Facebook recently decided to notch up its presence on the Android platform by offering Facebook Home. The new app essentially makes the whole experience of using an Android devices more Facebook-centric. Quite surprisingly, Google’s Eric Schmidt has said that he really loves the idea.
Speaking at the Dive into Mobile conference recently, Schmidt stated, “I think it’s fantastic — I love it. This is what open source is about. Open source is open source. It’s experimentation, it’s creativity. … I think it’s one of the main reasons that Android is doing so well right now. And it took some guts to do it.”
Schmidt’s talk took a rather interesting turn when he was asked that if the app got too popular and essentially started dominating the Android platform, would Google remove it from the Play store. Schmidt was quick to respond that doing so would be contrary to Google’s ‘religion’, which is a reference to the search giant’s commitment to the open-source culture.
His responses are quite interesting as well as significant because Google had originally positioned Android to be a platform which was more centered around Google’s own services. While other hardware vendors have used different skins to tone down this, now even apps such as Facebook Home may be able to change it. But at least formally, Google seems fine with it.
Schmidt also pointed out the huge influence that Android currently has in the smartphone market, “We’ll cross a billion [activations] towards the end of this year. That gives you a sense of the reach. Android is the primary vehicle of smartphones. … We’ll quickly get to the $100 price point, which is the key for those next five billion people looking to get connected.”
Courtesy: Venture Beat
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