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Originally Posted by taosaur
That fact becomes quite clear as your post goes on. We're all speculating here, and I by no means have a deep, code-based understanding of the Android platform, but your concerns are largely groundless. While it is in a dev's interest to keep their apps as broadly compatible as possible, Android has not forked so far that "different versions" are required, except insofar as a device with an out-of-date OS may have to run an older version of a given app. There are some Honeycomb-specific apps, but that has more to do with hardware than software. The NC will never have Honeycomb (and the stock OS is Froyo, btw, not Gingerbread) because Google has strict hardware requirements for licensing Honeycomb, permitting the development of apps that rely on, for instance, a dual-core processor.
Even Amazon can only "go its own way" to a certain extent. Their app market still has to remain compatible with the Android products that are already using it, and if they had the development resources to maintain and update a truly proprietary OS, they wouldn't be building on Android in the first place. From the sound of things, they are working to integrate their core apps and services into their OS at the same level that Google has integrated their services into licensed Android products. Aside from perhaps making more work for anyone wanting to root the device and run Google services, that forking is trivial in terms of app compatibility.
Devices running 1.x are either quite old, or were never intended to be compatible with an app market, and aren't a concern in terms of fragmentation. Lots of manufacturers use Android because it's free and ready made, but their devices are not actually part of the ecosystem, and thus of no concern to either app developers or Google.
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You see no technical reason why the Google and Amazon Android products should not be compatible. I bow to your superior technical expertise on that issue. However, looking at things from a business POV, I am considerably less sanguine that Google and Amazon are going to live in perfect harmony. I see two competing ecosystems, with considerable incentive to put up walls. I think it quite likely that Amazon will sign exclusivity deals for certain games and apps. I think the Amazon market will be far more closely curated than the anything-goes Google Market, with the result that apps will be approved for the GM athat will not be approved for he Amazon app store. All this will create headaches-and opportunies- for mobile developers, who may forego these uncertainties and opt for the Ios market.
However, both Android ecosystems could still flourish. As to which will do better, it will be the one that offers the best buying and user experience. I would bet on Amazon, its more "closed" ecosystem, nothwithstanding.