That's awkward. Welcome, defend, Android, partners, ecosystem. It's all the same quote.
Edit: But assuming they all mean it, this is actually fantastic. It's good to see that they aren't afraid; they don't seem themselves in a weakened position and they do desperately need the legal force that Google can provide to be on their side.
I doubt they all believe it, but they all want it to be true. At this point going on record for something they hope Google will do costs them very little.
But it is a bit telling that they didn't have an actual statement to make. I suggest the CEO's office of these companies is trying to make sense of the deal still.
How they really feel will be more apparent in statements about Windows Phone. They'll still state the party line on Android for a while, but if Samsung and HTC start openly talking about positive reception of WP devices and excitement around Mango then there's been an internal change in tune.
That’s how it works. Do you really believe that CEOs have the time to think up statements?
I thought this was common knowledge by now. The PR people write it, CEOs only give their ok.
Edit: All the statements being so similar is a testament to very shoddy PR work but it’s not all that surprising. The same PR people (well, very likely a single person) from Google who wanted to get statements from the all presidents and CEOs just called up the PR departments of all the companies and asked for statements, suggesting, along the way, the language: “Hi, this is Michael from Google. As you know we will very soon acquire Motorola and it would be very nice if we could get a short one sentence statement from your CEO about that, you know, to show your and our shareholders and customers how committed we are to the Android ecosystem. I can send you an email with an example statement to give you an idea about the length. Would that be alright?”
Yeah, my point was just that the statements clearly came from a common source (Google) not surprise that CEOs were not speaking with their own voices. The effect is that the statements do not appear at all sincere. They sound like they made these statements with Google twisting their arm, which has the opposite of the intended effect.
I'd doubt there was even that much involvement from the other companies - more along the lines of "We'd like to involve the following quote from your boss as a third-party validator in our release. OK?" And then their corporate PR says OK, because they haven't see the other ones, and it goes in the package.
This is how large-scale communications works - you write your message, come up with quotes that support your message, get them OK'ed by stakeholders, and send them out. If you ever see a media release that doesn't come from a speech, and it includes quotes from anyone, you can bet they never actually said those things - someone from PR wrote them, and got them OKed to have been considered said.
Put it another way, the first time the CEOs quoted ever saw what they "said" was probably when they read this page
That’s certainly also possible. I was just thinking there was more involvement because I have a really hard time imagining that some PR person at Google was writing one statement after another and didn’t notice how odd they would sound if you put them together on a page. Noticing stuff like that is something PR people are supposed to be good at.
That’s why I was thinking that Google gave them some talking points and they got oddly similar sounding statements back and didn’t really bother changing them afterwards.
Google PR should've done a better job of giving each OEM a different and longer quote. Cmon, is it that hard? The quotes when put next to each other, look like a joke.
Having been quoted in press releases before, I can say that it often works that way: the PR droids will send something saying "we quoted you saying this, is that OK with you?" It's weird.
I have to agree with this. Looking at those statements side by side it's as if they were given an assignment with 8 key words to choose from and given 5 minutes to work up a sentence.
t0rbad> so there i was in this hallway right
BlackAdder> i believe i speak for all of us when i say...
BlackAdder> WRONG BTICH
BlackAdder> IM SICK OF YOU
BlackAdder> AND YOUR LAME STORIES
BlackAdder> NOBODY HERE THINKS YOURE FUNNY
BlackAdder> NOBODY HERE WANTS TO HEAR YOUR STORIES
BlackAdder> IN FACT
BlackAdder> IF YOU DIED RIGHT NOW
BlackAdder> I DON"T THINK NOBODY WOULD CARE
BlackAdder> SO WHAT DO YOU SAY TO THAT FAG
*** t0rbad sets mode: +b BlackAdder*!*@*.*
*** BlackAdder has been kicked my t0rbad ( )
t0rbad> so there i was in this hallway right
CRCError> right
heartless> Right.
r3v> right
They're all hostages of patents and Google has an opportunity to stage a breakout. It could not go that way of course, but the opportunity is certainly there. I'd love to see Google play absolute hardball on anyone who comes after their Android partners.
Google's been withholding source code for Android lately. If they decide not to give access to the Android Marketplace, Google Maps etc to an OEM for any reason, the OEM is as good as finished, since forking the OS is a big deal.
While patents are a thorn on the side, they do not threaten the bread and butter of OEMs like even just delaying the release of source code(that the new Moto division already has from a long time prior) does.
Who's the hostage? It looks like they are trying to say Google is now responsible to ensure Android is defended. Perhaps they are trying to get it on the record that Google will not try to sue them? I'm not a lawyer, but it almost sounds like some kind estoppel thing.
>Who's the hostage? It looks like they are trying to say Google is now responsible to ensure Android is defended.
What if their reaction was frank? Something like
"We are concerned that this acquisition is lopsided and will hurt the major OEMs since now Motorola will have very big advantages that we won't. The DoJ and EU should look at forcing Google to give the same access to Android to us as they would do to their new hardware division."
>Who's the hostage?
The fact that it was a canned PR release from Google that they echoed instead of the above shows who's the hostage.
I don't think it sounds awkward or robotic but rather carefully thought out. If you release a longer statement, with many varied points, journalists can cherry-pick which statement they wish to draw attention to. In this age of out-of-context soundbytes, to keep maximum control over the message, the statements you release must be as short as possible.
Choose your most important point and release that only, as simply as you are able to state it.
Edit: But assuming they all mean it, this is actually fantastic. It's good to see that they aren't afraid; they don't seem themselves in a weakened position and they do desperately need the legal force that Google can provide to be on their side.