$240 Velocity Micro 8" tab comes with Amazon's appstore as default market.

[OtterBooks]

Amazon link
Endgadget link

I found the Amazon-oriented part interesting. Doubtful they made that decision without Amazon's consultation. Sorry if this is old news. What does this say about Amazon's allegedly imminent, allegedly "locked-down" device? If anything.

OS courtesy of Google. Want some apps? Here's Amazon for ya.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by OtterBooks

Amazon link
Endgadget link

I found the Amazon-oriented part interesting. Doubtful they made that decision without Amazon's consultation. Sorry if this is old news. What does this say about Amazon's allegedly imminent, allegedly "locked-down" device? If anything.

It's purely a financial move. Velocity was too cheap to pay the licenses to Google for use of the Google Market. Velocity devices have never used the Android market, and is one of the biggest complaints about the Cruz tablets. Velocity had until now the "Cruz Market", which blew chunks as it had very few apps. Even extremely popular ones like Angry Birds weren't available. I'd say this cost Velocity nothing, or at least significantly less than if they licensed from google.

[kjk]

The real test will be if: a) Amazon forks Android, and b) invites companies like Velocity to come on board.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by kjk

The real test will be if: a) Amazon forks Android, and b) invites companies like Velocity to come on board.

No need to fork. Why waste the money on R&D and development, when all you have to do is talk companies into using your app store on their devices.

[kjk]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

No need to fork. Why waste the money on R&D and development, when all you have to do is talk companies into using your app store on their devices.

I think the only reason to fork would be to control their own destiny/release schedules, and not be having to wait for Google to do so. It also takes away the frustration users may have if Amazon doesn't keep up with Google's release schedule.

I guess it really depends on what Amazon's intentions are in the future. Having their own platform, completely under their control, may have some benefit.

[=X=]

Originally Posted by kjk

The real test will be if: a) Amazon forks Android, and b) invites companies like Velocity to come on board.

That won't happen until they start getting exclusive apps on their appstore. However from what I've read dealing with Apple is a stroll in the park vs dealing with Amazon.

Also remember Android phone apps are the same apps for the tablets developing for the Android market you have access to the world instantly and you have access to 100+ Million phones/tablets.

Already devs complain about supporting different hardware on Android but developing for the Amazon Appstore is not much extra work since the targets are the same. What happens if Amazon forks? Now devs really have to support another platform since Ktabs will be frozen on 2.2 and the rest of the android community advances to Ice cream. Amazon has a lot of work in front of them and I don't think they realize how hard it is to keep a parallel fork. Not only does Amazon have to roll Google's code back into their own, if they want to keep compatibility, they also have to skin their code.

In a year it will be a bigger mess.

=X=

[OtterBooks]

I think it's gonna be fun watching all this stuff play out over the next few months.

[Hellmark]

Also, what advantage would there be to forking? Yeah, they get control, but they also get the headaches, plus the additional ones X mentioned. Not only that, but there isn't really any incentive. What would they need to have control over their own fork, when they can merely get other companies on board to use the software they already have? I mean, Amazon does it already. Quite a few phones ship with Amazon's MP3 app preinstalled. No extra dev costs, but increase of sales because people will be using things they already have on their phones.

[=X=]

Originally Posted by OtterBooks

I think it's gonna be fun watching all this stuff play out over the next few months.

Well the nice thing is it will focus more competition and that is always good.

[stonetools]

Originally Posted by =X=

That won't happen until they start getting exclusive apps on their appstore. However from what I've read dealing with Apple is a stroll in the park vs dealing with Amazon.

Also remember Android phone apps are the same apps for the tablets developing for the Android market you have access to the world instantly and you have access to 100+ Million phones/tablets.

Already devs complain about supporting different hardware on Android but developing for the Amazon Appstore is not much extra work since the targets are the same. What happens if Amazon forks? Now devs really have to support another platform since Ktabs will be frozen on 2.2 and the rest of the android community advances to Ice cream. Amazon has a lot of work in front of them and I don't think they realize how hard it is to keep a parallel fork. Not only does Amazon have to roll Google's code back into their own, if they want to keep compatibility, they also have to skin their code.

In a year it will be a bigger mess.

=X=

Don't worry. On another thread I was assured by the Android cognoscenti that Amazon forking Android wouldn't result in incompatability problems and that Android devs had everything under control. Taosaur:

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.

When techies disagee, what are non-techies to think?

[kjk]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

. What would they need to have control over their own fork, when they can merely get other companies on board to use the software they already have?

Maybe they just don't want to be at a disadvantage compared to manufacturers that Google favors-manufacturers who, unlike Amazon, don't "align to their standard" by including stuff like the Google App Store.

Lead device concept: Give early access to the software to partners who build and distribute devices to our specification (ie, Motorola and Verizon). They get a non-contractual time to market advantage and in return they align to our standard.

But it's all speculation of course-for all we know Amazon may end up providing a vanilla Android install-Bezos is nothing if not adaptable.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Don't worry. On another thread I was assured by the Android cognoscenti that Amazon forking Android wouldn't result in incompatability problems and that Android devs had everything under control. Taosaur:

When techies disagee, what are non-techies to think?

Eh, I have to disagree. Currently we've not seen a true and full fork of Android, so of course we've not run into mass app incompatibility. There still have been apps with incompatibility issues on a smaller scale. Its quite frequent to see comments on the Android Market of this app not working with that device. With the rate that Android is moving, if a fork is done, large amounts of work will need to be done to keep things compatible. I mean, Android is not quite 3 years old yet (Almost 4, if you count the year between announcement and when 1.0 shipped on the first device), and we've had 11 Major releases. If you break it down into "families" of versions, thats still 7 (1.0 and 1.1 as one family, then Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, and Honeycomb), with another (Ice Cream Sandwich) due out in a few months. I've been using Android since April '10, and in that time I've had to deal with a few version incompatibility problems, where apps wouldn't work on the particular version of Android I was using. With as much as is shifting right now, due to Tablets and Phones requiring differences, I don't see things slowing down anytime soon.

[Hellmark]

Originally Posted by kjk

Maybe they just don't want to be at a disadvantage compared to manufacturers that Google favors-manufacturers who, unlike Amazon, don't "align to their standard" by including stuff like the Google App Store.

But it's all speculation of course-for all we know Amazon may end up providing a vanilla Android install-Bezos is nothing if not adaptable.

Most of the companies not getting licenses for the gapps, aren't typically doing things bleeding edge, so not getting the latest release on time won't be a big deal. For instance, Velocity, has never used the latest release. They start working on something when such and such version is out, and even though a new version gets released before they've finished development, they don't change Android versions (despite the minimal amount of work that it would require, due to how vanilla their included versions are). For example, the Velocity Cruz T301 was released in December 2010, shipping with 2.0 installed. At the time of release, 2.0 was well over a year old, and had been replaced 3 times in that period (2.0.1, 2.1, 2.2, and if you want to be nitpicky, 2.3 was released little over a week before the release). Eventually, Cruz released an update to Froyo (2.2), because people were having issues with apps requiring atleast 2.1 or 2.2, in May (Some 6 months after 2.3 was released).

[kjk]

Originally Posted by Hellmark

Most of the companies not getting licenses for the gapps, aren't typically doing things bleeding edge, so not getting the latest release on time won't be a big deal.

True, but I doubt Amazon considers themselves in that boat.

[=X=]

Originally Posted by stonetools

When techies disagee, what are non-techies to think?

Well Rock, the fist thing this techie would tell you is to learn how to read .

I never said Amazon would fork, I don't have a crystal ball so I would not presume to know what direction Amazon will choose. I just listed the two routs Amazon could take and what kind of work it would require for developers and Amazon alike

If Amazon did fork however it would become it's own OS. Just like OS X branched from BSD to become it's own OS and just like Android branched from Linux to become it's own OS.

=X=