Enter the ANDROID

Well a new player has come forth in the Smartphone world.  Google has released Android which is basically a Google Powered phone.  I've been reading around the net about this little gem and trying to see what threat it poses to any phone that I may potentially buy.

Right now it seems that it is no threat at all.  This is a barebones smart phone that just uses Google crap.  I will admit I use a lot of Google crap personally but not so much on my phone.  So why do I consider this phone a non-issue over all?  It pretty much boils down to the biggest group of users that have a reason to use a Smartphone and thats business users.  The Android phone doesn't have any way for IT organizations to actively manage or push information to Android.  The big deal breaker is no Exchange support which most companies run on as well as no advanced security feature set (they let you monkey with everything in the phone).  Last but not least (this is huge for me) no desktop syncronization.  Thats just plain STUPID!  I don't want all my crap in the "cloud".  There are some things I keep locally only because thats where it belongs.  Security is a big thing for me and I like my privacy.

We'll see how well Android sells, I can see this for teens or something but not for your 20-50 somethings.  Even though I don't like admitting this, the iPhone is better than this thing by leaps and bounds in terms of useability and acceptance by IT departments (I'm still buying my Windows Mobile phone and having my iPod touch because I need something that syncs with my desktop seamlessly and I really need the Copy Paste functionality).