Google disconnects Google Phone chatter

Should we take Alan Eustace, senior vice president of engineering and research, at his Googley word that:

“WE’RE NOT DOING A MOBILE PHONE,” as cited by Bloomberg.

Google Phone frenzy is almost as intense as the GBuy mania last year forecasting an Ebay-PayPal online payments category killer from the world’s top search engine.

When Google Checkout (not GBuy) finally debuted, excitement checked out as well!

This year’s Google “impending” launch drama is “Will Google Phone or won’t it.” Google Phone chatter is a drama in itself. Here is a recap to date, cited verbatim.

“The future for Orange could soon be Google in your pocket,” The Observer, 12/16/06

The internet giant has held talks with Orange, the mobile phone operator, about a multi-billion-dollar partnership to create a 'Google phone.' Their plans centre on a branded Google phone, which would probably also carry Orange's logo. The device would not be revolutionary: manufactured by HTC, a Taiwanese firm specialising in smart phones and Personal Data Assistants (PDAs), it might have a screen similar to a video iPod. But it would have built-in Google software.

Tony Cooper, a telecoms consultant at Deloitte, said: 'There are numerous situations in which people say "I wish I had Google in my hand.

“The real Google Phone,” Sim Simeonov (Polaris Ventures) blog, 3/6/07

A widely reported blog post at the time of publication, but it has now apparently been obliterated from the Simeonov blog; in its place, the message: "Doh! Something has gone wrong, the page you're looking for can't be found."

Citation below from Don Dodge’s discussion of the post at the time of original posting.

There are rumors that Google and Samsung will build a new phone, codename Switch, together. Here is what I have learned from my inside source:

Blackberry-like, slick device

C++ core w/ OS bootstrap (some version of Linux?)

Optimized Java running on the C++ core (similar to what Andy did at Danger)

Vector-based presentation courtesy of Skia’s technology

Many services, including VoIP Google is planning to build distribution relationships with multiple carriers by allowing them to minimize subscription and marketing costs. In other words, Google will market the phone online and carriers will fulfill.

“Q & A, Google’s chief Internet evangelist” Sydney Morning Herald Blogs, SJ Hutcheon, 3/8/07

An edited transcript of my interview with Google's chief internet evangelist, Dr Vinton Cerf . I've massaged my rambling questions so they're a little more concise. Dr Cerf is one of the founders of the internet. The interview was conducted over the telephone on Wednesday evening. He was in Brisbane, I was in Sydney. I asked about recent reports that Google had a so-called G-phone in the works and that it was collaborating with Apple on a hardware project. Was Google getting into hardware?

I don't think so. On the other hand, we're very interested in the platforms that other people are building. We are quite eager to be part of the mobile revolution. People are acquiring mobile equipment which is much more elaborate that simple a telephone. Becoming an equipment manufacturer is pretty far from our business model.

“Google Phone-It’s for real,” The Register, 3/16/07

A Google executive has confirmed the existence of one of its best-kept secrets. The advertising giant is designing a mobile phone, according to the company's Iberian chief. Spanish IT site Noticias quotes Isabel Aguilera, Google's chief for Spain and Portugal, as explaining the move as a way of extending the "information society" (translation: Google's advertising business) into less developed countries.

As the personal project of co-founder Larry Page, Google's phone is also one of its best-protected secrets. When a report surfaced in the New York Times discussing the possibility of a mobile phone project, the famously grumpy Page threw a hissy fit, and the suspected leakers took the bullet. Google has announced some fairly conventional advertising programs recently, including "dead media" such as print…Google's phone is unlikely to generate the media hype induced by the iPhone - which outside the style-starved USA looks like a toy in search of a wealthy fool.

“Google has no plans for yet another mobile device,” Bloomberg, 3/23/07

“We’re not doing a mobile phone," Alan Eustace, senior vice president of engineering and research, said. "I'd like to find something that is broader, rather than do yet another mobile device."

Google will "look across all of the devices" rather than focusing on individual handsets, Eustace said. "Right now it is very difficult for companies to deploy applications," he said. "Mobile is a space where it's very difficult to reach a lot of users. That's a premise we're thinking about." Google will continue to work with device makers, including Motorola Inc., and service providers such as Vodafone Group PLC to develop and promote mobile products, Eustace said.

Is Google telling the Google Phone full story?

I have heard Eustace take Google-centric liberties in the Google Checkout ecommerce world, as I report in “Google to eBay, Apple, Dell, Amazon: Ecommerce is a ‘disaster’”:

In a fear-mongering diatribe trashing online commerce and casting doubt on consumer financial safety online, Eustace disparaged ecommerce players on the Web. Google gives a firm thumbs down to the payment processing systems used by its strategic partners, by its key advertising clients and even by a company where the Google CEO is a member of the Board of Directors.

The Google-centric view of the world does not always reflect the world’s reality. In touting Google’s latest underperforming initiative, Google Checkout (see “Google miscalculates with Google Checkout”), at an investor Q & A in New York City yesterday, Alan Eustace, Google SVP Engineering & Research, characterized payment right now on the Web as a “disaster.”

“Everybody who has ever tried to buy anything on the Web right now, you don’t know who the person who is selling the goods are, you have to input your credit card to a thousand different places out there, who knows what those people are doing with my credit card. It takes a long time to get through a transaction process, honestly if it took as long for you to get through the checkout at your supermarket, as it takes to do an ecommerce transaction right now, you may never do it," Eustace said.

What about the “Can you hear me know” situation in the mobile world?

Isn’t Eustache aiming to solve a “cell phones are a disaster” problem, to declare in the not so distant future that: Honestly, if it took as long for you to get through on your land line, as it does on your cell right now, you may never do it.

Google speak may be disconnecting the Google Phone chatter of others, but Google CEO Eric Schmidt and company undoubtedly are conjuring up a Google to the mobile phone rescue Googley solution.

How is Google really faring in Mobile? SEE:
WHAT MICROSOFT IS TELLING GOOGLE ABOUT MOBILE SEARCH