Word has it that Google is following Apple's lead and taking a leap into the phone business. Unlike apple, however, they are not looking to manufacture their own phone, but rather create an OS, creatively named Google Phone or GPhone, to compete with platforms like Microsoft's Windows Mobile.
What's more, in a move that will inevitably irritate a lot of carriers, the new software will be based on Linux and be open source. It is a move calculated to relinquish some control (and advertising space) from carriers over the formats and content available on mobile devices.
Being open-source, once this hits the market we are most likely going to see a slew of hacks and user developed extensions, which, on the one hand raises many possibilities for new ways to provide branded utilities and content for mobile devices, but, on the other, raises more than a few concerns about the future security of data passing through mobile devices. However this ends up panning out, I believe we are seeing the beginning of the end for carrier controlled networks as
Google continues its expansion into every sphere of life.
