• New York Times, Monday, October 8, 2007 11:30 AM

The New York Times has more on Google's worst-kept mobile phone secret, the GPhone. Is it a phone, mobile OS or both? Various reports have said the GPhone is actually both (er, a mobile lifestyle?), but the Times report reveals that it's not, really. Rather, Google's aim is to build open-source operating and Web-browsing software that would compete with Microsoft's Windows Mobile.

As ever, the Web giant expects advertising to be its engine. Ad revenue could not only help subsidize the cost of phones for consumers, but also allow it to offer software to handset makers free of charge. The prototypes Google built are examples of phones that would use the operating and browsing apps; Google itself will not make the phones.

Analysts don't expect that Google's foray into mobile will have the same impact as Apple's iPhone. IDC analyst Karsten Weide says GPhone software is simply an attempt to extend Google's online services. But in a way, so is Apple's iPhone, which bundles its pre-existing proprietary OS and browsing programs. Weide adds that Google's mobile impact will depend on how its plan is received by major carriers--the likes of Verizon and AT&T will no doubt want a piece of the ad revenue. However, Google recently won the battle to open a piece of wireless spectrum in an upcoming FCC auction, which means that regardless of who wins, that network would have to allow phones running Google software to operate on it.

Read the whole story at New York Times »