"Realising that not everyone wants to compile their own kernel before making a call"

so true!

It won't do any better than linux on the desktop

Could this at last be a chance to get a phone that is a... phone?

Linux powering cell phones is nothing new. In Asia Linux has shipped ten's of millions of phones phones. Here in the US Motorolla has now shipped its first Linux phone, and lets not forget the IPhone is a *nix phone

Bought that mobile in Singapore in summer '05, *nix phone too and hacked to death already (see www.motorolafans.com). Touchscreen and a very iPhoney style, in fact Apple and Motorola were together back in the day in order to release a MP3 Phone thing.

Still stands the test of time so I guess it was some €300 well spent.

I'm guessing these things are dual core (the GSM low-level smarts are in another chip which isn't open source).

Because although we aren't in Steve Jobs land where a rogue app could crash the entire network, there would be problems if a bugged or malicious device was transmitting when it shouldn't. Which could certainly happen if anyone could recompile the low level GSM code and flash the phone.

OpenMoko may - or may not - be a Great Step forward. But it says nothing at all about Google's Android initiative - which was never going to produce results this side of summer.

So this weird and slanted article tells us much more about your petty fears and prejudices than it does about technology.

If you want to vent your spleen at Google, be my guest. But try to more honest about it, huh?