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Since talk of the gPhone emerged, developers whisper that other companies, including Apple, may open their mobile-software platforms to programmers. "Mobile platforms will become very common in the next year," believes developer Craig Hockenberry. "We are on the cusp of a major shift in mobile technology."
Part of that shift will involve greater organization on the part of open-source developers creating applications in mobile Linux, which comes in many different flavors. "There are a lot of fragmented initiatives," says Jerry Panagrossi, vice-president of U.S. operations at Symbian. "A developer has to overhaul their code for every application they target." By designing for gPhone's particular flavor of Linux, open-source developers may be able to present a unified front--and reduce development costs. Consultancy ABI Research forecasts that Linux will be the fastest-growing smartphone operating system in the next five years. "Google has a lot of muscle to distribute things and to get [developers] excited," says Automattic's Schneider.
Part of that excitement stems from the possibility for developers to tap a new revenue source: mobile advertising, instead of user subscription fees. Developers may be able to share in revenues from ads displayed in the applications. Three weeks ago, Handmark, which sells applications and content for personal digital assistants, began displaying banner and search ads in its applications. It's seeing a nine percent click-through rate on its display ads and a 10 percent conversion rate on users who use the click-to-call service from its local paid-search feature. By contrast, PC Web banner ads often generate click-through rates of less than one percent.
"Openness would pay off for everybody," says Mike Phillips, co-founder of vlingo, a maker of software that lets users type using voice. Google's lips are sealed, but the buzz among mobile developers is well under way. Says John SanGiovanni, co-founder of ZenZui, a maker of tools used by mobile-widget makers. "We certainly hope Google will give us an honest-to-goodness mobile platform, so that we can party on it."
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