How Google Could Have Changed the World With Nexus One — and Still Might
If you thought that the world would change with the release of a Google-branded phone Tuesday, be assured that sadly it did not.
At least not yet. It just got one more cool phone.
You can buy the Google Android OS phone, dubbed Nexus One, unlocked directly from Google. But in the United States the only place you can really take it to is the country’s fourth largest carrier, T-Mobile. Or you can buy it through T-Mobile for a hair under $200 and pay about as much per month as a Palm Pre owner and about $20 a month less than an iPhone user.
What would something revolutionary have looked like?
How about a smartphone starter plan, deeply subsidized by ads, that offered a cheap data plan to entice the “I don’t need a smartphone” crowd into joining the revolution? Even better, would have been an order form where you could buy the Google phone and then choose from three or more carriers who are competing to provide you with a data and voice plan — just as you do when you buy a laptop. Instead, there’s just the one option — T-Mobile, which costs basically the same as all the other smart phones.
Google clearly wants the mobile-phone world to look different, it’s just not clear that this phone or its current manufacturing strategy will actually bring about the changes in the telecom world that Google is looking for.
Now, getting on par with Apple (and in some ways past it) is no small feat, especially when Google made this phone in partnership with HTC, a business model that rarely leads to the hardware that the design team really wants. Compare the Nexus One, for instance, to the first Apple phone, which the world has seemingly forgotten — the Motorola ROKR. That phone was limited to having 100 songs on it, couldn’t buy songs over the air and was full of compromises. With the Nexus One, Google managed to make a device that Wired magazine’s Steven Levy called “curvy,” “classy” and “impressive.”
And that’s important, because Google has recognized that mobile computing is a massive part of the net’s future — and thus its own.
With the recent $750 million purchase of mobile-ad provider AdMob and its reported overtures to buy the popular local-business–rating site Yelp, Google is showing it clearly thinks that mobile (and local) is the next place on the net to mine for riches. But what it doesn’t like is all the ways that users could get detoured, from the time they pull the phone out of the pocket until the time their search travels to a Google server.
Remember that the more people use the internet and the faster the internet works, the more Google makes money. Low-cost, uncontrolled devices with low-cost connections equals more people using Google software and seeing Google ads, even if that phone is made by Motorola, Nokia or even Apple.
That’s why it’s pushing hard to break down barriers between the average user and an online Google ad, by finishing the mobile-computing revolution that Apple started, but didn’t finish because of Steve Jobs’ fanatical need to control the iPhone.
Google’s created the mostly open source Android OS, which manufacturers can and are using for free. That’s pushing Microsoft out of the market, and keeping carriers from doing stupid things like forcing a user’s browser home page to divert to its software store in perpetuity, no matter how hard they try to change it. And third-party-app developers can write programs for Android devices without getting permission, a stark contrast to Apple, which must approve every iPhone app and controls the only way to add programs to the device.
Google bet more than $4 billion in an FCC wireless auction in 2008 just to make sure that openness rules would adhere to new spectrum, which led the eventual winner — Verizon — to sue the feds. Google’s won a battle in D.C. to make the wireless companies subject to the same FCC rules that force cable and DSL companies to treat all online content similarly.
In short, Google wants to transform the phone market with its complicated charges, long contracts, bizarre fees and bundling of devices with service plans and make it more like how you buy a television or a computer: Buy the device. Then find the service. That’s even as cable and satellite providers look at the wireless companies and decide those contracts look like a mighty good way to keep customers.
But the question becomes how far does Google have to push, how much capital must it invest, how many devices must it design and regulators must it convince, before it can back out of the mobile hardware business and simply focus on software and advertising?
Here’s the scenario that might get us there: Google convinces HTC that it’s not suicide to create a phone that can be used on any U.S. 3G network (maybe two phones — one for GSM and one for CDMA) and then sells it unlocked. It’s a great phone, and lots of people want it, and there are lots of great apps that run on it.
Users then could then take it to whichever carrier they like, and get a data plan a la carte. The carriers will hate this, perhaps create unfairly high prices and very annoying “device registration fees” — trying to protect the money they make offering phones at an initial discount in exchange for a two-year contract.
But the FCC will have passed a rule forcing carriers to accept any device that doesn’t hurt their network — much as Ma Bell was forced to open its lines after 1968 — and Google, regulators and consumers will break down those barriers. Or the market could simply take care of it, with a desperate Sprint breaking ranks with the other large U.S. telecoms and accepting a Nexus or any other device with no registration fee and a fair price for users.
And that’s when Google will stop making phones, and you’ll know that the Nexus One actually meant something.
Photo: Google employee Sara Rowghani looks over a jumbo model of the Nexus One phone at a demo in Mountain View, California, on Tuesday.
Jeff Chiu/AP
Wednesday, 6 January 2010
Innovation as Resource and China's New Magnetism
Innovation as Resource and China's New Magnetism
BY Jamais CascioWed Jan 6, 2010 at 1:00 PM
China is set to cut off access to rare-earth elements--and this might be a very good thing.
You've probably seen "neodymium" (actually neodymium-iron-boron) magnets advertised in techie-oriented magazines and gadget blogs. They're actually the strongest type of magnet available, and a pair of them can easily smash fingers. They're also incredibly useful, with small neodymium magnets found in everything from hard drives to wind turbines. Neodymium is one of 17 "rare-earth metals," and these elements have turned out to be critical to the rapidly-growing green technology industries. Rare-earth metals are used in hybrid and electric cars and low-energy lightbulbs, along with windmills (and numerous other greentech applications).
And China is the source for over 95% of the rare-earth metals now in use--something that increasingly looks like a problem. How we respond to this problem can tell us something about how we can respond to other imminent resource and sustainability crises.
Conventional wisdom says that we live in a globalized economy and if China can offer the metals at cheaper prices than other sources (namely, now-closed mines in South Africa, Greenland, and Canada), it's good for us all, right? The fact that many high-tech military technologies rely on Chinese rare-earth metals may give some people pause, but so far, so good. But that model assumes that China is willing to sell as much mineral as it can produce, to whomever wants to buy--and that assumption may no longer be true.
The U.K.'s Independent reports that China has been gradually cutting the amount of rare-earth elements it exports, now down 40% from seven years ago. China now exports only 25% of the rare-earth elements it mines. More worrisome, they say:
Industry sources have told The Independent that China could halt shipments of at least two metals as early as next year, and that by 2012 it is likely to be producing only enough REE ore to satisfy its own booming domestic demand, creating a potential crisis as Western countries rush to find alternative supplies... Beijing announced last month that it was setting exports at 35,000 tonnes for each of the next six years, barely enough to satisfy demand in Japan. From this year, Toyota alone will produce annually one million of its hybrid Prius cars, each of which contains 16kg of rare earths. By 2014, global demand for rare earths is predicted to reach 200,000 tonnes a year as the green revolution takes hold.
With industries relying on rare-earth elements making up a rapidly-growing part of the global economy, this isn't good.
So what are our options? We (as in, the non-China parts of the industrialized world) could try to pressure China to sell more, but that's unlikely to work--and China tends not to respond well to even mild criticism. We could try to rapidly reopen the now-closed rare-earth element mines, but mining is, frankly, an environmental nightmare and incredibly dangerous--hardly a sustainable practice.
Our best option is to innovate our way out of the problem. Ideally, we'd figure out a way to make what we need without those elements. In the shorter term, however, we'd want to figure out a way to obtain those necessary elements without either trying to push China around or reopening dirty mines. If the innovation manages to help solve an otherwise unrelated problem, too--a so-called "economy of scope"--so much the better.
Researchers from Leeds' Faculty of Engineering have discovered how to recover significant quantities of rare-earth oxides, present in titanium dioxide minerals. [...] The Leeds breakthrough came as Professor Jha and his team were fine-tuning a patented industrial process they have developed to extract higher yields of titanium dioxide and refine it to over 99 per cent purity. Not only does the technology eliminate hazardous wastes, cut costs and carbon dioxide emissions, the team also discovered they can extract significant quantities of rare earth metal oxides as co-products of the refining process.
This is, to me, a perfect example of how we should deal with resource problems. Not by simply fighting over the remaining scraps, or trying to get at marginal sources, but by looking at ways to increase supplies while reducing waste, with methods that have a smaller impact on the planet.
Can we do it for every limited resource? Probably not--but focusing research into how to use resources more efficiently, how to extract the resources with less waste, and ultimately how to move beyond them entirely will bring enormous benefits.
BY Jamais CascioWed Jan 6, 2010 at 1:00 PM
China is set to cut off access to rare-earth elements--and this might be a very good thing.
You've probably seen "neodymium" (actually neodymium-iron-boron) magnets advertised in techie-oriented magazines and gadget blogs. They're actually the strongest type of magnet available, and a pair of them can easily smash fingers. They're also incredibly useful, with small neodymium magnets found in everything from hard drives to wind turbines. Neodymium is one of 17 "rare-earth metals," and these elements have turned out to be critical to the rapidly-growing green technology industries. Rare-earth metals are used in hybrid and electric cars and low-energy lightbulbs, along with windmills (and numerous other greentech applications).
And China is the source for over 95% of the rare-earth metals now in use--something that increasingly looks like a problem. How we respond to this problem can tell us something about how we can respond to other imminent resource and sustainability crises.
Conventional wisdom says that we live in a globalized economy and if China can offer the metals at cheaper prices than other sources (namely, now-closed mines in South Africa, Greenland, and Canada), it's good for us all, right? The fact that many high-tech military technologies rely on Chinese rare-earth metals may give some people pause, but so far, so good. But that model assumes that China is willing to sell as much mineral as it can produce, to whomever wants to buy--and that assumption may no longer be true.
The U.K.'s Independent reports that China has been gradually cutting the amount of rare-earth elements it exports, now down 40% from seven years ago. China now exports only 25% of the rare-earth elements it mines. More worrisome, they say:
Industry sources have told The Independent that China could halt shipments of at least two metals as early as next year, and that by 2012 it is likely to be producing only enough REE ore to satisfy its own booming domestic demand, creating a potential crisis as Western countries rush to find alternative supplies... Beijing announced last month that it was setting exports at 35,000 tonnes for each of the next six years, barely enough to satisfy demand in Japan. From this year, Toyota alone will produce annually one million of its hybrid Prius cars, each of which contains 16kg of rare earths. By 2014, global demand for rare earths is predicted to reach 200,000 tonnes a year as the green revolution takes hold.
With industries relying on rare-earth elements making up a rapidly-growing part of the global economy, this isn't good.
So what are our options? We (as in, the non-China parts of the industrialized world) could try to pressure China to sell more, but that's unlikely to work--and China tends not to respond well to even mild criticism. We could try to rapidly reopen the now-closed rare-earth element mines, but mining is, frankly, an environmental nightmare and incredibly dangerous--hardly a sustainable practice.
Our best option is to innovate our way out of the problem. Ideally, we'd figure out a way to make what we need without those elements. In the shorter term, however, we'd want to figure out a way to obtain those necessary elements without either trying to push China around or reopening dirty mines. If the innovation manages to help solve an otherwise unrelated problem, too--a so-called "economy of scope"--so much the better.
Researchers from Leeds' Faculty of Engineering have discovered how to recover significant quantities of rare-earth oxides, present in titanium dioxide minerals. [...] The Leeds breakthrough came as Professor Jha and his team were fine-tuning a patented industrial process they have developed to extract higher yields of titanium dioxide and refine it to over 99 per cent purity. Not only does the technology eliminate hazardous wastes, cut costs and carbon dioxide emissions, the team also discovered they can extract significant quantities of rare earth metal oxides as co-products of the refining process.
This is, to me, a perfect example of how we should deal with resource problems. Not by simply fighting over the remaining scraps, or trying to get at marginal sources, but by looking at ways to increase supplies while reducing waste, with methods that have a smaller impact on the planet.
Can we do it for every limited resource? Probably not--but focusing research into how to use resources more efficiently, how to extract the resources with less waste, and ultimately how to move beyond them entirely will bring enormous benefits.
Monday, 4 January 2010
China's Changing, 'Learning-Minded' Party
China's Changing, 'Learning-Minded' Party
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, 01.04.10, 04:36 PM EST
An exclusive interview with a rising star in Chinese politics, Li Yuanchao.
While pundits pondered whether President Barack Obama, on his first trip to China, had been out maneuvered by President Hu Jintao or whether he had achieved his objectives with quiet diplomacy, a bigger, underreported, story was developing. China's leaders have recognized that for the Communist Party to retain its status as China's ruling party it must elevate its commitment to learning and innovation. Although previous generations of China’s senior leaders have emphasized learning, it now has been made prime Party policy--which will likely present a significant challenge to America's economic competitiveness.
Recently I sat down with Politburo Member and rising star in Chinese politics, Li Yuanchao, a champion of the learning-minded policy. A longtime colleague of China’s President Hu Jintao, Li is currently head of the Party's powerful Organization Department, which appoints and trains senior officials in government and executives in state-owned enterprises, a critical function in government and the economy. Li has pioneered new mechanisms for training and oversight of officials and executives, and has enhanced transparency in the process of governance in order to better serve the public interest.
Li said that China's leaders have determined to build a "learning-minded party." In China, relating current polices to past leaders helps legitimatize current policies, and Li stressed the Party's long-held devotion to learning. "When he was still in Yan'an (Shaanxi province) and living in the caves (1937-1948), Mao Zedong called on the Party to transform our study," said Li. "When reform and opening-up began, Deng Xiaoping stressed that we should learn the world's advanced knowledge. Then Jiang Zemin put forward that if China were to achieve modernization we must build a learning-oriented country and society. Recently, the Party's Central Committee, led by General Secretary Hu Jintao, asserted that a learning-minded party must be built, seeking to revitalize our penchant for learning so as to take up the arduous tasks and challenges ahead of us." These challenges include severe economic imbalances between different sectors of society, particularly urban vs. rural, coastal vs. inland; unemployment; corruption; unsustainable development; resource scarcity; pollution; and more. To China's leaders, social stability is a constant concern.
"To construct a learning-oriented Party," Le continued, "we need to learn both theoretical knowledge, such as Marxist classics and the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and all the advanced human scientific knowledge and advanced experience. In addition to learning, we must also apply leading-edge science and technology. The Internet was invented in America," he added, "but has found its largest number of users in China."
"Surfing the Internet every day has become a habit for many leaders and officials, including myself," Li continued, calling it "compulsory homework." He noted how President Hu Jintao answered questions by netizens and interacted with Internet users online. "We often acquire new information and knowledge from the Internet," Li said. "For example, when we want to develop a certain industry, we first search it online to see how people in China or around the world are developing it."
"During my recent visit to the United States," Li recalled, "I visited Google's ( GOOG - news - people ) headquarters. When executives started to instruct me how to use Google's features, I told them it was unnecessary as I used them every day. I often do searches on the Organization Department to find latest news about the ministry and comments about us by Internet users."
"We ask our officials to cultivate a reading habit and encourage them to read more books, and more importantly, good books," Li said. "The Chinese have a habit of reading. Many families regard books as the most valuable family asset. They can do without cars, but there would be cases of books in the house. Recently we recommended a whole set of books in various genres to officials of the Organization Department. This may sound hard to believe, but we also included A Brief History of Time, a classic by Stephen Hawking. Not only do we want our officials to learn latest knowledge of physics and cosmology but also to develop a way of scientific thinking."
"Every year all ministerial-level officials in the Organization Department will take time out for intensive study and discussions together," said Li. "This year's topic was how to expand democracy in our work. We read books by Marxist classic writers, expositions on democracy by Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, even The Theory of Democracy Revisited by Giovanni Sartori. All of us read together. After we finished, we had comparative discussions, taking into account China's special reality."
"We believe that a ruling party only remains viable and vibrant when it masters state-of-the-art knowledge," Li said.
"Of course, in addition to reading books, we also acquire knowledge through evaluating our experiences," Li continued. "Each year the Party holds a plenum, where an important agenda item is to sum up our own recent experiences. For example, last year we summed up experiences of the 2008 [Sichuan] earthquake and relief efforts. By doing this, we improve how we deal with future situations, for example natural disasters."
Li calls talent "the primary resource of scientific development," and has established "democratic, open, competitive, merit-based" principles in selecting and promoting future leaders. In response to the financial crisis, and in order to achieve the "goal of making China an innovation-oriented nation," Li instituted a "Thousand People Plan" to attract high-level personnel to China from overseas, such as scientists, financial experts, entrepreneurs and senior managers. Li's plan promises high salaries and attractive government funding to elite Chinese professionals, especially top science and technology researchers, who are working abroad and willing to return home. (Many whom China hopes to repatriate have been pursuing careers in the U.S.) Recognizing China's new place in the world, Li stresses training leaders with international knowledge and perspective--the "internationalization of the mind," he says, is a needed new way to "emancipate the mind."
In 1978, Deng Xiaoping initiated China's reform by calling for the Chinese people to "Emancipate the Mind," which meant casting aside Mao's leftist ideological dogmatism. In recent years President Hu Jintao has called for further reform, empowered by a new kind of mental emancipation. Circumstances have changed; the world is more complicated, variegated. This is why Hu stresses creativity and innovation in all areas: science and technology, industry and commerce, global partnerships, political participation, and cultural and spiritual life in all their diverse expressions. Without a further emancipation of the mind, Hu says, China's development will face obstacles and difficulties.
"The change China is undergoing is the greatest China and the Chinese people have experienced in thousands of years," Li said. "It may also be the greatest sustained change in human history."
In a 2009 international computer competition--sponsored by the super-secret U.S. National Security Agency (for obvious reasons)--China fielded the most finalists (20), well ahead of second-place Russia (10) and far ahead of America (2). The worldwide winner of the algorithm-coding contest was an 18-year-old Chinese student.
I need not have to spell out the challenge ahead.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, an international investment banker and corporate strategist, is a longtime adviser to the Chinese government. He is the author of How China's Leaders Think: The Inside Story of China's Reform and What This Means for the Future (John Wiley).
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, 01.04.10, 04:36 PM EST
An exclusive interview with a rising star in Chinese politics, Li Yuanchao.
While pundits pondered whether President Barack Obama, on his first trip to China, had been out maneuvered by President Hu Jintao or whether he had achieved his objectives with quiet diplomacy, a bigger, underreported, story was developing. China's leaders have recognized that for the Communist Party to retain its status as China's ruling party it must elevate its commitment to learning and innovation. Although previous generations of China’s senior leaders have emphasized learning, it now has been made prime Party policy--which will likely present a significant challenge to America's economic competitiveness.
Recently I sat down with Politburo Member and rising star in Chinese politics, Li Yuanchao, a champion of the learning-minded policy. A longtime colleague of China’s President Hu Jintao, Li is currently head of the Party's powerful Organization Department, which appoints and trains senior officials in government and executives in state-owned enterprises, a critical function in government and the economy. Li has pioneered new mechanisms for training and oversight of officials and executives, and has enhanced transparency in the process of governance in order to better serve the public interest.
Li said that China's leaders have determined to build a "learning-minded party." In China, relating current polices to past leaders helps legitimatize current policies, and Li stressed the Party's long-held devotion to learning. "When he was still in Yan'an (Shaanxi province) and living in the caves (1937-1948), Mao Zedong called on the Party to transform our study," said Li. "When reform and opening-up began, Deng Xiaoping stressed that we should learn the world's advanced knowledge. Then Jiang Zemin put forward that if China were to achieve modernization we must build a learning-oriented country and society. Recently, the Party's Central Committee, led by General Secretary Hu Jintao, asserted that a learning-minded party must be built, seeking to revitalize our penchant for learning so as to take up the arduous tasks and challenges ahead of us." These challenges include severe economic imbalances between different sectors of society, particularly urban vs. rural, coastal vs. inland; unemployment; corruption; unsustainable development; resource scarcity; pollution; and more. To China's leaders, social stability is a constant concern.
"To construct a learning-oriented Party," Le continued, "we need to learn both theoretical knowledge, such as Marxist classics and the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics, and all the advanced human scientific knowledge and advanced experience. In addition to learning, we must also apply leading-edge science and technology. The Internet was invented in America," he added, "but has found its largest number of users in China."
"Surfing the Internet every day has become a habit for many leaders and officials, including myself," Li continued, calling it "compulsory homework." He noted how President Hu Jintao answered questions by netizens and interacted with Internet users online. "We often acquire new information and knowledge from the Internet," Li said. "For example, when we want to develop a certain industry, we first search it online to see how people in China or around the world are developing it."
"During my recent visit to the United States," Li recalled, "I visited Google's ( GOOG - news - people ) headquarters. When executives started to instruct me how to use Google's features, I told them it was unnecessary as I used them every day. I often do searches on the Organization Department to find latest news about the ministry and comments about us by Internet users."
"We ask our officials to cultivate a reading habit and encourage them to read more books, and more importantly, good books," Li said. "The Chinese have a habit of reading. Many families regard books as the most valuable family asset. They can do without cars, but there would be cases of books in the house. Recently we recommended a whole set of books in various genres to officials of the Organization Department. This may sound hard to believe, but we also included A Brief History of Time, a classic by Stephen Hawking. Not only do we want our officials to learn latest knowledge of physics and cosmology but also to develop a way of scientific thinking."
"Every year all ministerial-level officials in the Organization Department will take time out for intensive study and discussions together," said Li. "This year's topic was how to expand democracy in our work. We read books by Marxist classic writers, expositions on democracy by Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao, even The Theory of Democracy Revisited by Giovanni Sartori. All of us read together. After we finished, we had comparative discussions, taking into account China's special reality."
"We believe that a ruling party only remains viable and vibrant when it masters state-of-the-art knowledge," Li said.
"Of course, in addition to reading books, we also acquire knowledge through evaluating our experiences," Li continued. "Each year the Party holds a plenum, where an important agenda item is to sum up our own recent experiences. For example, last year we summed up experiences of the 2008 [Sichuan] earthquake and relief efforts. By doing this, we improve how we deal with future situations, for example natural disasters."
Li calls talent "the primary resource of scientific development," and has established "democratic, open, competitive, merit-based" principles in selecting and promoting future leaders. In response to the financial crisis, and in order to achieve the "goal of making China an innovation-oriented nation," Li instituted a "Thousand People Plan" to attract high-level personnel to China from overseas, such as scientists, financial experts, entrepreneurs and senior managers. Li's plan promises high salaries and attractive government funding to elite Chinese professionals, especially top science and technology researchers, who are working abroad and willing to return home. (Many whom China hopes to repatriate have been pursuing careers in the U.S.) Recognizing China's new place in the world, Li stresses training leaders with international knowledge and perspective--the "internationalization of the mind," he says, is a needed new way to "emancipate the mind."
In 1978, Deng Xiaoping initiated China's reform by calling for the Chinese people to "Emancipate the Mind," which meant casting aside Mao's leftist ideological dogmatism. In recent years President Hu Jintao has called for further reform, empowered by a new kind of mental emancipation. Circumstances have changed; the world is more complicated, variegated. This is why Hu stresses creativity and innovation in all areas: science and technology, industry and commerce, global partnerships, political participation, and cultural and spiritual life in all their diverse expressions. Without a further emancipation of the mind, Hu says, China's development will face obstacles and difficulties.
"The change China is undergoing is the greatest China and the Chinese people have experienced in thousands of years," Li said. "It may also be the greatest sustained change in human history."
In a 2009 international computer competition--sponsored by the super-secret U.S. National Security Agency (for obvious reasons)--China fielded the most finalists (20), well ahead of second-place Russia (10) and far ahead of America (2). The worldwide winner of the algorithm-coding contest was an 18-year-old Chinese student.
I need not have to spell out the challenge ahead.
Robert Lawrence Kuhn, an international investment banker and corporate strategist, is a longtime adviser to the Chinese government. He is the author of How China's Leaders Think: The Inside Story of China's Reform and What This Means for the Future (John Wiley).
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