Wrong Normandy, you idiot.
Nokia is still expected to unveil its Android phone this month. Despite the naysayers saying nay, it seems like it'll happen. It's said the reason is that Windows Phone doesn't work well on the low-end phones that are sold in emerging markets.
Who knows how long this will last.
In IT Blogwatch, bloggers utter "fork" and "fragmentation."
Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment.
Channelling "people familiar with the matter," Sven Grundberg, Shira Ovide, and Rolfe Winkler sit on it:
Nokia...plans to introduce this month a smartphone powered by...Android....
Nokia engineers had been developing the Android phone before Microsoft struck the...$7.4 billion deal...to buy Nokia's handset business. [It] underscores how badly Microsoft and Nokia each miscalculated in the mobile market. [The] Windows Phone operating system doesn't yet work on...low-cost smartphones [which are] big sources of growth....
It isn't clear whether [this] is a stopgap measure while Microsoft refashions...Windows Phone...to work on lower-priced smartphones. MORE
Matt Hamblen utters the F-word. And the other F-word:
Phones [that] use forked Android...hurt Google's ability to monetize the Android ecostem. ... An Android variant on Nokia devices gives Nokia a lower priced smartphone to get first-time users....
In the past two years, Google has been increasingly criticized for allowing too much Android fragmentation across the many Android vendors. MORE
And Ron Amadeo adds 2+2:
The new phone is a low-end replacement for Nokia's S40 Asha platform. ... Despite Nokia's Microsoft betrothal, it doesn't have many options for a low-end device targeting developing markets. ... It runs the open source parts of Android with all the Google functionality removed. ... Nokia will also be heavily skinning Android. ... It's also missing typical Android navigation buttons like Home and Recent, with seemingly only a back button for navigation....
[But] unless Microsoft has a huge change of company policy, this device is firmly in the "dead on arrival" category. ... It released a Meego version of the N9...before immediately abandoning the platform. MORE
DOA? Miku agrees:
Any smartphone currently in development will end up being under Microsoft’s watch. If this is released, expect it to die as fast as the Kin. MORE
Meanwhile, Nancy Gohring puts a fried egg on top:
The presumption is that [it] would run Microsoft and Nokia services, like Bing, Office, and Nokia's Here mapping service...the same model adopted by Amazon....
Amazon and a fair number of others have realized the benefits of using a forked [Android]. ... 25 percent of Android phones that shipped [are] forked versions, according to ABI. MORE
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