Ice Cream Sandwich brings the best UI and core system features of Honeycomb to smaller screens that are in the phones. I think that can mean the new holographic UI, new widgets, better/smoother multi-tasking, no more hardware buttons (means completely reconfigurable shortcuts depending on software), new settings menus, better multi-tab web browsing.

The goal I think with Google TV when used in combination with regular TV such as in Dish Networks, is to provide better and better overlay features, to imagine making it perfectly smooth for people for example to chat in overlay on top of TV, nice new UI to rate content, find info about content, but not really needing to resize the TV image (especially not making it tiny small), but introduce more overlay features, so all that interactive content shows up on top of the TV content behind, or all around it. The goal is to bring all the things people would do if they have short attention span, want to multi-task, pause video, check stuff on the web all the time, chat with friends watching the same things, but to put all that on one screen and make it easy to interact in lean-back mode in the sofa. Thus the interaction model might be the nice thin Logitech keyboard and also a tablet for getting more interactive custom buttons, widgets, and other shortcuts, all a combination of what gets to be on the screen, what stays on the tablet screen, all to enhance the TV watching experience. Having to pause TV to search on the laptop for info about an actor is not the best solution, with Google TV, it should be people still lye back in the sofa, hit one or two charachters on the keyboard, or click one shortcut/widget on the tablet, and boom cast info is displayed on top of the TV content, pausing is maybe not even needed, but YouTube videos can pause TV and play and are just one click away.

Here are some of the reasons why I think that Google TV on ARM will be huge:

- the box can be made for much cheaper than the Intel powered box. ARM chips are lower power, thus require less electronics, the box can be made smaller. Basically, Google TV can be sold everywhere for $99 unsubsidized.

- This means Google TV functionality could be part of every future Android smartphone, those smartphones integrate HDMI output.

- ARM support means many more chips can be used, many more manufacturers can make them, competition increases innovation and reduces prices.

- I think there will be two types of Google TV, the type that includes existing TV (with HDMI input and overlay features), and the cheaper type that only displays WebTV content (only HDMI output, overlays only on web content). The future is webTV only for all, but people watch in average 5 hours “normal” TV per day, so normal TV isn’t disappearing overnight.

- If Hollywood and other content owners can’t come to their senses and open up all content on all Google TV and any other box without special licences, then BitTorrent will quickly become the most popular application on Google TV, it’s an open platform (maybe you aren’t supposed to know this?).

- But in reality, this is the decentralisation of broadcasting, this is a fight between WebTV-on-demand and the old-content-gatekeepers. In all this revolution, what role should Dish Networks try to anticipate? I am not sure. I’m all for bringing Gigabit Fiber networks to the people everywhere, perhaps satellites can help bring Gbit/s download-only bandwidth to a whole country using the satellite dish technology, maybe Dish Networks needs to build a set-top-box with removable 2TB hard drives (that currently cost $89 in Frys and Best Buy) that lets people download 2TB of all the best content content in some type of multi-cast, spreading around all the 1080p Movies and TV shows on everyones hard drives, and then provide a global licence, $20-30 max for everyone to access all those files as much as they want, and this should possibly include all the best content. But this may only be temporary solution until everyone can get Gigabit Fiber in the home. Possibly, with collaboration with HDTV screen manufacturers, you can launch 4K2K or Quad-HD LCD screens for little more expensive than a normal 1080p screen (it’s just a new processor in there), and then provide Google TV with 4K2K decode capability and distribute on-demand 4K2K video content that can be encoded at below 25mbit/s (all the best movies digitized) through on-demand multicast, whatever highest bitrate can be multi-cast for download-only.

Sorry if I speak too much. You can contact me charbax@gmail.com if you would like more.

Google has systems that increases sales and lowers costs for all the businesses of the world. On the other hand, Apple is valued 1.5x more than Google and all they have is a closed proprietary smartphone, that was so secretive in development that they didn’t realize that it doesn’t work when held in the left hand, and which they can only sit back and observe how it gets completely out-competed by the rest of the industry using a superior open platform.

I wonder what a shitstorm that would have raised had Apple done the same.

We have seen this same “linux/OSS will rule!” slogan in netbooks. Everybody knows how that ended Apple and Microsoft are eating the mobile devices cake on that front

Nuff said. Case closed.

http://twitter.com/zodttd/statuses/53519800151969792

Charbax: What is the latest on the Marvell Ebox computer that was unveiled on your site at CES 2010 more than 14 months ago?

@OSS leads to faster development comment: Also, there is no reason an open source project should move faster if there is no clear direction. Case in point, FF3.6 and the associated bloat, which allowed Chrome to come out of nowhere and take marketshare.

@Touchwiz, Sense Blur comment: Yes the idea is good. The direction that Google, the hardware manufacturers and carriers (US) are going right now, I am not sure Google has many options. It is not AAPL v GOOG any more. by the end of the year there will be three “tightly controlled systems” vs one “open system” (i use that word with much sarcasm). My money is on the tightly controlled and well funded systems.

What they need to do is to bring Android to a point of openness so they have a reliable and efficient way to keep the open source community up to date with all the latest advances that they are making at the Googleplex, thus nearly publish dailies for all to look into, and then they need to allow code to be submitted from any open source developers, and have code testing happen out there in the open. I am sure they will reach that kind of openness eventually, and I also understand that in the beginning they think they need not to let competition know what they are doing, at least for the first couple months with each new Android version (new Android versions are coming very fast). But as Android is now already the biggest Smartphone OS, a few more months of secret Android development and I think Google will be able to start being more transparent with what they exactly do day to day.

With hardware specs moving so fast in mobile space, even if software updates are provided, newer feature will make older phones obsolete, as with iPhone and iPhone 3g, despite them getting timely and free-of-charge updates. Future proof? seriously?

If Google can help shut down the Touchwiz, Sense, Blur, Rachael of the world, that would be great. That doesn’t mean they cannot get input for UI improvements from the industry in the open, and it’s not necessarily something they have to force as the only allowed UI, they just have to make it easily switchable on/off and let people who want Vanilla Android have it, that can be a requirement.

Can I place first dibs on whatever it is you are smoking?

I love how phandroids such as you are coming around to the Apple viewpoint that *control of ecosystem* is more essential than openness, in order to reduce the amount of puke and crap such as this

http://fuglyandroid.tumblr.com/

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2011/03/google-yanks-psone-emulator-developer-blames-xperia-play-launch.ars

And as if Android fragmentation, Google cannot do anything about it, Amazon will make sure fragmentation happens.