All Things Digital

The first handset to be powered by Google’s Android OS debuted this morning at a T-Mobile launch event in New York. Manufactured by HTC, the G1 is largely as anticipated. Peter Chou, CEO of HTC describes it as “iconic,” but that’s being a bit generous, I think (“The G1 won’t win any beauty contests with its Apple rival,” writes Walt Mossberg. “It’s stubby and chunky, nearly 30 percent thicker and almost 20 percent heavier than the iPhone.”)

In design, the device seems to borrow quite a bit from T-Mobile’s Sidekick, and its touchscreen GUI owes a thing or two to Apple’s (AAPL) iPhone. Which makes perfect sense, since that’s the device it’s clearly intended to compete with. The G1 will run on both 3G and Wi-Fi and be tethered to the T-Mobile (DT) network. It will come preloaded with a version of Amazon’s MP3 store and Android Market, an application store similar to Apple’s App Store. And it will support and sync with the broad spectrum of Google (GOOG) apps–Google Talk, Google Calendar, etc. Its browser is something the dev team refers to as Chrome-Lite, a mobile version of Google’s new Webkit-based Chrome browser.

Oddly, the G1 has no built-in video player. Odder still, it has just 1GB of memory. T-Mobile has helpfully outfitted it with a 1GB/month bandwidth cap, though.

The G1 supports PDFs and Microsoft Office documents as well. Email will be handled through Gmail; there is no Exchange support, though presumably, engineers developing for Android Market will fill that void in short order.

Oh, the device offers copy-and-paste functionality. Hear that Apple?

It will arrive at market Oct. 22. Price: a highly-subsidized $179.

So that “technical issue” that caused 5 million to 10 million White House emails to disappear from its archives? A botched migration from Lotus Notes to Microsoft Exchange. Seems even the blame for the current administration’s failure to obey the Presidential Records Act can be laid on Microsoft (MSFT).

In written testimony to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Steven McDevitt, a former information technology specialist at the White House, explained that the administration began migrating its email to Exchange without having an adequate records-management solution in place. Worse, its email-retention process was as laughably primitive as it was insecure. To quote McDevitt:

The initial email-retention process involved a manual process of copying messages from the Exchange journals to .pst files for storage and retention.”

The White House refers to this process as “journaling,” which is most likely a euphemism for “interns handled our email backups.” And, in this case, without the proper access and logging controls to prevent tampering or even note that it had occurred.

All of this is quite troubling, to say the least. But not to worry–the White House is at this very moment developing a new archiving system. Too bad it’s unlikely to go live before the end of this administration.

Well, if this rumor proves true, Canada really will have to declare a national day of mourning for the BlackBerry (RIMM). When Apple (AAPL) CEO Steve Jobs uncrates the 3G iPhone a few months from now, presumably at the company’s WWDC conference in June, the device’s price may draw more oohs and ahs than its feature set.

Fortune claims AT&T (T) plans to knock $200 off the cost of a new iPhone for customers who sign two-year contracts. If that is indeed AT&T’s intention, the 8-gigabyte version of the device would likely price out at $199, the 16-gigabyte model at $399. Which is a pretty compelling value proposition given that the device will soon support Microsoft (MSFT) Exchange and run Spore, Salesforce (CRM), AIM from AOL (TWX) and a host of other third-party apps.

No wonder Apple execs seemed so comfortable reiterating the company’s goal of selling 10 million iPhones in 2008. At $199, they might be able to hit that number without the Asian markets.

We’re telling IT executives to not support it because Apple has no intentions of supporting (iPhone use in) the enterprise. This is basically a cellular iPod with some other capabilities and it’s important that it be recognized as such.”

–Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney, July 2, 2007

Today’s an important one for Apple (AAPL). The company is hosting a “town hall” meeting to discuss an iPhone software roadmap. Presumably, this event will see the release of more details about the eagerly anticipated iPhone SDK, but perhaps not the debut of the SDK itself. Certainly, that’s the impression given by the invitation to the event–”Please join us to learn about the iPhone software roadmap, including the iPhone SDK and some exciting new enterprise features.” Enterprise features? Ready to eat your words, Dulaney?

But whether the SDK is released to developers today or not, this event promises to be a watershed one. Because it heralds a vast new addressable software market for developers. After all, the iPhone and iPod touch run OS X, and presumably most future iPod models will as well. Which likely means that applications written for Mac in Xcode–Apple’s development toolset–will be deployable on any OS X device. They’ll be “write once, run anywhere”–anywhere there’s OS X, that is. And word on the street has it that we may see a few of them as early as today.

The event begins at 10 a.m. PT (1 p.m. ET). Updates to follow …

UPDATES:

• The event’s begun. You’ll find streaming video of the event here.
• The next iPhone software update will include support for Push Email, Push Calendar, Push Contacts, Global Address List, Cisco VPM, Certificates and WPA2/802.1x, Security Policies, Device Config, and Remote Wipe. Wow.
• Responding to customer demand for Microsoft Exchange on the iPhone, Apple has gone ahead and licensed ActiveSync for the device.
• Exchange will be native to the iPhone. Jobs must be muttering multiple “BOOMS” from backstage.
• Nike and Disney have been testing Exchange for iPhone and are pretty happy with it.
• Scott Forstall is now taking the stage to talk about the iPhone SDK. Apple giving developers the same tools and APIs it uses to develop iPhone apps.
• Apple took Cocoa and created Cocoa Touch, a new framework for building apps.
• The OS X kernel is the same for desktop and iPhone.
• Xcode has been expanded to support iPhone. It will code complete APIs for the iPhone SDK. (See? What’d I tell you: write once, run anywhere there’s OS X.)
• SDK includes Interface Builder and iPhone Simulator that allow developers to run their apps on their desktops. “It runs on a Mac and simulates the entire API stack on your computer,” Forstall says.
• Forstall builds a quick “Hello World” app, drops it on the iPhone and runs it. Quick and easy.
• “This is an app I just built in two minutes. But we wanted to see what we could build in two days. So we built Touch FX,” Forstall says. It’s an image editor that allows you to warp photos by pinching them.
• Forstall then demos Touch Fighter, a point-and-shoot game.
• Did I mention the SDK is available today? Good luck downloading it …
• Whoa. Travis Boatman from Electronic Arts takes the stage and demos an iPhone version of Spore. They’ve already ported 18 levels. (Hope SDK includes tool for building spare batteries.)
  

• Apple really pulling out all the stops on this one. Chuck Dietrich from Salesforce.com onstage now.
• Salesforce ported one of its automation tools to the iPhone, one that graphically displays how salespeople are performing against their goals.
• Next up: AOL. AIM for iPhone. Took five days to build.
• Larry Ellison takes the stage to announce Oracle Database 11g for iPhone.
• Kidding.
• Epocrates demo. Clinical reference app for doctors.
• Ethan Einhorn from Sega up next.
• Ha! Super MonkeyBall for iPhone. “This is not a cellphone game. This is a full console game. … We had to fly in a developer to upscale the art for the iPhone,” Einhorn says.
• Jobs back onstage. Announces the iTunes App Store. “You’re a developer who just spent two weeks or a bit longer writing an application. What’s your dream?” Jobs asks. “To get it in front of every iPhone user.”
• Apps can be downloaded wirelessly or sideloaded via iTunes. “This is the exclusive way to distribute iPhone applications,” Jobs says, adding: “We are controlling distribution.” (We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. You are about to participate in a great adventure. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to… The iTunes App Store.)
• Developers price their own apps and they get 70% of the revenues they generate. Apple takes 30% for running the App Store. ” … To be clear, we don’t intend to make money off the App Store. We’re basically giving all the money to the developers, and the 30% that pays for running the store, that’ll be great.”
• Apple plans to release an iPhone 2.0 software update in June that will include enterprise capabilities, App Store, etc.
• One more thing …
• Oh, look: It’s KPCB’s John Doerr. Must be here to demo i’MRich for iPhone.
• Doerr announces the iFund for iPhone developers.
• $100 million to start. Boom.BOOM. BOOM! “That should be enough to start about a dozen Amazons, or even four Googles! … If you want to invent the future, the iFund wants to help you build it,” Doerr says.
• END

(Spore photo courtesy Gizmodo)