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I had the chance this week to meet Andy Rubin, Google’s director of mobile platforms.

He’s the man behind

Android, the open source operating system that is at the heart of the Open Handset Alliance.

He was kind enough to give me a demo of Android running on a handset and the video is here. I’ve written up my interview with him and you can read it on the BBC News website.

The software stack, I was told, was Alpha, so not even Beta; but what I was shown gave a good indication that Android should be taken seriously by competitors like Windows Mobile and Symbian.

Google says they are driving the Android initiative because they want to see internet-style development on mobile platforms in the way that the openness of the web has given rise to Facebook and the Web 2.0 movement which should be able to migrate to the mobile phone.

Of course, coming in at the ground level of Android will give Google plenty of opportunity to tailor its own applications.

No-one company dominates the mobile web as yet - perhaps this is Google’s chance.

Google has committed to being a multi-operating system company and they will continue to produce services for all phones on all platforms.

It will be interesting to see how the firm differentiates the same services across different platforms - just how much better will they be on Android as opposed to Windows Mobile or Symbian?

BBC NEWS | dot.life | A blog about technology from BBC News | Under the bonnet of Android

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