The obvious comparison is to Apple's iPhone, but the idea that Google is going to go head-to-head with Apple, matching feature against feature, is probably mistaken.

We don't know yet what Google intends, but allow me to speculate on the "gPhone," which could be an interesting model for differentiating such a new phone and computer from its glitzy competitor.

If there's one thing Google has taught us in the past few years, it's that thinking in terms of stand-alone products isn't the way Google operates.

Apple's iPhone is curiously out of touch, despite its connectivity via phone and Web browser. The gadget offers no way to install third-party software, unless it operates through the Safari Web browser. Developers who want to create programs that run directly on the iPhone can't do so without voiding the warranty, damaging the phone or possibly damaging the AT&T cellular network, Steve Jobs says.

This is pretty hard to swallow -- especially the bit about damaging the network -- considering the widespread use of third-party software on other mobile devices.

An online friend chides me, asking why I would need third-party products when Apple's are so good, but I think he's missing the point.

Innovation isn't predictable, and you don't nurture it by declaring experimentation off-limits, no matter how highly you regard your own creations.

So what exactly does Google have in mind, given the clear success of the iPhone in attracting customers and, in many respects, changing the paradigm of what a telephone should be?

My assumption is that the company is looking beyond the success of a single phone and thinking about how to create standards that will resonate throughout the industry. Doing that will apparently involve a mobile operating system based on Linux. It will also involve tapping into a wide range of online applications and robust third-party contributions.

The latest Internet buzz on the potential Google phone suggests that Google wants to create, not the telephone itself, but the software that cell phone manufacturers can build into their latest products.

An operating system coming out of the open-source world is a serious challenge to Microsoft's Windows Mobile. It also challenges the control exerted by wireless carriers, which often cherry-pick the software and services that can run on their devices.

But ponder how far this model could go.

That open-source platform could be used to develop unique features for a carrier's telephones and establish hierarchies of devices that focus on doing some tasks well.

Maybe you don't need a Swiss Army knife version of a phone but wish you had a way to concentrate on a global positioning system. A cell phone running open-source software could put the Google Maps service to good use, and the third-party programs to support GPS mapping tasks would proliferate.

That's the kind of flexibility that saw hand-held applications for Palm Treos, Blackberries and the rest become readily available, precisely because the gadgets were open to such innovations. Obviously, a phone that uses Google technology could be tuned to maximize the Internet search giant's programs by loading support for these capabilities into the device.

Playing interestingly around all this is Google's AdSense program, which might allow the cost of the telephones to be at least partially subsidized by advertising.

Industry commentator TechCrunch (www.techcrunch.com) suggests the possibility of Google sharing ad revenue with developers in much the same way that it shares revenues with Web log operators, giving them a percentage of the income they generate. That could draw more developers and innovation, tying location-based ads to a Google cell phone experience.

It's a scenario that makes sense, though I stress again that we're still at the rumors-and-leaked-information stage of Google's potential phone quest.

One thing that I seriously doubt will happen is a wild rush to buy a cell phone that uses Google technology. Apple is a master of generating demand for a product and responding to that demand with revised versions of that product. Google lacks that kind of marketplace experience for hardware, nor would a phone using Google programs likely create the kind of mystique that the iPhone did.

But open development makes many friends, gaining traction as small companies go to work producing software to run on such devices.

We might be at the beginning of a wave of innovation that rides the coattails of the iPhone introduction, with consumers beginning to consider new possibilities for the phones they carry.

In the meantime, ponder what seems to be developing as Google works on gPay, a mobile telephone payments system that might be built into the new handsets. Each phone would become a wallet substitute for a wide variety of commercial scenarios.

No doubt about it: Any work on a phone that uses Google innovation bears watching.

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