Google phone to cost $179, go on sale Oct. 22

Google’s search engine changed the way people find information. On Tuesday the Internet giant took a step toward transforming the way people receive information with the long-awaited debut of the first mobile phone to use its software known as Android.

The phone, which will go on sale at T-Mobile on Oct. 22 for $179 — $20 less than the iPhone — closely resembles a T-Mobile’s Sidekick, with a big-screen and a keyboard that slides out from underneath and contains an extra key dedicated to Internet search. The device also has WiFi capability and GPS built in.

But what is special about the device is that it is designed to function as a full-fledged personal computer running any kind of application a developer can dream up.

“This is as good a computer as you had a few years ago,” said Google co-founder Larry Page at the press conference Tuesday.

Alongside him, Google co-founder Sergey Brin joked that the first application he wrote took advantage of the phone’s accelerometer and measured how long it took for him to catch the phone, or for it to hit the ground, after it was thrown up in the air.

Andy Rubin, Google’s senior director of mobile platforms, said the source code for the phone would be released on the Internet as soon as the phone goes on sale. Though the software is basically complete, Rubin said Google will continue to add features and functionality and that third-party developers would also be able to contribute changes.”Because of its openness, a developer will be able to modify the platform and make it better,” Rubin said. “It is future-proof because it has openness built in.”

The G1 comes with maps, e-mail and instant messaging, a music player and a camera. Users can also download applications that measure their carbon footprint or scan barcodes in a store so they can comparison shop on the Internet.

Ten years from now the end result will be powerful devices that are tailored to the personal preferences of their owners. “Your phone will be smart about your situation and alert you when something needs your attention,” Rubin wrote in a blog post last week as he prepared for the launch.

“I think people will be happier with the G1 than they are with the iPhone,” said John Bruggeman, chief marketing officer of Wind River, which is working with manufacturers to adapt Google’s code to new phones and other devices.

“Plain and simple, I will be able to get more applications more easily from a broader set of options.”

Apple has shown that ordinary people are eager to experiment with games and productivity applications that run on a mobile device. Since it launched its App Store in July, users have downloaded more than 100 million applications for the iPhone and the iPod touch.

There are more than 3,000 iPhone applications available — but that is a fraction of what was submitted to Apple. The Android Market will theoretically be more open than even that.

“If it can truly be that anyone can publish whatever they want, that’s a paradigm change in itself,” said Gerry Purdy, chief analyst for Frost & Sullivan. Purdy acknowledged that security will be a major issue.

Google made sure the store was stocked before the launch by holding a contest for the best applications, the Android Developer Challenge, with $275,000 going to each of the 10 winning teams and $100,000 to each of the 10 runners up.

Cole Brodman, T-Mobile’s chief technology officer, said the G1 will be advertised through “the biggest marketing campaign we’ve ever launched for a mobile device.”

Brodman said T-Mobile also announced two new plans to make it cheaper to use the phone. It will cost $25 a month for unlimited Web searching and $35 a month for unlimited Web searching and messaging. A voice plan will cost extra. Similar to the iPhone, the G1 will not be able to be used as a modem for a personal computer.

The phone will be able to run on T-Mobile’s new 3G network, which is in the process of being installed throughout the country. Brodman said the new network, which is much faster, will be available in 22 markets by October.

T-Mobile, a unit of Deutsche Telekom, Google and HTC, which manufactured the phone, are hoping it will have the same mass appeal as the iPhone, but at a low cost. The phone is being subsidized, but it is unclear who is footing the bill. Brodman said Google and T-Mobile have “a unique business partnership,” but declined to provide details.

Google intends for this to be the first of many so-called “gPhones,” making its Android software as ubiquitous as Microsoft’s operating system. The development of mobile technology has long been hobbled by the absence of a standard software base. By providing a base that is optimized for its own applications, Google is also hoping to “future-proof” its own operations as people increasingly access the Internet through smaller gadgets they can carry around.

Still, it’s not clear that Google will be successful. Jake Seid, managing director of Lightspeed Venture Partners, noted that the idea of a standard technology platform has been tried multiple times in the past. In 1998, mobile industry leaders tried to come together around the Symbian operating system, partly out of concern that Microsoft would come to dominate mobile devices the same way it dominated personal computers.

But there were conflicts among the members and in June, Nokia announced it would buy the shares of Symbian that it didn’t already own and release the software under an open-source license, similar to what Google plans to do with Android.

Meanwhile, the LiMo Foundation, a telecom industry consortium, has announced 18 phones built on a platform that, like Android, uses Linux.

Seid said these efforts face a common challenge in keeping a uniform code base.

“Being open doesn’t matter,” he said. “If you look at what has been successful it has been end-to-end control.”