The significance of the Google Nexus One.

Posted: January 6th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

I have been on the lookout ever since I made the mistake of selling my iPhone off. It was the 2g version which I miss a lot. So the next obvious decision was to get myself  another alternative. Ever since the rumour of the Google phone was being floated about since December, I was more than intrigued. It was Google.

This is not the first Google phone

The G1 developer phone that they brought out was also custom designed by them but the hoopla was around HTC building it. Now HTC has again joined hands with Google to build Google’s new phone called the Nexus One.

The word Nexus is a latin word that means “Connection”. Pretty apt considering Google’s overall goal is to connect all information together by making it highly searchable.

The Nexus is also the main command center in the Protoss race of Starcraft which is why I think getting a phone called the Nexus would be totally rad.

The Nexus is also the first instanced dungeon that was available in World of Warcraft. But I digress.

Google gave a phone free to it’s employees.

One of the coolest things about working in Google is that they not only define the landscape but also lets its employees, the Googlers, test out new products. That’s what happened this Christmas for a lot of them, the US employees got a free nexus one to try out.

I have a couple of friends working in Google both in the US and out of it. Apparently the Google people of India cannot get the free phones that the US employees got, due to some tax/custom regulations. And not every country is friendly either to this. Thus, a lot of non US Google outfits did not get the phone. And the few friends I have have come back with “OH AWESOME SO GOOD” replies. A few others are yet to reply.

I’m not sure if this is better than chocolate. But in the smart phones business, the Nexus 1 is definitely looking vanilla now.

What does the Google Nexus phone offer?

At the surface, this is another smartphone like the others. Better people than I have covered this in comprehensive detail. Here are the reviews.

• Gizmodo guide to everything you need to know about Nexus one.
• TechCrunch review on Nexus One.
• Wall Street Journal’s review.
• All Things Digital gives its view on the Nexus one.

Significance of the Google phone?

My observation is that Google is now entering into the space that was alien to them. I used to chide my brother on Google and it’s path to World Domination.

But what essentially google is doing is being the Nexus of all knowledge we have today.

Think of them as gatekeepers to the technology of today. They have conquered Search. So all information already “flows” through them. They other 2 ends of the pipe are “Software” and “Hardware”. An oversimplification but let me explain.

Software here includes operating systems and applications everything today runs on. What did they do? Chrome OS, Google Chrome and perhaps the Chrome Tablet PC.

Hardware here did not include Google until today. Their entry-  the Nexus 1. Why not the PC? Well because that’s been conquered and is a saturated market with Dell and others pretty much dominating. But what no one has “conquered” yet is the Mobile platform. With people going mobile, with people needing information as they travel and augmented reality being a concept not too far into the future.. the future is in the Mobile space.

Google wants to be in that space. With an effective launch into Hardware. The pipe flow is now complete. World Domination is not too far off. I’m getting a Nexus phone because I use gmail, I use google docs, I use google chrome and I’ll get stuck on to Android. But remember another company, not too long back, that tried to become a monopoly? They have become soft and are micro now.

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