If you’ve rooted and modded your Android phone you’ve probably found Cyanogen, one of the best sources for modded Android ROMs out there. All of his ROMs are stable, usable on the G1 and MyTouch, and well-designed.
Google, however, takes issue with him releasing closed-source Google apps like Gmail, Maps, and YouTube and has sent him a cease and desist. They’re not particularly mad about the ROMs, mind you, just the apps inside them.
He IMed the folks at AndroidAndMe, telling them:
[20:03]
google just cease and desisted me
[20:15]cyanogenmod is probably going to be dead
[20:16]i’m opening a dialogue with them
[20:20]no they are talking specifically about the closed-source google apps
[20:20]and how i am not licensed to distribute them
Presumably he can just take out the closed source apps and he’ll be fine. The only problem will be the users who may or may not have the wherewithal to find them online later.
very good post ..
This is sure to raise a ruckus and will make Google look bad unless they quickly find a resolution to this.
What they need to do is hire him and pay loads of $ to make their product better. I’m making this comment from a g1 running one of his roms and it is great, far better than the stocjk roms.
Here’s just more proof that while Android is a Google-developed platform, Google does not want all Androids to be known as Google phones. What I’d think would be the practical alternative would be to have a google apps apk available on the Google code site, that ROM devs can link to. They distribute the apps package for PCs, right?
The app market does not include some of these google applications (i.e. Gmail, Google Talk) so if they are not distributed with the modified rom the user will end up with a significantly inferior phone, practically defeating the reason for an alternate rom (and google can close the few remaining workaroud to get these apps).
So legal issues aside, it appears that Google is trying to control the market and the user experience in the very same way Apple does.
This opens the door for for Apple to go back to the FCC and say that they are not controlling the iPhone market more than Google does the Android app market. Google may have been penny wise and pound foolish. They thought they shot Cyanogen, buy may have shot themselves in the foot.
The cyanogenMod products are excellent. It is unfortunate that Google has decided, after all this time of app-redistribution by 3rd parties, that they have to suddenly do something. As far as the Apps go: Gmail? You can get that through the included web browser. Google Talk? Not a show stopper for me. Google Maps? Well, yeah, that one is pretty important, but you can download that App from the Android Market.
It is unfortunate that a company with a “do no evil” motto appears to behave in an underhanded (hence, “evil”) fashion. Shame on Google (again).