The market for Android tablet pcs has been flooded with inexpensive generic Android tablets from China and India that typically provide scaled-down hardware features - no GPS or 3G/wireless carrier antennae - and instead focus on the essentials - Wifi, touchscreen, speakers and media jacks - with a priority on hitting as low a price-point as possible.

While some very impressive Android tablets have come off these OEM production lines, with full 10" monitors, 1GHz CPU, USB2.0 ports, and many with Android 2.1 or better, even the best Android tablets from these overseas manufacturers seem to suffer from two primary complaints among consumers:

1. Lack of the Android Marketplace app

2. Resistive touch screens instead of more sensitive "Capacitive" touch screens

Google's Android Marketplace Issue:

It would appear for the time being that the issue with getting approved by Google to pre-install the Android Marketplace app onto any of these Android tablet devices will not be resolved anytime soon.  Much of this has to do with Google's position that the current versions of Android (currently 2.2, aka - "Froyo") do not support the tablet "form factor", and even their hardware compliance documentation specifies a screen size no MORE than 5.8" measured diagonally - which would theoretically disqualify all tablets of any usable size from receiving the license to pre-install the market app, though Google has shown that it is willing to grant exemptions on certain hardware items, at least to its friends in the Open Handset Alliance.

Google's hardware requirements for licensing the Marketplace app also dictatet that compliant devices must have among other required hardware; mobile carrier antannae, GPS, rear-facing cameras, accelerometer, Bluetooth, and a long list of hardware requirements that are not necessarily essential for creating an effective tablet with Android, and certainly not conducive to achieving the lowest price point possible.

Of course, customers don't NEED to have the Android Marketplace app installed on their Android tablets in order to install games and apps onto their devices - they can still do this by simply downloading apps off the internet using a PC computer and saving these files onto an SD card.  Then they swap the SD card to their tablet and can launch the apps from the SD card to their Android tablet from there, so some part of the Android Marketplace app appeal is simply convenience.

It would appear that many of these items will be resolved with future releases of Android - "Gingerbread" is supposedly designed to better support tablets and Google and their allies will certainly be targeting the tablet market in 2011 in hopes of chipping away at iPad's marketshare.  Whether they try to make it easy for smaller factories to get in on the game seems a bit unlikely, though in the meantime it seems there is little alternative in the market for any affordable tablets with the market app.

The Touch Screen Issue: Resistive vs. Capacitive

The other galring issue with nearly all of the Android tablets to come out of China is the use of a resistive touch screen rather than the current industry standard capacitive screens.  Resistive screens work by sensing the pressure applied to the surface of the screen, whereas capacitive screens work by sensing the current in your finger or specialized stylus.  While resisitve screens provide the benefits of low cost and can be used with any stylus or even a gloved finger, capacitive screens have proven to be far more responsive and have all but rendered resistive screens obsolete in the smartphone market.

The only real issue here is cost and the cultural misperseption among China's factory managers that the lowest price will ultimately win.  Considering that larger resistive screens add as little as $10-20 to the manufacturing cost of these devices, the added value should be obvious to any consumer minded product development engineer.  However, very few of these factory managers actually use these devices and those that do are accostomed to Chinese quality including pervasive use of resistive touch screens.  So it has fallen on their Western partners and wholesale customers to direct and demand the development of these Android tablets with capacitive screens, and the first wave of these upgraded products is slated to hit the market in the next month if not sooner.

Still, the cost to retool machinery in the upgrade to capacitive screens will cause these manufacturers to initially charge a premium for these capacitive screen devices, and this will inevitiably be passed on to end consumers, but it will only be a matter of time befor capacitive screens are the defacto feature set for all Android tablets save for special circumstances or for those chasing the absolute basement price-point.

Conclusion:

Since one arguably does not need the Android Marketplace apps to get apps onto their Android tablet devices, this point could be seen as insignificant, however ease-of-use has been proven to be a significant factor in iPad's success and for less sophisticated users the routine of transfering apps to a tablet via a SD card or USB stick may be confusing.  On the other-hand, resistive touch screens seem to be generally on their way out anyway, though the impact a capacitive screen upgrade will have on costs may keep resistives in the market, and anyone who has used a resistive touch-screen tablet can tell you that it can be quite frustrating at times, though a stylus can help quite significantly.

I would suggest that if you had to choose one or the other, get the capacitive screen and don't worry about the Android Market app - you'll ultimately save yourself a lot of money if you can learn to "borrow" these apps off the internet by downloading them off file hosting sites or via torretz and other file sharing systems.

Slideme.org, AndSpot.com, and just about every device manufacturer that's come out with an Android tablet are just a few of the many Android app markets that have grown to challenge Google's proprietary app market for piece of the multi-million dollar market for paid Android apps and advertising within Android apps expected to emerge over the next decade.

Blog mumblings around the 'Net suggest that another major player may have their eyes set on moving into Android's open-source framework and Creative Commons protected branding to set up their own Android marketplace.

If a big player like Amazon actually did threaten to step in and make a major push with an Android app market of their own, Google would certainly be forced to reconsider the current restrictive nature of it's CDD - the hardware compliance manual and diagnostics for creating Android tablet and phone devices that qualify to pre-install Google's marketplace app - as the need to protect its handset manufacturing allies may not be enough incentive for them to risk losing control over the apps market entirely.

Android tablets started appearing on Alibaba.com and other Chinese sourcing websites around April this year, and just recently, Archos, Dell, and Samsung have all released brand name Android tablet pcs.  But whereas brand name manufacturers have dominated the smartphone market in America, it seems that Android tablets may go the way of the flat-screen tv and DVD player, with consumers focusing less on brand name and more on features and a more community-audited sense of quality.

Mobile phone handsets, unlike tablets, inherently require wireless carrier service in order to place calls and sen SMS messages - the primary function of any phone.  This has meant that the market for handsets in America is almost entirely dictated by the wireless carriers such as Verizon and AT&T, who have limited the selection of smartphones to a very scarce offering while barring all other 3rd party competitors from participating in their market.

But tablets are different, primarily because they do not rely on wireless carrier signal - unless you require 3G connection, but for the sake of this argument let's assume you can settle for Wifi.

Even the best Android tablets suffer somewhat from the fact that the market for .APK apps that run on the Android OS is primarily dominated by Google's official Android Market, and Google seems to retain the right to install this marketplace app on devices to just those manufactured by it's partners in the Open Handset Alliance.  Though they claim that anyone who passes their CDD tests can apply to pre-install the Android Market app onto their device, the current CDD compliance documentation limits screen size to 5.8 inches - and officially does not endorse any of the current versions of Android for the tablet "form factor", though they have made exceptions for their buddies over at Samsung for the Galaxy Tab device with a 7" screen.

But for the most part Google is not endorsing any of these Android tablets, and so the market is wide open for both manufacturers in China who want to produce cheap Android tablets and app developers who are turning to alternative markets to sell their apps outside of Google's watchful eye and restrictive Terms of Service (which exclude the ability for developers to provide paid-upgrades in their apps among other complaints from developers).

As these non-Google-controlled markets evolve ahead of the industry curve, it seems that the cat may already be out of the bag in terms of Google's ability to control over Android's use in the tablet market and as more Android app markets emerge outside of Google's control, the value of these generic Android tablets becomes increasingly greater and greater, and so too does the incentive for app developers to build apps for these devices and to publish them outside of Google's marketplace.

Whlie this may leave somewhat of a mess for consumers, companies like AndroidGold.com are setting themselves to finding the best Android tablets from China and offering selected devices for sale to the public at incredibly cheap prices. But if Amazon and eBay's latest Android tablets are any indication of things to come, it seems there will be many cheap generic Android tablets that will come onto the market this year, and would expect the quality of these devices to improve steadily from these first incarnations - just as cheap DVD players and flat--screen TVs have done in the past 10 years.

Realising that even the name of our blog here at AndroidHype warranted a few review of Google's license and brand usage policies for the Android™ logo and how we might even mention the name "Android" within our site, we decided to forego hiring expensive lawyers and see if we couldn't figure out Google's licensing guidelines for Android branding ourselves.

Here's what we've learned:

Google's guidelines for who wants to use the Android logo on their products are posted online and written out in plain English (so it would seem) - so I figured this would be an ideal place to get started.

Reading from their site:

"The Android Robot:

Can be used, reproduced, and modified freely in marketing communications. Our standard color value for print is PMS 376C. Our online hex color is #A4C639.

When using the Android Robot or any modification of it, proper attribution is required under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution license. For more details on proper attribution, please see this page."

At first read I thought that might mean I have to use that funky green color to replace my "Hype Droid" which wouldn't be too rough, but would throw off my general color scheme. But upon reading their details on this "Attribution" clause - it appears I can keep the Hype Droid in his current bluish hues.

"If your online work shows modified text or images based on the content from this site, please include a paragraph at the bottom of your page that reads:

Portions of this page are modifications based on work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License."

You also need to include:

"Android is a trademark of Google Inc. Use of this trademark is subject to Google Permissions."

So you will now notice a small notice at the bottom of this site with this text, and that's the reason why.

Anyway, I decided to dig a little deeper and recognized that my assumptions were a bit premature and that I still had some more work to do if I wanted to keep Google's watchdog's off my tail. Reading down the page on Android Branding I came to the sections on "Android in Official Names":

"Any name with 'Android' alone may not be used in a name without permission. Any name with 'Droid' alone may not be used in a name.

The word 'Android' may be used only as a descriptor, 'for Android'. If used with your logo, 'for Android' needs to be smaller in size than your logo. First instance of this use should be followed by a TM symbol, 'for Android™'.

If you are not sure you meet these criteria, please contact us."

Well, it turns out some guy made some space movies with characters called "Droids" in them, and unless you shell out the big bucks like Motorola did, you can't use that in any names - sorry Hype Droid - you're now HypeAndroid until further notice.

As for this blog, I guess that means I better break out the PSD file swap the words "Hype" and "Android" - make Android a smaller font, slap a "TM" on it, and hope the lawyers stay away from my door. So I guess I'll be calling this blog Hype for Android™ from now on, though it will remain at this URL - unless Google starts regulating domain names too, it WOULD be pretty easy for them to render any site they wanted obsolete simply by delisting them if they used "Android in their name.

Geez, open-source can be such hard work... and sometimes even smell a bit, dare I say it: "evil".

(and in case you need it, the HTML code deliminator for "TM" is ™ )

...(doesn't attribution sound a lot like attrition?)

Portions of this page are modifications based on work created and shared by Google and used according to terms described in the Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License.
Refernces to Google's Brand Guidelines here - References to Google's Site Policies here.
"Android is a trademark of Google Inc. Use of this trademark is subject to Google Permissions."

As a new wave of Android tablet pc devices are released into the market, many from India and China, clarification on Google’s relationship to the Android mobile operating system have come into the spotlight. Unlike Anrdoid smartphones and handsets, which typically require approval from the major mobile carriers before they can enter the market, Android tablets do not rely on mobile carrier services in order to provide their core functionality – primarily browsing the Internet and consuming media.

Still a recent episode involving the Auchen Android tablet being sold in K-Mart has brought some confusion over what software manufacturers can and cannot pre-install onto their Android tablet and smartphone devices. At the hear of the issue is not the Android OS itself, which is owned by the Open Handset Alliance – which boasts support from Google, ChinaMobile, Motorola, and many other major industry players, but rather in the use of Google’s proprietary software such as GMail, GMaps, and the Android Marketplace.

While these are all free to download and anyone who owns an Android tablet or device can freely download and install these Android apps onto any Android device – this does NOT mean that hardware manufacturers can pre-install these apps onto their own devices without Google’s permission. This is apparently an attempt to ensure that hardware meets minimum performance criteria, but is likely also a means of maintaining some level of control over how devices display the software Google has developed – particularly the way it integrates and displays advertising alongside GMaps and GMail content.

Gratefully, Google has made it relatively easy for wholesale Android tablet and smartphone manufacturers to test their devices for compliance, and offers a dual-tiered licensing system to allow smaller operations to at least pre-install Google’s Android apps onto devices, even if they are prohibited from branding their devices as “Android” products or using the Android logo on their devices.

To Clarify, there are three levels of Google Android licensing:

Tier 1: Free - Devices cannot have Google's Android apps pre-installed on the device.  Consumers may add apps if they download them and install them themselves after the device is purchased.

Tier 2: Licensed as meeting CTS requirements - Devices can be pre-installed with Google's Android apps - users can access the apps market without installing any software themselves

Tier 3: Google Experience Licensed - You can use the Google brand on your phone - cost is quite high for this license.