Also intriguing is CDMA support—as in the kind of network that Sprint runs—adding on to Sprint's Dan Hesse remark that Android is coming to Sprint this year and rumors that it'll be Hero. You can see a lot of the new Donut features in action here, like universal search, in this video from the Google I/O conference.

Folks at XDA are working on a build that'll run on the Dream (G1), though it works in the emulator right now. [XDA Developers, Images via XDA's cyanogen, Thanks Will!]

A couple interesting things gleaned about the Hero as I barely refrained from cramming it down my pants: There's a ton of HTC software on there, not just the Sense UI—they've built their own mail client with Exchange support, and even a slick, iPhone-worthy Twitter app. Also, the grey Hero has a rubber back—only the white one is rocking out the Teflon (but it's the only one that needs it).

Oh yeah, dear god please give me one. Right now. Thanks.

In a nutshell, the device converts electrical signals sent to the visual cortex into images that can be viewed on a computer screen. In their experiment, they showed test subjects the six letters in the word neuron and succeeded in reconstructing the word on screen by measuring their brain activity. As the technology progresses, it could be possible to "see" what people are thinking, what they dream about and record it for posterity. What do you think? Would that be awesome or scary as hell? All I know is that image weirds me out. [Yahoo Image via Pink Tentacle Thanks Roger!]

We’ve been notified of this issue (Jailbreaking of Android) and have developed a fix. We’re currently working with our partners to push the fix out and updating the open source code base to reflect these changes.

So what do Android users stand to lose from this Apple-like vigilance?

At present, very little. The so-called 'jailbreak' was of a completely different nature than the app-enabling hack that iPhone users are now so accustomed to. The technique was a telnet trick that allowed for easy root access to the operating system, so the reality of the situation is less like a 'jailbreak' in the iPhone sense, and more like finding the administrative password on a desktop Linux system.

The exploit did provide more access to the the Android's core functions, some of which could be useful for app development and porting to other phones, but it also exposed a gaping vulnerability that would be immediately shut on any other Linux distribution. Google's patch is most accurately characterized as a security fix, not a party poop. [ModMyGphone, XDA —Thanks, Kyle]

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Android: iPhone's Refugee Camp
While Android's open approach undoubtedly led some developers to pick it over the iPhone from the start, Apple's byzantine approval process and perhaps anti-competitive protection of its own apps—Podcaster and MailWrangler being two of the most prominent—have definitely driven some devs into Android's open arms, or at least made them stare longingly at it.

One such dev was the maker of the ridiculously popular Instictiv Shuffle app for jailbroken iPhones. Currently, iPhone apps aren't allowed to touch a user's music or iTunes functionality in any way. Instinctiv CEO Justin Smithline told us that "the minute we found out about the restrictions of the SDK...we started up an Android effort." Nevertheless it was clear in our interview that they loved the iPhone platform, using the word "amazing" more than once to talk about it.

Free But Not Equal
One of the original dustups around Android was that the 50 finalists in the Android Developer Challenge received early, privileged access to SDK updates that the rest of the developer community didn't get. While it makes sense that Google would want to fast-track Android's potential killer apps in time for the launch, it also goes against Android's atmosphere of openness.

It seems like there is some favoritism—whether it's toward specific devs or just toward the best apps is uncertain. TuneWiki is a finalist and one of Android's 10 most exciting apps. Amidst complaints about the lack of updates to Android's SDK until the recent 0.9 release and Google's secrecy, TuneWiki CEO Amnon Sarig told us that "I cannot say good enough things to say how [Google] treated us. They gave us whatever we wanted. They want us to succeed."

Since TuneWiki looks like it'll be a fantastic app, it's hard to argue with this—why shouldn't Google devote the most resources to the best and brightest, the stuff that'll make its platform shine? Logically, it should, given how much of the platform's success ultimately lies in the hands of developers. Depending on how you see Android's raison d'tre, that might be deeply troubling philosophically, on the other hand.

Nuts and Bolts
One thing that every developer we talked to pretty much agreed about is that coding for Android is not exactly warm robotic apple pie. While it's commonly assumed that Android development is done using run-of-the-mill Java, the developer of BreadCrumbz—a very cool image-based navigation app that's one of the 50 finalists, told us that the Android framework is actually "very different" from a regular Java stack, so that even "experienced Java developers still need to learn." TuneWiki's devs agreed that there's a learning curve, but both said that since it's still Java at the end of the day, it's a short one.

Instinctiv was more down on Android Java, compared to iPhone OS X, when it came to porting their app. When we talked to them before the release of the 0.9 SDK, they said that "Android is a mobile OS unlike the iPhone system, which is really kind of a desktop OS." Because of Java, they lamented that it'll be hard for Instinctiv Shuffle to do any really heavy lifting without bogging the system down, so they didn't think they'll be able to make it "as personalized" as the admittedly outlawed iPhone version.

Access to hardware appears to be much better than with the iPhone SDK, even though BreadCrumbz's Amos Yoffe says that Android "doesn't let you access the hardware directly, you go through Java APIs which are abstracted from the hardware." He still says that it's "pretty good." TuneWiki devs raved that "Android doesn't sandbox you like Apple does, so you have more flexibility." Apps run in the background just fine, battery drain issues aside. And conversely to this freedom, security policies and threats should be interesting (and maybe terrifying for nail-biter types) to watch develop, though at the start, Android seems to strike a good balance between security and freedom (insert current events political joke here).

Flexibility is a huge thing for Android. One of its strongest points—that it's going to run on a ton of phones with a rainbow of specs—might also prove to be one of its weak points, and perhaps the biggest challenge for developers. TuneWiki's Sarig said that since the Dev challenge only provided them with a single set of specs, no one's had to deal with the issue yet. It's definitely looming, however.

He admits that they're going to "have to scale back for less powerful handsets," though he doesn't know to what extent, since no one's seen the pile-of-rusted-bolts end of the Android hardware scale. BreadCrumbz's Yoffe says that "it's a bit early to say" if performance variance between handsets will be an issue, no one will really know "until we get our hands on real Android hardware." The G1's hodgepodge of interface methods—touchscreen, QWERTY and trackball—perhaps not so coincidentally gives developers a chance to experiment with multiple ways to interact with their app using a single device, though having to account for them all necessarily adds layers of complexity and consideration to creating apps.

Android vs. iPhone: The Final Battle
Pandora CTO Tom Conrad, who famously said "I need Android like I need a hole in the head," actually takes a more measured approach to the platform war. He told us that "Generally, when I look at Android and the challenges we faced bringing Pandora to handsets," it doesn't seem to solve them. "It just adds another one to the mix."

Critical for Android's success is an easy-to-use app store and the killer apps to stock it. Conrad noted that while Pandora had been on a number of low-end phones for over two years, within 24 hours, their iPhone app had surpassed all of those users combined. They are currently taking a wait-and-see approach with Android, though he stressed that "absolutely, we want Pandora to be everywhere there are listeners." TuneWiki similarly wants to achieve multi-platform ubiquity, though they're much more juiced about both the iPhone and Android, saying, "We love them both."

Whoever wins, it looks like the carriers will lose. Every dev agreed that the iPhone sparked a revolution that is changing the way US carriers operate. Android is a part of that now, and the two, even locked in competition, will push that revolution further. In that sense, at least, we all win something.

T-Mobile branded phones operating on the T-Mobile network may only use T-Mobile SIM cards. To use a T-Mobile branded phone on another wireless carrier's network with a non-T-Mobile SIM card, you must first request a "SIM Unlock" code from T-Mobile. Conversely, if you have a phone from another North American wireless carrier, you may need to request a "SIM Unlock" code from that carrier before being able to use a T-Mobile SIM card on the T-Mobile network.

* SIM Unlock Codes will only be provided after your account has been active for 90 days. Only one unlock code may be provided per customer every 90 days.

Yes, even if you pay $399 for a contract-less phone, you've still gotta have an active account for 90 days to have T-Mobile unlock it.

Of course, as we noted before, if you're just interested in unlocking the G1 you really won't have to worry about this at all: Developers can (and probably will, we're betting within a couple of days after the launch) totally put an unlocking application in the Android Market—it won't be blocked or pulled down. Definitely a prudent and laudable move on T-Mobile's part, since trying to fight hackers on a phone almost explicitly designed for it would be retardo to the tenth degree. See, it really is up to devs to make Android awesome. [T-Mobile G1 Coverage @ Giz]

Android Market is officially out of the bag. The application store for Google's Android cellphones only contains free software for now and there is no approval process for the software: it's an open content distribution system. The structure is similar to the iPhone App Store, with a rating system similar to YouTube's. Google is touting their experience as a search engine and infrastructure provider as advantages to Apple's store, but would that be really useful if everyone and their dogs can submit their flashlight apps?

As shown in today's presentation, some developers are very excited about Android Market. In the keynote, T-Mobile and Google have pushed the Open Source aspect of the new store. But at the end, as demonstrated by the barrage of useless applications that inundate the Apple's iPhone App Store, what really counts is the overall quality of the software and how the best applications can reach the consumers. That's where the rating system may come in handy, but like with YouTube, there's no warranty that the really good things will float up, especially since you are limited to the G1 built-in store.

There's a good side to the open no-limits, no-approval nature of the system: developers can publish anything they want. No prohibitions and controls means that developers will be able to access any part of the hardware, allowing software that is not allowed in the iPhone App Store, like tethering. On the other side, this may also bring bad things to the user end, since it opens the door to potential problems and conflicts that may affect the stability of the Android cellphone.

The lack of a desktop component may be the biggest problem for final users, an online shop that allows you to easily surf through different options and manage your applications (as well as any other content). This could make things more difficult for consumers. Once we try the store—which looks extremely similar to Apple's own—and see how you manage the software, we will be able to answer this question more thoroughly. For now, however, the idea that everything has to happen over the air in a tiny screen may make Google's solution a weaker one than Apple's, which in its current form has problems of its own.

The long-awaited HTC Dream, the first commercial handset running Google's Android operating system, will be coming to T-Mobile as the G1 for $179 on October 22nd. Featuring a 3-inch touchscreen, internet navigation buttons and a full QWERTY keypad, the smartphone market has finally broken free of Symbian, Windows Mobile and the sweet clutches of fruit companies. Read on for the details, and you can decide whether or not the competition is a good thing.

Features:

Date and Pricing
$179 on October 22nd. (That's with a two year contract.) Unlimited internet with "some messaging" will run $25/month. Unlimited internet and messaging is $35/month. Data plans will require voice plans.

Screen
The G1 sports a 3.17" 65K color touchscreen that runs in HVGA (480×320) resolution.

Battery Life
You can talk for 5 hours, or keep the phone in standby for 130 hours.

Camera
3.1MP, or right around 35mm 4x6 print quality.

Frequency Fun
GSM/GPRS/EDGE/Wi-Fi and UMTS/HSDPA
850/900/1700/1800/1900/2100Mhz

Dimensions
4.60” x 2.16” x 0.62”; Weight: 5.6 ounces. And available in white, black and brown.

Storage
1GB MicroSD card preinstalled. Supports 8GB MicroSD.

GPS
Of course, what would Google Maps be without it?

Google Maps
As we've seen in a recent update, the G1's Maps application will integrate Street View so you can see where you are going. But in an industry first, a built-in compass orients the map to your position. North is always up!

Android Market
Similar to the iPhone's mobile App Store, the Android Market will allow downloading of various Android apps from the Market, to the phone.

Amazon MP3 Store
Amazon's MP3 store will be preloaded on every G1, allowing the download of 6 million DRM-free tracks with singles starting at 89 cents. Downloading music requires a Wi-Fi connection, previewing can be done over T-Mobile's network.

YouTube
Yup, it's on there.

Other Apps
ShopSavvy: designed to help people do comparative shopping
Ecorio: developed to help people keep track of their daily travels and view what their carbon footprint looks like BreadCrumbz: enables people to create a step-by-step visual map using photos; customers can create their own routes, share them with friends or with the world.

Update: T-Mobile also has a live webcast of the event going up soon, but who knows how many concurrent connections that will hold. Hopefully it stays up, our liveblog definitely will.

SEATTLE—(BUSINESS WIRE)—Sept. 23, 2008—Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced that the Amazon MP3 music store will be pre-loaded on the T-Mobile G1, the world's first Android(TM)-powered mobile phone in partnership with Google. T-Mobile G1 users can search, download, buy and play music from Amazon MP3, which offers over 6 million DRM-free MP3 songs from all four major music labels and thousands of independent labels that can be played on virtually any hardware device and managed with any music software.

"Amazon wants to make it easy for customers to discover, buy, and play their music wherever they happen to be—whether sitting at their computer or on the go," said Bill Carr, Amazon.com Vice President for Digital Music and Video. "We look forward to the release of the T-Mobile G1, which will put Amazon MP3's vast selection of low-priced DRM-free music at the fingertips of even more customers in more places."

The T-Mobile G1 comes pre-loaded with an Amazon MP3 application, giving customers a phone-optimized version of the Amazon MP3 store and the immediate gratification of buying and playing their favorite music. Amazon MP3 has worked to make its DRM-free music available through numerous products and services, such as Pandora MySpace Music, and now Android and T-Mobile G1.

Downloading music from Amazon MP3 using the T-Mobile G1 requires a Wi-Fi connection but searching, browsing, listening to samples and buying MP3s can be done wherever customers are connected to the T-Mobile network. Downloaded MP3s can be played anytime on the T-Mobile G1, PCs, Macs or any other MP3 music player.

Launched in September 2007, Amazon MP3 offers a massive selection of DRM-free MP3 music downloads with more than 6 million songs from thousands of record labels. Every song and album in the Amazon.com digital music store is available exclusively in the MP3 format without digital rights management (DRM) software, enabling customers to play their music on virtually any personal digital music-capable device, including PCs, Macs(R), iPods(R), iPhones(R), Zunes(TM), Zens(TM), and to burn songs to CDs for these customers' personal use. Amazon MP3's 100 bestselling songs are 89 cents, unless otherwise marked, with over 1 million songs available at 89 cents. Amazon MP3's 100 bestselling albums are $8.99 or less, unless otherwise marked. Most albums are priced from $5.99 to $9.99, with more than 80 percent of Amazon MP3's album catalog priced at $8.99 or below.

The T-Mobile G1 is the world's first Android-powered mobile phone in an exclusive partnership with Google. The T-Mobile G1 combines full touch-screen functionality and a QWERTY keyboard with a mobile Web experience that includes the popular Google services that millions have enjoyed on the desktop, including Google Maps with StreetView, Gmail, YouTube and others. With a fun and intuitive user interface and one-touch access to Google Search, the T-Mobile G1 is also the first phone to provide access to Android Market, where customers can find and download unique applications to expand and personalize their phone to fit their lifestyle.

Android is an open, free mobile platform developed by the Open Handset Alliance. It includes everything a manufacturer or operator needs to build a mobile phone. Android was designed from the ground up to enable the best user experience possible on a mobile phone. It leverages web and Internet content to provide advanced services such as Mobile Mash-ups.

Songs and albums on Amazon MP3 are generally sold by Amazon Digital Services, Inc.

[Amazon]

• One-click Google search and easy access to all Google Applications - Quick and easy access to the Internet in one click.
• One touch access to Google applications:
Maps (including satellite, traffic and street views)
Gmail
YouTube
Calendar
Google Talk

• Size: 4.6 x 2.16 x 0.63 inches
• Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Display: 65K color screen, HVGA (480×320) 4.6 inches
• Talk Time: 5 hours
• Standby Time: 130 hours

• Expandable up to 8 GB memory

• No stereo bluetooth

• Gmail account required to sign in and use, no corporate access email available

• Required data plan associated with this device; it will not work without the data plan active
• No prepay.

• GPS is confirmed.
• No video capture.
• 3.1 mp camera.

Time will tell exactly how accurate these "confirmed" facts are. Over to you in the comments, chaps: does that make you want the phone more or less? It certainly seems a tempting prospect to me. [TmoNews]

Amid the iPhone 3G launch hysteria, we made a pronouncement that, looking back now long after the dust has settled, pretty well nailed it: forget hardware, it's code that counts. Code via the juggernaut that is the App Store, which allowed the iPhone to truly came into its own as a mobile platform.

Now, our first official look at T-Mobile's G1, the first Android-capable phone built by HTC, is less than 24 hours away, and the same adage holds true now more than ever. Android's openness puts the emphasis even more squarely on the code this platform will run, making the hardware almost an afterthought. And while it's still quite early in the game and things won't really kick up until the G1 becomes available sometime in October, the Android Market is already looking like an equally if not more vibrant place for great apps for your phone.

One of the main positive points in our Android preview guide was that Android will likely be home to the best direct tie-ins to Google's web apps like Maps, Docs, and Gmail, of any device around. And not only will they shine individually (remember's Apple's proud claims of the iPhone's custom Google Maps integration?), each Google service is set up as an open API within Android, meaning they're all available for mashing up with any other type of data imaginable in third party applications, effectively allowing developers to easily convert awesome Google service hybrids (like Beer Mapping, one of my favorites) into mobile apps.

Unsurprisingly, Maps integrations are the main focus being taken by the early wave of Android Apps, many of which were written in response to the Android Developer's challenge. Throw in location awareness via GPS or cell towers (another Android core service), and we've got ourselves the ingredients for some truly next-level stuff.

Enkin: When many people envisioned a location-aware future for mobile tech, they were probably dreaming up something like Enkin. If you can last through the somewhat brutal video here, you'll see some amazing potential: Enkin is basically a visualization framework for location information which can place locations on a two-dimensional map, a quasi-three-dimensional Google Earth type view, and coolest of all, overlay them onto the view streaming live out of your phone's camera. It uses GPS and accelerometers to sense exactly which direction the camera pointing, giving you an annotated view of the real world. You can add your own placemarkers or draw them in from the internet.

Locale: Borne from an MIT class specifically for writing Android apps (and winner of a $275,000 first prize from the Android dev challenge), Locale lets you define your most frequented places on a map and set your phone to respond to those places in a number of different ways. While the prototype is mostly focused on phone settings (like switching to silent when you're in the office or at a movie theater), these kinds of frameworks can be expanded infinitely. Home automation software could be programmed to turn on the lights (or start cooking your breakfast, Pee-Wee Herrman style) once you're a few blocks away from your home, for instance. It takes Bluetooth proximity to a whole new level, one that's not dependent on the limited proximity to another device but only your actual real-world location independent of any other variables.

GeoLife: In a similar vein is GeoLife, a location-aware to-do list. You can pair actions on your list to locations (or types of locations) to get a reminder to buy milk when you're near a grocery store.

Ecorio: Using GPS, Ecorio runs in the background (another edge Android has over the iPhone) and estimates the carbon output of your day's journeys. Once it learns your habits, it can then suggest public trans or carpooling alternatives. Another $275,000 first prize winner.

Cab4me: Takes your current location and feeds it into a database of nation-wide cab companies, allowing you to order a cab pickup instantly with your current locations. Google Maps overlays also show areas of cities where you're likely to hail a cab off the street.

BioWallet: Not all of the innovative apps are map based. BioWallet uses your phone's camera as an iris scanner to lock down sensitive information like account numbers and passwords on your phone, or even the phone itself. Handwriting-based IDs can also be implemented, all processed for an additional pass/fail reading—all processed on the phone itself which keeps biometric data secure.

CompareEverywhere and GoCart: Both capture photos of product UPC codes to then tie into online databases for comparison pricing, product availability, and shopping list compilation.

TuneWiki: Music apps are a bit thin pre-release, but TuneWiki (which is already out for jailbroken iPhones—not in the store yet, which won't be a problem with Android) looks impressive for grabbing lyrics and album art with your music. See it in action here.

Teradesk e-Storage: We love Air Share on the iPhone, and e-Storage looks to provide many similar services, with file versioning and Google Docs integration (one of the first of many G-Docs tie-ins, surely).

True, some of these apps could seemingly be just as at home in the iTunes App Store and on other platforms (many mobile OS's have some iteration of a barcode reader, for instance). But what has the potential to set Android apart though is its open source foundation; with the support of the open-source development community—one of the largest and most important driving forces of innovation in computers and software throughout history—Android could blast open mobile platforms even further than the iPhone has or could. Especially when you consider the core open-source projects that have shaped the internet since the beginning—Apache, MySQL, PHP, ssh, and countless others—making it onto phones in a core and unified way. Despite early SDK kinks, we could be seeing some exciting stuff in the next few months.

For a few of the other sides to the Android coin, be sure to check out our guide to five things both good and bad about Android. And if you've seen any other embryonic pre-release Android apps that look exciting, tell us in our new-and-improved threaded comments.

1. It's open! The single best thing about Android is that's a modern mobile phone OS that's also almost completely open, unlike some other locked down mobile OSes. (There are a few restrictions in accessing the hardware for security reasons.) It's based on Linux, and once Google has released Android, most of it will be totally open source, so it'll be incredibly easy to dive into its guts and mess around, which will help build a robust developer community, along with all of the other benefits of using open software. Most of its other awesome traits grow out of its openness, actually.

2. We'll keep the Steve references to a minimum here, but Android will accelerate the process that the iPhone helped kickstart last year—the gradual devolution of carriers to open, dumb pipes. Before, carriers controlled every single facet of what a phone could and could not do. They still do to an extent, and it's not completely "anything goes" on the iPhone and Android, but together they have and will make the mobile landscape change far more rapidly than before. As Opera CEO Jon von Tetzchner told me a few days ago, just a few years ago, carriers thought that the idea of full internet access was ridiculous, not to mention dangerous, threatening the obscenely lucrative business they have set up around minuscule bits of data like text messages, crappy "web portals" and ringtones. Android phones will be constantly connected and totally revolve around the internet, incessantly sucking down ever cheaper data—a carrier's worst nightmare not so long ago.

3. You'll have tons of hardware options. Android's designed to be versatile, so lots of manufacturers will be putting it on lots of phones—ones with QWERTY keyboards, touchscreens, T9, outrageously spec'd out phones, as well as ones that are kinda crappy in the spec department, actually. But this also provides a common platform for developers, making it easy to put their apps on millions of phones. It's the benefit of any OS that runs on a lot of hardware—like Windows or Linux, etc. Of course, this is also the Windows Mobile argument against all of the other proprietary OSes like Palm and BlackBerry.

4. There's even more potential for amazing apps than the iPhone, because developers are almost completely unencumbered by arbitrary rules and restrictions. So awesome apps like Podcaster or Instictiv Shuffle won't be mercilessly killed for not fitting into a tightly controlled framework or navigating a byzantine approval process.

5. It'll have the best Google apps experience of any mobile device, and play super nicely with Gmail, Gcal, Maps and everything else Google puts out. Or at least it damn well better, since you know, it's Google's baby. Simple, direct syncing with Gcal is tops in our list, since doing it on the iPhone requires sacrificing a goat while chanting from a book covered in the skin of baby unicorns.

Bonus reason: Not an iPhone. And our software geek sister Lifehacker has some more too.

1. Google can see into your soul. If you've ever been wary about how much Google knows about you, how are you going to feel when they're all over your cellphone? While a lot of the reason Android came to be was just to get people really using the internet on their phone (because when people use the internet, they use Google), we won't be surprised to see contextualized local ads, kind of like the sidebar ones you see offering you a date from hot local girls in Brooklyn or whatever hovel you're holed up in. But this will be hot girls just around the corner, since the phone will know where you're at.

2. It's not on the US's two biggest carriers, AT&T or Verizon. Statistically speaking, you've got one of them. But so far only the two runts of the majors, Sprint and T-Mobile are going to have Android phones. T-Mobile's 3G network is pathetically tiny compared to the other three, and well, Sprint's the only carrier actively losing subscribers, if that tells you anything. It's possible we'll see some Android action on Verizon's mythical open network though.

3. Buuut, carriers still have the right to gimp Android to their liking, precisely because of its Apache licensing. So a Sprint Android phone could have its built-in "store" stocked only with, say, Yahoo! apps—or no store at all. In Verizon's hands, the UI could still look like it fell in a bucket of gaudy red paint.

4. Android is designed to run on a ton of different of hardware—phones with and without touchscreens, with and without QWERTY keyboards, phones with amazing specs, crappy phones, and everything in between. While this is a strong point as mentioned above, it could also be a point of suckiness. That means there won't be a consistent Android experience, and it'll depend heavily on the device you're using. Devs told us that you'll likely see different versions of their apps, so that on weakass phones, you'll have more diluted apps, which might be an issue for people picking up a cheap Android phone expecting to do everything a more expensive one will.

5. Relying too much on developers to fill in features could result in a phone that's not quite totally seamless and consumer-grade across the board. For instance, from what we've seen in the SDK, there's not a built-in, Google-made media player. It's rumored that the excellent TuneWiki will be Android's default player, which is great, but doing this for too many key features could make things a bit bumpy, since you're talking several developers instead of just one.

Bonus reason: It's not an iPhone.