Answer Guy Central

Remember back when Google launched the Nexus One SmartPhone and told us we should expect to see “their” phone on every major phone network? I commented at the time that the Google Phone looked like way less business change than Google wanted us to believe they were creating, and later told you that Google’s fragmentation of the Android Operating System might kill phones they were less attached to, like the Verizon Droid.

Now it looks like the entire Google Phone movement and creating the Nexus One was nothing more than a red herring to get carriers to develop Android devices.

Last week, Google basically abandoned the Nexus One. This morning, Google told Verizon customers to buy the upcoming Droid Incredible instead of waiting for the Nexus One.

Let’s examine:

Any phone running Android is a “Google Phone”. Google launched the Nexus One amidst much anticipation and with great fanfare, showed us a road map for a time when we’d be able to buy phones and take them to any carrier, telling us they were changing the entire phone business, selling the Nexus One using a business model that made no sense and charging incredibly high Early Termination Fees.

And three months later they want people to buy a non-Google-branded-or-distributed phone that is very much like the Nexus One from the one US carrier that could never use the Nexus One.

But Android is now huge.

Looks like Google never really meant to be in or change the phone business, other than to promote Android.

Google lied. It’s the kind of thing that happens every day in business, and as “don’t be evil” is no longer an official Google slogan there’s not even a joke to append here; Google has become the evil empire.

I’m off to use my Google Docs account now . . .

FOLLOWUP May 14 2010:

It’s official. The Nexus One is dead, and Google is shutting down their phone store

Ahh, Droid. We barely knew ye . . .

This week, Google introduced a version of Google Earth for Android SmartPhones. In large part, I don’t care; Google Earth is very cool, but compared to Google Maps it has limited real-world use.

And Google Earth requires version 2.1 of the Android operating system. Which means that it won’t run on the Droid, which has been available for just over three months.

Aside from being a Droid user and being in sour-grapes mode, maybe you think I shouldn’t care. You’d be wrong. Android is the fastest-growing operating system for SmartPhones, and Google is splintering the market for that operating system, which like Google Earth and the Nexus One is also a Google product.

Operating Systems don’t do very well when they get splintered this way. Just the introduction of viruses that act differently on one version than on another is all the proof you need of that. In fact, be cynical if you like about the Microsofts of the world being after your money, but the real reason you have to eventually upgrade to a new version of Windows  even if you think you don’t need it is because unless you do you’re open to all kinds of security threats.

I sometimes pick on Apple for the heavy-handed way they control the Macintosh OS and iPhone OS, but users of both sure do get consistent behavior, don’t they?

Google’s “Don’t Be Evil” slogan is feeling more and more like a line of . . . nothing. And as a business consultant I understand that they need to make (lots of) money. But to be as involved in the marketing of the Droid as Google was and after such a short period of time leave its users behind as they try to sell more Google-branded phones (the Droid is supported by Motorola, not Google) is just . . . bad. Evil. Wrong.

By the way: while Google Earth officially requires Android 2.1, People who use Android 2.01 can get it to work by going here.

You know . . . assuming there’s no virus.

Wow. And just when we had declared the Google Nexus One to represent no real business change.

While I’ll be standing by that statement for the most part, in not reading the contracts I missed one huge business change that folks who opt to take the Google / T-Mobile subsidy and get their Nexus One phones inexpensively could run up against:

Cancel early, and you owe not just T-Mobile, but also Google an early termination fee.

And it’s a fee that would make Verizon proud: $350 to Google, $200 to T-Mobile.

What ever happened to Google and their “Don’t Be Evil” motto? The little company that’s become more influential than any other has created the first fee to a phone manufacturer for early plan termination, which would be fine if in doing so they had eliminated your liability to the carrier. They’ve not. The Google Nexus One, as cool as it is, is feeling more and more like a giant rip-off.

When I bought my Droid from Verizon one of the things that made me jump when I did was the knowledge that Verizon was getting ready to raise their ETF from $175 to $350. Verizon’s caught grief from the FTC for this, but next to the $550 you might pay to back out of a Nexus One contract that’s looking pretty tame.

I’m all about business change. I was disappointed when I thought the Nexus One looked like no business change at all. Now, I wish that had been correct.

I don’t get to defend telcos very often. AT&T, Verizon, and the like make up rules, enforce government regulations in a way that hurts their customers, and generally are questionable corporate citizens so much that it’s hard to be on their side.

Today I am. Thanks, Google.

AT&T is all over Google for violating Net Neutrality. Umm . . . AGAIN.

Google’s approach on this particular business change is wrong. No, as pointed out in this article from the New York Times they aren’t obligated to do the same things that regulated telcos do. But in holding themselves out as poster children for “don’t be evil” (this is an actual Google slogan, in case you weren’t aware), they’ve taken on an even more important position.

Very bad move, Google.