • Tethering:
    • TMobile will not be allowing Tethering for computers to connect and go online.
  • Bandwidth:
    • Although TMobile claims that for $25 a month, you will get the unlimited data plan ($35 for unlimited text), they will slow down your data sessions to 50 kbps after 1GB of use.
  • 3G Coverage
    • 3G connectivity will only be available for certain cities for the rollout. Check out their coverage map here.
  • Design
    • The phone design supposedly not changed in 2.5 years. What does that say about the ability for handsets to adapt to the OS?
  • Email
    • No exchange support. Must have a gmail account to even activate the phone.

Made tiny from: TechCrunch, GigaOm, TFobile

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  • CGlue
    Like I said WACK!
  • James Salamone
    Well I'm done being pumped up by Google about this phone and it's not even out yet.....Why you ask???

    Well in the fine print on its G1 site: "If your total data usage in any billing cycle is more than 1GB, your data throughput for the remainder of that cycle may be reduced to 50 kbps or less." BUT IT GET WORSE!! They can even stop your plan for good..just because I got a cool new phone and want to be a power user!!

    Let me break it down: 50 kilobits per second is roughly 6 kilobytes per second -- about the speed of the dialup modem

    One gigabyte is about how much it takes to download the equivalent of a few albums, a decent quality movie, and a decent quality TV episode -- not much. Add to that whatever email, Web browsing, file downloading, app downloading, and whatever else you'll be doing, and it wouldn't be far-fetched for the power users that Google is courting to hit that 1 gigabyte cap -- 34 MB a day -- on a regular basis.

    In closing I just want to remind you AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint -- offer a more liberal cap: 5 gigabytes

    I LOVE YOU GOOGLE DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS!!...before it's to late
  • jason
    You're right James. Is it Google's fault or are they too falling victim to the Carriers? We'll I'll tell you it's the carriers. The internet was created as an entirely open enviornment and it was a brand new innovation. Telecom has been around forever and they are not going to budge for anyone. This is a scary place especially to be a startup because when push comes to shove, no carrier is going to throw you on a deck.
  • Carrie Jones
    This phone is such a fucking sham. How long will it be before TMobile has to pay Paris Hilton 2 million dollars to say this is the phone she uses over the iPhone? My guess is a couple weeks.
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