- So Android, it's been around for about 10 years now.
And it all started
with the release of the T-Mobile G1
back on September 23rd, 2008.
But here's a question.
Why did Google bother making Android in the first place?
(snappy, upbeat music)
When you think about smartphone battles today
you pretty much think of it as Android versus iPhone,
and that's how it is, but back before the iPhone,
heck even right after the iPhone came out,
the world looked a whole lot different.
Phones were actually relatively small.
They fit in the palm of your hand
and most of them didn't have touch displays.
If you did have a smartphone,
chances are you were either in IT,
you worked on Wall Street, or you were a huge nerd, like me!
Anyway, here's how things looked back in 2007.
Blackberry was kinda the king
because it's devices were simple, they were fast,
and they had super-long battery life.
Palm was running out the clock on Palm OS
and trying to figure out what it was gonna do next.
Nokia was doing some Symbian stuff
and basically everybody else
was making Windows mobile devices
which went from Pocket PC to Windows Mobile
when Microsoft started focusing more on phones,
but this was before Windows phone existed.
Anyway, the point is Microsoft was trying to replicate
the Windows PC business model but with phones,
so it partnered with Samsung and Motorola and HP
and HTC and a bunch of other smaller manufacturers.
And a lot of these smartphones felt like overgrown PDAs
with antennas tacked onto them.
But, that was starting to change
by the time the iPhone rolled around.
(uptempo, jazzy music)
This right here, this is the Moto Q, the original.
It ran Windows Mobile and it came out in 2006.
Now, I'm not saying
that this was the best smartphone back then
but it was actually in the running,
and there's some really cool things about it.
It's got this backlit QWERTY keyboard here.
It's got this dope jog dial
and it was one of the phones that made people realize
that something nerdy like a smartphone
could actually be accessible to more people.
Anyway, this thing, this kinda gadgety,
dorky looking phone right here,
or more specifically phones that are just like it,
they were the thing that made Google think
that it needed to do Android.
Okay, so why do we know that?
Well, let's start with some,
I don't know, circumstantial evidence.
Take a look at this thing.
This is the Sooner.
It was the very first prototype of an Android phone.
It looks kinda familiar, doesn't it?
It looks kinda like the Moto Q eh?
Or kinda like this other phone
which came out a little bit later, it's the Treo Pro.
Fun fact, I heard that when Palm was in really bad places
it went to HTC and basically took something
HTC had already been developing
and had them turn it into this Windows Mobile Treo for them.
It's possible that this
Windows Mobile Treo device right here
is what the Sooner sort of, maybe,
eventually turned into, maybe.
Anyway, it was phones like this
and the Samsung Blackjack and the Moto Q,
that showed that Microsoft was maybe getting closer
to actually kinda knowing what it was doing in mobile,
and so Google saw these phones
and it decided it needed to gun for Microsoft,
not Apple at the time,
so it bought Andy Rubin's Android company
and it got to work.
Maybe you've read this famous story
about how Andy Rubin reacted
to the launch of the first iPhone.
According to an article in the Atlantic,
he was in a car watching the keynote,
and when he saw the iPhone he said, "Holy crap!
"I guess we're not gonna ship that phone!"
Except he didn't say it like Strong Bad
'cause he's not Strong Bad.
Anyway, when he said we're not gonna ship that phone,
he meant the Sooner,
because compared to the iPhone it looked instantly dated,
it looked like these Windows Mobile phones.
Now according to Diane Hackthron,
a Google engineer at the time,
she said that the decision to drop Sooner
was well before the iPhone announcement,
though we continued to use it for quite a while,
internally for development,
since it was the only semi-stable hardware platform
that we had.
Whichever version of the story is true,
the end result was this,
the HTC G1, which was code named Dream,
it was the first commercially available phone
that ran Android
and it was unveiled a year and some change after the iPhone.
Now compared to the Sooner this is much more advanced.
It has a touchscreen for example.
And compared to Windows Mobile phones
it also feels pretty advanced.
It has a landscape keyboard that you can type on,
and this cool Sidekick lookin' flip-up thing,
and it's got a scrollball,
and you can also put SD card in it.
This is a super gadgety gadget, and using it, looking at it,
you can really tell that they were more focused
on getting business users and taking on Windows Mobile
than they were just trying to take on the iPhone.
So I admit, this is all circumstantial evidence.
And you probably want actual evidence.
And you know what makes really good evidence?
Actual evidence.
Google's former CEO said
that Android was about taking on Windows Mobile.
One of the bigger tech trials of the past decade
was Google versus Oracle.
Tech trials are great because you get testimony.
You get executives on the witness stand
and they have to answer questions.
And Oracle really needed to talk
about the early days of Android to prove it's case.
So here's the transcript of the jury trial proceedings
of Oracle v. Google from April 24th, 2012.
Oracle's lawyers are questioning Eric Schmidt
about the origins of Android.
And Eric Schmidt answers,
"We were quite concerned about Microsoft's products.
"It's hard to relate to that now,
"but at the time we were very concerned
"that Microsoft's mobile strategy would be successful.
"This was before the iPhone was announced
"and before the whole iPhone revolution occurred."
So, honestly, there you have it.
The whole structure of how Android works
was designed to undercut Windows Mobile.
Samsung and LG and HTC, basically most of the companies
that were making phones back then
were making Windows Mobile phones,
and Google got them to make Android phones too.
And then make them basically exclusively.
That was the trick.
That's why you have an entire ecosystem
of Android phone partners.
Google knew all of these companies
would want to make phones,
so it knew it had to make the operating system
those phones would run.
Google wanted for phones
what Microsoft had on the desktop, scale.
They wanted Android on every phone.
'Cause more Android customers meant more searches,
which means more money for Google
because Google makes all it's money
off of people using Search,
and that's how they paid for Android.
Giving Android away for free
actually made Google more money
'cause more people were using, and it undercut Microsoft
which was making companies pay a license fee for Windows.
The bottom line is if you've ever wondered
why Android works the way it does,
why even today there's still weird quirks
like menus and back-buttons and whatever,
don't look at the iPhone.
You should actually take a look back,
way back, at the Moto Q
because this is what they were trying to compete with.
Hey everybody, thanks for watching.
We're probably gonna do some of these more history videos,
so let me know what moments
in Android's history you're interested in
or let me know what you're nostalgic for
'cause God damn I love this little phone.
It's so nerdy, it's got a trackball,
it also doesn't have a headphone jack.
So take that, every phone made right now, I guess, anyway!