Google Voice update! Not that it’s a big update, but ever since the Google Reader announcement to be shut down, I’ve been paranoid of losing everything tech I love. This at least means something is happening.

While the official changelog states it just improves texting, Android Police have already done the digging to find what changes are really happening. Prepare to start speculating wildly!

I think it all points to another app taking over Google Voice’s duties. Google is either baking in special support for its own app, or they’re going to start supporting a 3rd party Google Voice ecosystem about a million years too late. GV is going to at least partially readying to transfer data to something, we just aren’t sure what.

So is it just going to be better integrated into Android Key Lime Pie? Is this in preparation for Google Babel to take over? Only time will tell. Google I/O can you not get here any sooner?!

Nexus 4 gets a very minor tweak, but it fixes my biggest complaint. Nice.

Chrome Beta for Android updated!

Yeah, yeah, that’s not rare, and pretty much the point of Chrome Beta… so what?

WHAT? THIS ONE’S GOT FLAGS!

Hit up chrome://flags (works in the browser version of Chrome too!) once updated and start playing with those options too out there for normal consumers or features that are still in the crazy experimental phase! FUN STUFF FOR NERDS!

There are not too many which work with the mobile version yet, but I’m sure more will come! How about a flag to swap the icon to the one without the word beta? Any flags you guys wanna see?

Uhhh… Wasn’t expecting my dream to come true so fast, it only took a few hours. Google must be very avid readers of this blog lawlz.

This is my biggest beef with Android, and it has nothing to do with the OS itself. I really wish Google was more restrictive in requiring updates.

Samsung, HTC, etc., are against the concept of Google owning Motorola, but at this point, forget the other companies, I hope Google just starts focusing on Motorola. Give the all rest the source code, make them keep up with Motorola. 

Also: Verizon sucks. I’m sitting here, with my Galaxy Nexus, a Nexus phone which I bought the day it came out, at the time only available at Verizon, and am now stuck with a Nexus phone currently three, count’em three, updates behind.

Google released this year’s Nexus phone, the Nexus 4, and it definitely warrants some attention. Google’s latest and greatest is looking to be a big hit and seems to already be off to best start any of their Nexus phones (though that’s not saying too much). I got to try one out as a friend was lucky enough to snag one. Didn’t get much time to play with it, but simply put, I’m a big fan.

What’s good:

1. It is the first Nexus that actually resembles the last one! Glad Google has stopped trying to re-invent its phone design. It has its differences, but overall looks very similar to the Galaxy Nexus. I would say that it’s almost to a flaw when looking at both’s faces, they are near identical. But, I’m a fan of that whole flat, black, seamless look so I’m not complaining.
2. The build quality makes it just feel better than the Galaxy Nexus. The edges on the sides made me associate it to the iPhone’s design philosophy rather than Samsung’s boringly plain, plastic, rounded sides.
3. The thing is blazingly fast. Both in terms of processing power, but also in terms of data speed. No 4G? No complaints here. My Verizon Galaxy Nexus’s battery is TERRIBLE, and I’ve already upped to the larger one. Oh, and I did a speed test on both, in a suburb near Chicago, my Verizon 4G LTE pulled in about a quarter of the speeds the Nexus 4 (T-Mobile’s HSPA+) did. Sigh…
4. Uhhh…. how about the INSANE price? $300 for the unlocked one! THE UNLOCKED ONE!

What’s not so hot:

1. The back of the phone. Sparkles? Ok… I mean they are more subtle than the pictures online made them look, so it’s not that bad, I certainly would prefer something else but they are nowhere near bad enough to be a dealbreaker. What is bad though is the material. It is way too slippery! Set the thing down on a flat surface and it might as well be an air hockey table. When I was just casually trying it, I couldn’t grab the home button and flick up to Google Now without moving the whole phone on the table.
2. Keeping the Galaxy Nexus look is nice, but at the same time, it does end up being a little bit… boring. I mean it is hard to complain when there isn’t anything wrong with the design, but it does just come off overall as a little unremarkable. Again, I love the simplicity of the all black face, but everything else just seems like standard, safe design. Perhaps the sparkles in the back were added for this reason.
3. Android 4.2. What the heck happened? It feels unfinished. Forget all the bug complaints, even if those were fixed, it still just is not a very polished update. Hopefully 4.2.2 will fix a lot of problems. Why not just release the Nexus 4 with 4.1? No one is buying it FOR 4.2, they are buying it knowing that they will be be the first to get 4.2. (I’ll be putting up a whole post soon about my thoughts on 4.2)

Overall, I can easily say this is a great phone. If I were in the market for a new phone today, this is what I would buy, no second thoughts. The Android 4.2 problem is my biggest complaint with the phone, and great news: It’s also the only one that is actually able to be fixed after you purchase it! And to say 4.2 is bad quite the overstatement, it is just not quite at the level we’ve come to expect.

If your cell plan is expiring soon, definitely check out this phone. Buy it unlocked, and hop onto one of T-Mobile’s super-cheap prepaid, contract-less plans!

I’m really not a big fan of the bolded hour, however the rest of the new Clock app looks amazing! I’m loving that UI. How could they get the rest so right and think bolding the hour is sleek?

EDIT: This rumor was determined to be made up. I altered some of the language in the post to reflect that, but I’m leaving this post up because I think the idea really is interesting and deserves thinking about.

There was a rumor for the 29th even, since proven to be made up, that Google is not only working on LG’s Nexus 4, but also a program to allow any company to create a “Nexus” phone, provided it meets certain requirements, such as running plain, stock Android, having hardware capable of running the next few versions of Android OS, and certain features such as NFC, etc.

The idea is a very intriguing one, both good and bad. Even though proven false, I think this is interesting enough to be worth looking into. Here are my takes on the pros and cons:

Pros:

1. When choosing a phone, consumers will have many more options. Fans of vanilla Android with dependable updates get more than one choice. Right now the Nexus phones come out one per year, either like it or don’t. Google picks the manufacturer, you just go with their flow.
2. Google can use this as an excuse to get Motorola cracking on a Nexus phone. Who can accuse them of favoritism when every other company has an equal opportunity? If Google used Motorola right now for a Nexus phone, shit would fly.
3. Perhaps an actually popular Nexus phone would exist. So far the Nexus phones haven’t exactly been the hottest sellers. With more phones out there, perhaps one would finally catch on in the eye of the general public.
4. Android’s OS version growth would explode. Imagine more than just 1-2 phones being up-to-date at any given point in the Android ecosystem! WOW, what a world to live in!
5. The phones aren’t able to differentiate via software. Hardware companies would have to compete via hardware, which is how it should be IMO. How about some Nexus phones giving iPhone’s camera a run for its money, or phones looking as sexy as possible with great battery life?

Cons:

1. There won’t be any one “killer phone” from Google. Right now for Android fans, it’s an event to see Google’s next Nexus phone. It’s a big deal, similar to Apple’s iPhone announcements. With multiple Nexus phones, the magic disappears a little bit. Will Google continue to bless one of them as the Android phone?
2. Hardware companies won’t like this. With hardware companies competing via hardware, their jobs got harder for sales. Suddenly buzz terms like phones being “smart enough to be social” won’t apply. Laggy skins on the OS that shoehorn in new “features” won’t be the main selling points.
3. Carriers won’t like this. Carriers don’t like phones having the same OS. It is hard to sell different phones at the same price when it is also very easy for the customer to tell some are clearly better than others. Carriers would request more differences in the OS.
4. These “Nexus” update terms might be vague. Obviously these phones would be expected to get updates faster, but exactly how fast is faster? Right now, faster than a year would be an improvement, but far from ideal. Look at Google’s own Galaxy Nexus on Verizon, even it lags behind the OS updates. How far behind would other companies get?
5. If a company like Samsung sells more Galaxy S IIIs than Galaxy Nexuses, then what is the point of making more vanilla Android phones? Right now, the advantage is that there is only one at a time. It doesn’t have to compete for that specific audience, but that would disappear with this program. Over time, the one company that makes the best Nexi could become the only company to make Nexi.

So… should the Nexi program exist? I believe the pros outweigh the cons. Two of the cons are for the carriers and companies, and the consumer benefits from those. Plus, pushing the importance for fast Android OS updates is always a good thing.

But… will the Nexi program exist? I’m not sure, but I’d bet against it. I see that the hardware companies and carriers won’t like it, so who exactly will be pushing for this and then pushing the phone’s sales? Only Google?

Google announces they will be holding an event on the 29th. The LG Nexus phone is almost a guaranteed show, however the event has rumors of so much more!

First there is the new Android OS 4.2 which is said to be still considered Jelly Bean, and has too many rumors for it to be worth while to even explain. Might as well just wait and see what makes it into 4.2 and what will be held for 5.0.

Second, there is the Nexus 7 16gb getting replaced by a 32gb version at the same $250 price. And if you wanna go even deeper into the rumor pile, there are theories on the 8gb version dropping to $99. Awesome, but I’ll believe it when I see it. The only thing this rumor has going for it is that the iPad mini gets announced on the 23rd, and it will certainly eat into Nexus 7 marketshare, which this attempts to negate.

Finally, there is the rumor of Google launching a Nexi program, allowing any carrier to make “Nexus” phones, rather than Google picking a hardware company and putting out one phone each year. This was proven to be a hoax, but I like the idea so I’ve put my thoughts on this in a whole separate post.

BONUS: Maybe they will give an update on what is up with the Nexus Q and Google TV? Why can’t there just be a Nexus Google TV? Will it move past Honeycomb? And what exactly differentiates Google TV from the Nexus Q? By all regards, the Nexus Q appears to just be a crappy Google TV at the moment, but with better hardware. Why not just merge the two? Give Google TV the Q’s NFC/streaming capabilities with the better hardware and boom, problem solved.

A good list of things Android can still improve upon. While I’d agree that the back button needs some help I’ve gotten accustomed enough as to how it works in each app. The two that really rustle my jimmies are the Play Store not remembering scroll location and the home/back/recent button’s weird rotation.

The best news is that Matias Duarte commented on it!

A very good piece on defining which apps should be put in focus. I think Android is beyond having to show off as much as possible that it finally had some big iPhone app from the year prior. Start focusing on apps that really are made with Android in mind.

Reserve the title of “Top Developer” to developers that follow the Android Design Guidelines.

Reserve the title of “Editor’s Choice” to apps that not only follow the guidelines, but also go above and beyond in terms of usability and overall popularity.

I can’t believe Tasks hasn’t been more highlighted by Google. The thing bleeds simple, perfect, holo design. Or what about Tumblr? It has a unique, but damn sexy design to it, that was even released to Android well before the iPhone version came out.

THIS. The HTC One X.

This phone represents one of the biggest changes to how Android will continue on existing and it has nothing to do with Google.

(First off, take the time to check out The Verge’s review. The phone is NICE.)

Now, hundreds of Android phones have flown out from HTC, Samsung, Motorola, etc. since the launch of Android. This is both a good and bad thing for Android. The marketshare exploded, however the quality of phones really dragged down the quality of Android. Even on the nicer phones, lack of updates due to supporting so many phones made phones obsolete days after release.

I’m a huge fan of Android, but frankly I’ve viewed my Android interest as solely the latest Nexus phone. Google is doing it right in competing against the iPhone. One phone a year and it should represent your best.

The HTC One series really gives me a glimmer of hope for other companies competing for my dollar. Honestly, I don’t care if HTC keeps shoveling out other crappy Android phones, as long as they realize that this is how you try to win over the same people who went to the iPhone. Each company should try to compete with iPhone not with their monthly releases because they slightly bumped up the processor, but with one solid (as close to perfect as possible) phone. Promise to keep the OS up to date. Promise that it will be their flagship for at least a year without some “HTC One X MAXXXXX Plus+ 4G 3D” coming out 3 months from now.

Make one phone that represents the company. Apple doesn’t make a hundred different iPhones a year, they sell the old ones for less. If HTC keeps the One brand strong enough, they can find themselves in the same position. This would mean less phones for them to have to worry about software updates for and Android fragmentation would decrease by a huge amount.

As for the Sense skin, I’m glad they toned it down. I’m still a vanilla guy myself (why can’t companies just offer a way to revert to stock?) but this is at least much, much better than what Sense used to be. Companies argue how there are a lot of factors that slow down updates, but skins certainly play a part. This phone’s release (HTC’s first ICS) is closer to Google announcing the next version of Android at I/O than it is to Ice Cream Sandwich’s release in November. Skins suck.

Also, why real buttons? What happens if Jelly Bean reintroduces the Search button or changes how the back button functions? I always saw the change to buttons being on the screen for the Galaxy Nexus as being a stepping stone for more contextually aware buttons.

There are clearly some things HTC needs to fix, but frankly the phone looks beautiful and this is a HUGE step in the right direction for how companies should be handling Android.