Senior Vice President at Motorola, Rick Osterloh stated to reporters on Monday that their goal is to provide regular updates and to ship a purer Android experience to their customers. He stated:
Going forward, we’re going to try to be as close to the base as we can be, because we think that’s the right thing for users. We think users also want fast upgrades and upgrades for their phones over the long haul, so we’re going to be focus on that as well. It’s a little bit different than what a lot of OEMs are doing and certainly what Motorola did in the past, but going forward that’s going to be our strategy.
- Rick Osterloh
When reading around the tech blogs and reading about further details that were detailed by Osterloh, it’s would be clear that Motorola prefers to ship out Vanilla Android phones, but back down at the demands of Verizon and other carriers to ship a more skinned experience. When I re-read his statement, I get another impression.
Motorola will be in the not so distant future will be releasing their own Nexus device. Rumors have swirled for weeks now about inevitable LG, Sony, and Samsung Nexus announcements later this year, but it’s clear that the new leadership at Motorola is going to inevitably supersede Verizon’s demands by releasing a Nexus phone on their carrier as well as others.
With the lack of enthusiasm for the Blur experience on Motorola, I believe a turning point will also occur for other OEM’s as well. It’s up to us as users and enthusiasts to not only sidestep these stock themed experiences, but to demand a tidal change in how Android is presented to the general public. Choice is great provided that stock AOSP experience is provided as an option with the others.
The mainstream tech press does not count us when it comes to the overall Android phenomenon. We are considered a niche group of geeks that want to supercharge our devices and aren't added to the overall demand of what people want out of their phones. Our time has come to make a loud and clear case to carriers and to tech journos that there is a significant branch of Android fans that love it just the way it is in all of its original glory.
