David Ruddock - 97/143 - Android Police - Android News, Apps, Games, Phones, Tablets

David Ruddock

David's phone is an HTC One X+. He is an avid writer, and enjoys imparting a legal perspective on Android news where it is relevant. He also doesn't usually write such boring sentences.

Follow @rdr0b11

Dec

[LOL Of The Day: Throwback Edition] 2009 PCMag Article Asks "Has Android Already Failed?"

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS

First off, this is all in good fun. Any intelligent person could draw the conclusions this author did based on what was happening at the time, and with the limited information available about Google's plans for Android. We're posting this because it's funny to look back on it with some hindsight.

Back in 2009, Android's fate was anything but decided in the eyes of the tech journalism world, and many took a dismal view of Google's purchase of the young upstart open-source mobile operating system. What could Google, a website, possibly do with a mobile phone OS? This 2009 PCMag article, titled "Has Android Already Failed?" has some real gems, including speculation that Android is doomed, and, in what is news to us, headed to netbooks:

Android's proponents, including Google CEO Eric Schmidt, now seem to be turning their attention to netbooks.

Dec

[Updated: Here Are The Winners!] Mega-Holiday Giveaway #1: Win One Of 4 HTC EVO Design 4G's Or A White EVO 3D

Posted by David Ruddock in Contests / Giveaways, EVO 3D (Shooter), EVO Design 4G, HTC

Last Updated: December 26th, 2011

And so it begins - Android Police's First Annual Mega-Holiday Giveaway Series. For the next ten days, you'll have chances to win all sorts of awesome Android phones, tablets, and other goodies. (As a note to our international readers, this first contest features prizes that don't work outside the US, but don't worry, we have some more stuff coming for you later today.)

This contest is now over. Here are our winners, selected at random:

Grand prize - White EVO 3D: Anne Kaluza, a.k.a. @mrs_puddle
EVO Design 4G: Will McKee, a.k.a. @Skullshank
EVO Design 4G: Chris Webster
EVO Design 4G: Rachel L Farhi
EVO Design 4G: Eric Camil, a.k.a.

Dec

Coming Soon: The Android Police 2011 Mega-Holiday Giveaway - So Much Stuff We Made Santa Jealous

Posted by David Ruddock in Contests / Giveaways, News

Android Police is getting into the spirit of the holiday season, by throwing so much free Android goodness at you that you just might be sick (not really, we hope). We'll be giving away over 150 prizes over the next ten days from many of our friends, including NVIDIA, RadioShack, Texas Instruments, Beansoft, Gameloft, and more. It's going to be our biggest giveaway ever. You'll have the chance to win phones, tablets, cases, headphones, books, and other miscellaneous awesome Android-related stuff.

Oh, and did we mention Samsung's Galaxy Nexus and ASUS's Transformer Prime are going to be up for grabs?

Dec

Gingerbread Now Running On 50% Of Android Devices, Just In Time For Ice Cream Sandwich

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Cupcake 1.5, Donut 1.6, Eclair 2.1, Froyo 2.2, Gingerbread 2.3, Honeycomb 3.0/3.1/3.2, News

Last Updated: August 20th, 2012

Google has released the latest of its monthly Android version distribution charts, and for the first time Android 2.3 Gingerbread is present on over half of all Android devices. A milestone, to be sure.

We also get a look at the end success rate of Honeycomb (a tablet-only version of Android), which achieved a mere 2.5% piece of the Android pie since the first Honeycomb device release back in February. Android 1.5 and 1.6 (Cupcake and Donut) have continued their march toward extinction, commanding only 2.1% of the Android population total. Android 2.2 has remained relatively steady at 35%, but is clearly on the downtrend.

Nov

HTC Might Ignore IPCom And Keep Selling Smartphones In Germany, Despite Injunction

Posted by David Ruddock in HTC, Legal, News

If you haven't heard, Germany has pretty much become the hotspot for smartphone and tablet patent litigation. Most recently, HTC has been hitting headlines in its ongoing battle against IPCom, an intellectual property firm. IPCom claims that HTC's smartphones violate a number of its patents in the realm of 3G GSM technology. HTC says that the last time it made a phone which might have violated those patents was in 2009, and that it has since developed a workaround which does not infringe on IPCom's patents.

A court in Karlsruhe issued an injunction against HTC because of these patents last week.

Nov

EFF Defends Android Dev Trevor Eckhart From Carrier IQ's Bogus Legal Threats After Exposing Phone Data Logging

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Legal, News

If you don't know who Trevor Eckhart is, you might remember a little piece we published earlier this year about a massive HTC data vulnerability caused by the company's data-logging operations. Trevor was the guy who found that vulnerability and did almost all of the legwork in investigating it. Since then, Trevor has been hard at work looking at more mobile data logging applications used by various manufacturers, including one written by a company called Carrier IQ.

CIQ, as it's more commonly known, harvests various user data from its host device and sends it back to carriers or manufacturers for analysis and record-keeping purposes.

Nov

Editorial: Android Custom ROM Developers, I Think We Need To Have A Talk

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Development, Editorials

Dear Android Custom ROM developers: I love most of you. Really. You're part of what makes Android so awesome, because you're so enthusiastic about it, and about making it better. Because of you, we have awesome things like CyanogenMod.

I want to give you some numbers. Let's just look at some popular Android devices:

T-Mobile Galaxy S II: 9
AT&T Galaxy S II: 8
HTC ThunderBolt: 23
DROID BIONIC: 7
Epic 4G Touch: 10

What do these figures represent? The number of different custom ROMs found on the first page of the XDA forums for the above devices. The ThunderBolt's count comes from the pinned post on the ThunderBolt's forum with a listing of ROMs - and those are only the Gingerbread ones.

Nov

Motorola Says Apple's iCloud Infringes On Patent In Germany, Presiding Judge Seems To Agree

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Legal, Motorola, News

A court in Mannheim, Germany today held a preliminary hearing in a patent dispute between Motorola Mobility and Apple Sales International (a European Apple distribution subsidiary), and it seems like Apple's on the ropes.

While the hearing didn't discuss the particular merits of Motorola's patent infringement claim against Apple, the presiding judge issued substantial blows to Apple's defense by indicating that he believed the patent-in-suit was ripe for trial. The judge also seemed to agree with Motorola's reading of that patent (also known as "construction claims") in important ways that would allow it a broader scope of applicability at trial.

The judge did not seem interested in many of Apple's defenses, such as Motorola's claim lacking specificity, the patent in question being invalid, or that the patent should be construed more narrowly.

Nov

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Editorial: Google Music Doesn't Bring Anything New To The Table - But That May Not Matter

Posted by David Ruddock in Android OS, Editorials

Google Music is old hat. Sorry, guys - it's true. Streaming? Amazon's Cloud Player and iTunes iCloud both have it. Locker storage? Amazon gives you a decent amount, too - and they might even increase it if they feel Google Music is one-upping them. Purchase options? Apple and Amazon both have more music you can purchase digitally, including titles from Warner Music Group (which Google Music does not have), where many major contemporary artists are signed.

Basically, Google did what it had to with Music: it kept up with the competition. Not having streaming, cloud storage, or a major storefront would make Google Music look like a joke next to iTunes with iCloud or Amazon MP3, and this is probably why Google waited so long after the launch of the "Beta" to unveil Music in a more public way.

Nov

Is Amazon Deliberately Hiding Non-Kindle eReader Apps From Kindle Fire Owners?

Posted by David Ruddock in Amazon, Kindle Fire, News

It sure seems that way, according to Android Guys. They claim competing eBook apps such as Kobo and Aldiko don't appear in search results when using the Amazon Appstore on a Kindle Fire tablet. Additionally, eBook reader developer BlueFire claims that while his app is listed as Kindle Fire-compatible on the Amazon Appstore, it too fails to show up in search results on the device.

We've not heard of many apps mysteriously not showing up in the Fire's app list (presumably Amazon had lots of time to work on ensuring most apps on its store would be compatible) for a lack of compatibility, so if this does turn out to be true, we can probably assume that Amazon made a conscious decision to keep competitors' apps out of the hands of users.