Google acquiring Motorola Mobility

Happy Monday to you, and happy Monday to Motorola Mobility, which Google has announced is about to become its next acquisition. This comes hot on the heels of a $56 million Q2 net loss for Moto -- and CEO Sanjay Jha's less than subtle hints about going fishing for Android-related patent royalties. Now, at a price of $40 per share for a total of about $12.5 billion, Big G will be making Moto a "dedicated Android partner" to "supercharge the Android ecosystem" and "enhance competition in mobile computing."

Larry Page had this to say about the deal:

    Motorola Mobility's total commitment to Android has created a natural fit for our two companies. Together, we will create amazing user experiences that supercharge the entire Android ecosystem for the benefit of consumers, partners and developers. I look forward to welcoming Motorolans to our family of Googlers.

What happens next? While this will of course strengthen the ties between hardware and software, Google is pledging to continue offering Android as an open platform -- Moto will license it and others will be able to as ever. Additionally, Google will continue to operate its new toy as a separate business and not morph it into an in-house hardware wing. But, one has to wonder what this means for companies like Samsung, which partnered closely with Google on the Nexus S, and of course HTC, which released the Nexus One and the iconic G1. And then there's the big question: just where does Moto Blur fit into this equation?

Update: More quotes from Android partners after the break.

Peter Chou, CEO, HTC:

    We welcome the news of today's acquisition, which demonstrates that Google is deeply committed to defending Android, its partners, and the entire ecosystem.

Bert Nordberg, President & CEO, Sony Ericsson:

    I welcome Google's commitment to defending Android and its partners.

Jong-Seok Park, President & CEO, LG:

    We welcome Google's commitment to defending Android and its partners.

J.K. Shin, President, Samsung, Mobile Communications Division:

    We welcome today's news, which demonstrates Google's deep commitment to defending Android, its partners, and the ecosystem.

iMID

Google TV add-on preview for Android SDK now available

Back in May at Google I/O 2011, we learned that Honeycomb would be coming to Google TV, and that we would be seeing an SDK add-on for developers to begin work on apps for the big screen.  Since then, we've seen Honeycomb leak out for the Logitech Revue, so we know it's pretty far along.  Today the Google TV team has announced and released a preview of the Android SDK add-on, allowing developers to start getting ready for the Honeycomb update.  This isn't something for the average Android user to play around with, even though a Google TV emulator on your computer may sound tempting.  It requires a machine running Linux, with  kernel-based virtualization built and operational.  This means that the emulator won't be the sluggish build we currently see for Honeycomb, and should make for a much better experience for the folks developing apps for Google TV.

The Google TV team has also published design patterns and UI guidelines for Android on the television, with great notes about resolution, overscan, application scaling and other issues likely to crop up while writing apps for 1080p displays.  We're excited to see Google getting ready for the Honeycomb update for Google TV devices, and it's great to see good tools for developers making their way out the door.  Google TV could be the next big push from Mountain View, and a little pro-active planning will go a long way.  For more information, or to get the tools ready and set up your own Google TV development environment, check out the source link.

iMID

BBC News Mobile: Mango Beta [Hands on]

Now, he's gone ahead and released the beta XAP file for those of you with dev unlocked devices and Mango to side load. Of course he'd greatly appreciate if you could provide bug reports, insight, opinions, etc. so as to make the app even better. The current beta will work till September 1st at which point he'll update with a newer version, but you should also follow his blog for any new updates in the mean time.

We took it for a spin and even though it's just "beta" it feels pretty polished to us. Check out the video above where you can see the multiple Live Tiles in action, dual flip live tiles, feeds and get the over-all feel of the app. We're already really impressed with the new version and it's fun to see the power of Mango in action.

Grab the XAP and get more info here. Grab the free non-Mango version in the Marketplace here.

iMID

Activate Facebook Chat in Windows Phone "Mango" [How To]

You should know by now that Windows Phone "Mango" has Facebook Chat built in to the Messaging app (see our full Mango review). Turning it on is actually pretty simple: navigate to the Messaging (SMS) app, hit Setting and enable. Or you can do it under Settings --> Applications --> Messaging. Easy enough, so why the how to? Well, this is more a "troubleshooting" thing i.e. you're one of the very few who can't it to work.

See, since I've been running "Mango"  (nearly a month next week), I could not get Facebook Chat enabled. Yup. Every time I'd throw that lil' switch, it would ask me to setup Facebook Chat, it would then open what looks like an embedded IE window where it would return with a "Page cannot be found". Seriously. It did this dozens of times and I just thought "welp, it's not enabled yet".

Long story short: I didn't have my Facebook account linked to my Windows Live one. Who knew it was necessary? It would have been nice for an error message to explain that but alas, I was lost till I ran across Mobility Minded's excellent step by step guide on setting this up. The guide was perfect right up to the point when I had to enable the feature and bam...it still didn't work.

The solution was an extra step not in Mobility Minded's otherwise great write up: delete the Facebook account on the phone and set it up again (just name and password). The next time I headed to Messaging --> Settings, Facebook Chat was magically enabled and all is good. Of course the funny part in all of this is I don't use Facebook or Chat period, except for testing. Still, this issue was nagging me and hopefully if any of you have something similar, it'll help too.

iMID