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>>Alright, what's up guys? Welcome to Editor's Office Hours. We're back in sunny San Francisco, sunny for today at least. I'm joined with Editor Jessica Dolcourt, what's your actual editorial title?
[ Laughter ]
>>I'm an Associate Editor at CNET.web.com.
>>Alright and what we're here today to talk about is basically all things T-Mobile G1 related. We'll talk about the app store because specifically that's what Jessica's beat is with Mobile apps, she's gotta a chance to play around with it a lot and also what her impressions are on the T-Mobile G1. If you guys wanna write us, ask us questions, whatever you guys wanna do, just pop it up here in this box you can submit a question. If you don't have an account with CNET all you have to do is create a user name and password and give us your quick email address and then you'll be able to participate. We also have the live chat running down below so you guys can rip on us, talk about
>>Jessica: No, they wouldn't do that.
>>They would never do such a thing [Laughter] of course not. So let's just get jumpin into it. You've been able to play with the G1 for what about 5 days or so?
>>Jessica: Yeah and all last week.
>>What are your initial just raw impressions? Let's not talk software. Just when you picked it up and you know started using it what'd you come up with.
>>Jessica: Oh, the hardware?
>>Yes, everything.
>>Jessica: Well, I agree with pretty much everything that Bonnie says about it. The interface is pretty cool that is software but I like being able to just slide up this dashboard of all of the applications you've got on it. This big bump here, it's unsightly, it's a really big pain and for me especially, I don't know, it's just really hard. It gets in the way of typing. It gets in the way of like when I press alt and then I have to press something it's just. It's not the world's greatest design.
>>We're talking about if you look at it here. If you can see this the way they designed it actually it feels off center because they have the kinda menu navigations buttons here.
>>Jessica: about a half an inch extra overhang and this pretty thick little knob.
>>But then on this side there's nothing. So it just feels awkward when you have this chunky thing in your right hand while you're trying to, you know, use the device. What other impressions do you have of it? How do you like the scroll ball in the center? Do you like that?
>>Jessica: I actually do kinda of like the scroll wheel. It gives you an alternative if you don't feel like
>>Very blackberryish, this little scroll ball
>>Jessica: It's a little smaller, again, you can press that down to center click. It just gives you an alternative form of navigation and it helps you if you don't feel like gumming up the screen a little bit. One thing I will mention that the keys there's also this menu key here and that and the scroll wheel and this back button are sometimes used in the apps. So if you're going from a full touch screen something like this iPhone here which is all touch in all of the navigation and all the menu is on the screen, then it does take a little bit getting used to. There is a slight learning curve. You can press the menu button and there are more options hidden there. Or, oh to take a picture, you know, with the camera like I don't really know which was the capture button so I played around and then you release it's the scroll wheel and you have to press on that. So there is a little bit of a difference because there could be more hardware involved in using an application depending on just what the publisher does.
>>Ok, excellent. So now you really got a chance to, let's actually talk about just also the general OS and being able to customize the desktop. What did you think about it? I don't know if you can show.
>>Jessica: I think it's kind of cool. It actually does look like a desktop. It's got this blue background, it comes with the clock on it. It comes with a view, it comes with a dialer, a browser, contacts, maps and then everything else. You can actually grab any program you want and kind of just drag it on to, there we go, you hold down it buzzes then you drag it on. Another kind of cool thing is you can switch off to the side. There's a Google search bar. So you actually get 3 desktop views and you can change your wallpaper too if you don't like this so I think that's kind of neat. But I have a cluttered enough desktop anyway. I don't really need to clutter this up. And I think that using, you know, using the menu and getting to the apps through this little flighty thing that lives just off screen was actually a really convenient way to do it. So, I like that. I'll stick with it.
>>Yea, I mean I can see how it's nice. I lot of these phones are allowing you to customize essentially like the desktop of it but I can see how just only having essentially 3 screens to customize your desktop, could be a little cramped especially with all the widgets that will be eventually coming out with this phone. I think my first impressions of this phone is still obviously the first Gen but it has a lot of potential. There's a lot of things that need to be worked out but you can definitely see the potential in it. As the apps develop and give you more access to like un-tap the power it's gonna be nice. It still is really, it feels really like real beta to me still.
>>Jessica: I think that's another key is the organization. I mean, right now everything is alphabetized in here and you can type. You can just flip sideways and start typing to get an app and it does sort of pull in like a searches you type, type thing where it's surfacing the icons. I typed in T and I get like three applications that start with a T. So that's a nice way to use it and that's actually one of the complaints that I have here with the iPhone is that you've got, you've got your main interface and you pretty much have to remember where things are. You can't really auto arrange or if you can I don't know how. So if you've got editing spaces you kinda have to actually manually arrange that and I think that's a real downside. I have to know where things are.
>>But see what I like personally is that because you can customize it you do have to learn where they are but if everything was alphabetized it would drive me crazy.
>>But there should be more options. You should be able to manually customize it and you should be able to have some sort of auto arrange where you don't even have to think about it.
>>Like if it was divided into sections like games versus utilities type thing?
>>Jessica: Sure, whatever you want. But you should have those choices.
>>Yes you should.
>>Jessica: Absolutely
>>We'll be talking about some of the apps that Jessica's been able to play with. I have a few beefs with some app stuff with the Google store as well. But we're gonna first take this first question. It's from, it will show you on your screen right there, this is from night wing. Night wing asks, "Are we starting to see the same apps on both iPhones and Android?" Now Androids app store out of the gates I think it came with something along 50 apps or so maybe.
>>Jessica: Thirty five to 50 [Laughter]
>>Ok, 35, not too many but maybe you can kind of speak on things that you've seen that are similar. What's up with that?
>>Jessica: Ok, are we starting to see some of the same apps? No, not really. Obviously the market, it's called the Android market and that is getting a little bigger and a little bulkier but initially what we saw because Google had an Android developer challenge so a lot of the apps that were developed, and there were a lot of apps that were developed for this because it was a really big bank, but a lot of the apps were actually custom made for Google, well for Android and using a lot of the Google tie ins. So things like GPS, but also things like Map, things like Utube, just basically everything with the phone. And there's a little bit more openness. It's just a different kind of system than the iPhone. So there are quite a few new applications. One for example, this one was a finalist or a winner, Cab for Me Light.
>>What does it do? It helps you find cabs?
>>Jessica: It helps you call a cab basically.
>>From where ever you are, basically.
>>Jessica: From wherever you are. It used GPS. It shows you where you are. It shows you where there are some taxi stands nearby. It gives you a number, a list of numbers of cab companies near you that you can call. And when there's a little bit more development out and they've got some actually partnerships with cab companies, then you'll be able to actually order a cab, you stay where you are or you enter an address and you press the big button and it will call a cab for you to where you are, which I needed actually yesterday in San Francisco. There's also this music app we'll probably talk about later, Tune Wiki, and there are a lot of other apps that were really custom made for Android. Sudden News, last week or two weeks ago, was that I ME mobile decided to make its debut on Google Android and not actually on the iPhone. But I think that a lot of those big companies, yeah, absolutely. If they're gonna have, you know, they'll replicate it, especially if it's easy enough. If you've already got something that's sort of touch screen. Android, even though it does have these hardware buttons that can interact with the programs, not all of them, you know, use them. Some of the programs are touch screen only. So, I think those developers have a lot of opportunity to hopefully easily pour over their applications and will see them across all the major mobile platforms.
>>Yeah and now also what we can do for you is during the break we play a video once in a while, we'll just open up the app store and we'll just scroll through it really quickly and I'll be able to see off the bat if, you know, we see any stand outside are very similar and are the same between the Android store and the iPhone app store. As time goes on and people submit more stuff you will probably see a lot more overlap with some of the same companies developing for both platforms but right now just also because the iPhone is so pervasive in the market, I would say until the G1 kinda shows how far it penetrates. There might be developers that would rather spend their resources, if they're smaller companies, developing for the iPhone until the G1 gains some traction. Because if the device isn't in the market why build an app that where you could get so much traction on the Apple side right?
>>Jessica: Yeah, absolutely
>>Just a business type decision.
>>Jessica: Yeah and that's especially cause right now Google Android suffers from some of the things that the iPhone suffered from at the beginning in terms of attracting business users. It doesn't have exchange. It doesn't have a lot of things. It does have the ability at least to run programs in the background but, you know, we're still not seeing a lot of those full features that really make something like the Blackberry or certain Windows mobile devices high end much more suited at this point to business users. Even the iPhone with support for exchange still has some problems and won't be ideal for certain people.
>>And it still, I mean at the end of the day it still took the iPhone about a year before it really exploded. So you know everyone's like comparing the G1 to the iPhone, which we all wanna do but it's such in its infant state compared to where the iPhone is.
>>Jessica: Although the iPhone has the advantage. There is only one puddle, there is one iPhone and there is, and you can see that as a benefit or actually a drawback, depending on what you like in a phone. We don't really like the hardware. I don't think anybody I've talked to loves the hardware. I think people can work around it. But Google Android is an entire platform and it's in Google's prerogative to basically work with as many carriers and manufacturers as they possibly can. I mean, this one's made by AT&T
>>They just want to get them out to everybody's hands.
>>Jessica: Right, I mean it's the platform that can take any shape so to answer a question that I saw here as well, yes probably really possible that they'll be moving over to other carriers. They haven't made an announcement yet about what those carriers or handsets will be but this is basically, think of this as almost a beta I suppose. It's the first attempt to create it and I think that this is actually a lot more, you know, say what you will about the hardware but we really need to think of this as a platform. We need to judge Google Android on the platform and it's quite too bad it comes with this casing but, but in the future we may see something that's pure touch screen like this with no hardware at all. We may see something that resembles more of a Blackberry, I mean it's really up in the air. And so another question, just to finish this off, this is from Pat Gamer, the Google app store an Apple killer, basically as in Apple
>>Yeah the Apple app store killer
>>It really depends on the developers and what they throw out there. The app store's a lot more open. It doesn't take as much to get an application through there. There have been some concerns about security. There haven't been any reports of any of malware that's come through but there's some concern could malware come through in the future. I imagine that Google's going to do some sort of screening, especially if there are instances. I'm sure they're not just gonna make it a free for all because nobody would want there product and nobody would like Android in that case but I think that there's a lot more freedom and the sky is the limit.
>>Yeah, it really comes down to the developers. Ok, here we go. This question is from Matt Burley [Assumed spelling] and I can just jump on this, he asks "Is the screen plastic or glass?" And actually I looked up on the Android community forums the straight up answer is it's actually a tempered and laminated composite so it's laminated so it can make use of the touch screen, the compassive touch screen and even though it has a plastic feel to it, it's glass so it's pretty scratch resistant. So there you go. It does - when I first played with it I thought oh, it might be a plastic screen but that is the answer. It is a glass screen. It has just been treated the right way.
>>Ok one user wrote in, Ichtar [Assumed spelling] says comment, Google's got a kill switch and they've got control over the Android market. Yeah, so it's not a complete free for all but I think there's a lot more flexibility. I don't think that you're gonna see Google killing apps the same way that Apple has killed podcasting that we all talk about it.
>>Ok, I don't know if you know this off the top of your head, if not it's ok. Someone just asked I heard that the G1 was unlocked today. However Google integration and the Android market don't work when using different SIM cards even though calls in Texas will do. Will those things ever work? First of all, I haven't read that yet. Have you heard anything about that?
>>Jessica: I haven't heard anything yet.
>>So we will maybe take a look and see if that's true but in most cases with a lot of these unlocked phones you are right. This is from Just Cuz, you will have the ability to receive calls and do the text but getting those extra services that kind of enhance how the phone's used, much like when people had the iPhone and they were unlocking it they, at least in most places, they couldn't use visual voice bill because that was a feature specific to the carrier that it was dedicated for so for the most part you probably won't see those kind of extra bells and whistles if it's unlocked. But, you know, who knows? I don't know with your experience or what you know if that's
>>Jessica: My experience is usually on locked phones[Laughter] for testing purposes here at CNET. [Laughter] Otherwise if there's a problem we can't get it serviced. So, I'm gonna take this question from Matt Burley, Matt asks how do I like the keyboard on the G1? I don't. [Laughter]
>>You don't like the actual keyboard?
>>Jessica: I'll tell you why. This big knob here has a lot to do with it. It's kinda sunken in and so it creates this kind of trough and I find some of the keys a little bit on the flat side
>>A little too flush
>>Jessica: Yeah, I just feel like I'm diving in to press the keys.
>>I would say, yeah, the big thing like we talked about earlier is this big, fat, chunky piece where some of the call buttons and menu buttons controls are this. This is what hampers the device the most when I pick it up and feel it and use it. It just gets in the way of every aspect of using it.
>>Jessica: It gets in the way.
>>And also here's the thing like you wanna put this bad boy in your pocket [Laughter] you can't see it but this nub here, this extra thing
>>Jessica: It kinda angles up
>>It's angled up so, although you know, maybe back in the 80's where you like your cordless phone and it curved to your face, you put this curve thing in your pocket and it's actually going to jut out a little bit more. I'm not here to hate on it. We're just talking about it. We're just being honest and real about it, I mean. There's a lot of good things about it to.
>>Jessica: I actually really enjoy using some of the applications on here. I think that using the apps has a really good flow and it feels really natural. I think the iPhone is really easy too for most of the applications. But again more of it comes down to the developers because they can sort of decide to integrate the hard keys or not or use the menu so there's a little bit more guess work, I think.
>>Now here's a question that we both probably will be able to take. This question is from Ben AG89, is there any chance
>>Jessica: Ben Silver?
>>Is it Ben Silver?
>>Jessica: No I don't know.
[ Laughter ]
>>Maybe that's sort of nerler, [Assumed spelling] ok, is there any chance of an Android device coming to other service providers, especially AT&T? So the answer is yes, because the G1, sorry not the G1, the Android platform is developed and made to use on multiple phones. It's not carrier specific so this whole Google phone is really about the platform, about the Android OS. So without a doubt as long as they can, you know, make the agreements with the different carriers from what all indications show, it's going to be at least accessible for all carriers to use with specific phones. It depends if they agree and if it happens, right?
>>Jessica: Yep, basically as far as I know. Maybe all colors of the rainbow, all shapes.
>>Yeah, that would be nice.
>>Jessica: Going slimmer
>>Do you wanna take a little breather and take a little video and then we'll come back and crush through some of these questions? Does that sound good?
>>Jessica: Yeah, sure, let's do
>>Oh, you actually had a question before we get on to the video.
>>Jessica: Ok, I'm gonna answer Nalene's question, the question was, "If I'm going to buy a phone right now, we're going to rush out to the store right now, would it be a Windows Mobile, Android Blackberry or iPhone?" That's a tough call. I think I would still probably go with the Blackberry.
>>It depends on your uses first of all. Like why would you, like how do you use your phone?
>>Jessica: Absolutely, because I'm really interested in some more of the emailing composition aspects and I really like a physical keyboard. I think the bold looks really good. I can't wait to see the storm and try that out. I really like the iPhone. I think it's really easy to use, it's fun, it's got this beautiful, bright, huge screen. So I guess it'd be a toss up between them but I think that the physical keyboard would win me over in the end.
>>Ok, excellent. Alright, we'll be back in a few couple minutes. Sit tight, here's a little video and we'll see you guys in a squish.
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>>You may be a huge fan of the iPhone's touch keyboard but don't you ever get tired of 1 finger typing? I'm Jessica Dolcourt from CNET.download.com and this is the first look at Version 1.0.6 of Writing Pad, a free app that makes writing notes to yourself a whole lot easier. Writing pad is a new kind of input system for the iPhone. Instead of stabbing away at the keypad you just slide your finger over it to trace out the word. For instance if I want to enter the word platypus I touch P and slide my finger in a line until I get to the next letter and the next one after that in one solid movement. It's ok to run right through the other letters you don't need because the beauty of this app is that is figures out what you're getting at. You can also ignore double letters like for the word look. The app has been consistently accurate filling that in. Actually it's been consistently accurate filling in spaces too because you don't actually need to manually enter a space, you just move onto the next word after writing the first word and Writing Pad will automatically enter a space between those words like magic. In case there's any ambiguity guessing the word you want, Writing Pad will give you a list of options to choose from. If your word isn't on that list you can simply add it to the library by typing the word in letter for letter and then pressing the space button. That will prompt you to save the word. When you're all done writing your note you can save it in Writing Pad or even better you can email it. Writing Pad pulls up the iPhones emailing list. It's a fast way to compose emails, even taking iPhones predicted text into account. The big thing that Writing Pad is missing is support for landscape mode. It won't work. There's also a little inconsistency with contraction I'm and with common characters like the exclamation mark which just take way to long to get to. It would be better, I think, to cycle through the comment symbols by tapping on the button like the comma button for example, really similar to what you can do on a cell phone. These little quibbles aside, because they are really little, Writing Pad is a good addition to your iPhone app list and a solution that we wish we could apply everywhere that you see the iPhone's keyboard. I'm Jessica Dolcourt and thanks for looking at Writing Pad.
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>>Ok, guys thanks for watching that video. We're just coming right back and taking your questions. We wanted to refer back to the question about when one of our viewers said that they had just read or saw that the G1 had in fact been unlocked and there's actually the group at unlock T-Mobile G1 that are basically offering you the ability to unlock your G1 phone.
>>Jessica: There you go.
>>Now it's like a $22.99 fee that you pay and essentially you also send them your IMEI code which is like the identity to your phone and if you give that information to them they send you an 8 digit code that unlocks it and frees the G1 from T-Mobile. So there you go for any of you guys that are curious. One thing that the article does mention and there's also a video on Androidcommunity.com that you guys can check out but one thing that it does mention is that, you know, the calls and texting did work like we had talked about but currently the ability to even log into Gmail's email isn't so maybe they'll work those kinks out, probably but at least bottom line it has been unlocked if you want it to.
>>Jessica: That could have something to do with registering the phone. When you register it you actually claim it and make it yours by putting in your Gmail account or your Google account so if anybody else finds my phone they have complete access to all of my contacts.
>>Yeah, we should thank our producer Anthony Neilson for, you know, digging that information out for us. Three heads are better than 2 or really just 1 because I'm just here. [Laughter] Alright we're gonna continue to hit up your questions. One thing, again Jessica is the software guru so some of the questions I know a lot of people wanna know hardware stuff, we will answer most of those that we can based on our experiences and what we know but if you guys really, you know, dig into some of the software stuff that's where all these little secrets are, right?
>>Jessica: [Laughter] That's right.
>>Ok, you have a question you want to take?
>>Jessica: Sure, we have from channel clip
>>Oh is that a little plug to go to channel clip [Laughter] The persons name is L Yaz, Yaz
>>Then AG both had questions about the sound quality, especially the audio quality and a little bit about the video quality too. So I would just say from my experience audio quality is pretty standard. It's annoying that you have to have an adaptor straight out of the box. It kinda comes with headphones.
>>That's right listening to music. Everyone talks about, if you don't know we'll just go over quickly cause people are sick of it
>>Jessica: USB, go ahead
>>Yeah, this is the USB adaptor jack. There is no actual 3.5 millimeter headphone jack on the device so you have to have an adaptor and then plug in your headset. Ok, we're done with that.
>>Jessica: Unless you wanna use the default headphones which are ok, they're fine. And I would say audio quality, one thing if I just picked a song right now I don't know that I'm gonna do it but if I picked a song and turned up the volume all of the way, it's pretty loud. I can hear it.
>>I did, we're going to be actually, just a heads up for you guys, I just worked on a price fight, uh oh, between both the iPhone 3G and the T-Mobile G1, I did get a chance to, you know, test out the call quality and really they sound about the same. AT&T's network, T-Mobile's network, you'll have a few hitches here and there.
>>Jessica: It depends on where you are.
>>Yeah, overall the sound quality is solid. It's not stellar. Its not gonna be anything like Verizon's but its good, it's not poor. It has a few hisses. Sometimes it cracked but it's what you would expect out of a cell phone and both phones the sound quality is full so if you were curious about which one really does sound or if it sounds crappy or not they're both about the same to the naked Brian Tong ear, that is, ok.
>>Jessica: And then in terms of video there was a video question. There are some third party video apps and then there's also this Utube app. I'm playing video now. I know you probably can't see it. It's ok.
>>Utube video quality over the 3G network is basically about the same as Utube video quality over the iPhone's 3G network but one thing that was disturbing to me is the fact that by default the G1 phone does not come with any video software. Now, Jessica did mention you can go to the Android app store and get a video player application that plays a few [Inaudible] but natively out of the box this thing is not made - it doesn't have really much multimedia features when it comes to video and you have to download kind of a, I won't say a home brewed app but a developers app video and it's not built in on the phone. Maybe Google will address that later but that's, with a stream that big I think its lame.
<<Jessica: Also the video's don't play full screen, which is strange because then when you play a video on this, the iPhone, we are totally comparing it. [Laughter]
>>Well, that's alright. That's what people wanna see, that's what they care about right?
>>Jessica: You know, video takes up the whole screen. When you play it on this G1 it's taking up maybe three quarters, five sixth of the screen. So it's a lot smaller when you compare it side by side. That application that I looked at there's one called video player, really basic but it plays videos. You have to get a [Inaudible] from the market. But it plays videos.
>>Yeah, and the video quality, you know, at least out of the box what's available, it just ain't that hot. [Sneeze] Excuse me. Let's, do you see any questions in here that you wanna jump at?
>>Jessica: I'm looking quickly.
>>If not, I can ask you a question.
>>Jessica: I can also talk about apps. Does anybody wanna know about apps?
>>Well, yeah, let's talk about apps for a little bit. Based on what you've been messing around with.
>>Jessica: Ok. Actually there's a video that's coming out tomorrow that's gonna be on the playlist, it's for Tune Wiki, which is actually a song and video app so it helps you download songs. You can also search for music videos off of Utube but it's all contextualized within this application. And what makes it different from the normal Utube app on here is that you can actually save those videos to a library on Tune Wiki on the phone, so this one's pretty neat. I'll just give you an overview. The thing that really stands out about this is lyrics. It will attempt to find lyrics in multiple languages, can't guarantee that they're all correct [Laughter] but they're there. You can find lyrics in your language and it will attempt to think them. Lyrics aren't available for all songs and right now there is some questioning over licensing so it's possible that those lyrics could get pulled if there's a stop order but I did find lyrics for several songs and music videos. That's just really neat to be looking at it. You've always wondered what they're saying. [Laughter] So to see that lyric pop up and you can try to rethink it if the lyrics get out of sync so that's neat. And there is a social aspect for Tune Wiki, it's that you can look at any given time, you see the song that you're playing and you can see who else in your area or who else around the world is listening to that song. This builds consolidarity around the globe.
>>Is that it sends the data of your location to a server so you know this?
>>Jessica: Yea, exactly, it uses the GPS and it finds all the people who are using Tune Wiki and since Tune Wiki knows what you're playing it knows what everybody else is playing too.
>>Ok, well this is actually a nice little transition because someone asks, not someone but Jeman [Assumed spelling] says, "What GPS or location apps are currently available?" So that's one of them.
>>Jessica: Oh, good question.
>>This is what I'm talkin about. So what other apps have you found.
>>Jessica: A lot. [Laughter] A lot of them.
>>Go to town, go to town.
>>Jessica: So there is actually many of them. There is, where did it go, it's called where to go
>>Where to go?
>>Where to go and that basically finds you nightlife spots and every time you open it it gives you a little recommendation of a highly rated spot near you and knows where you are so it knows how to intelligently recommend it so in a second it will tell me where to go.
>>And it doesn't have the whole Google maps feature obviously.
>>Jessica: Yeah, so this tells me to go to Slide Club, it's rated 85 out of 100 and it is half mile away. So that's kind of cool. Let me see, Tune Wiki is definitely one. The Cab app that I was talking about. It knows where you are and you actually have to program in if you want the cab to pick you up from somebody else's place like if you're ordering it for 5 minutes from now and you're just on the street. So that's one. Some of the apps where you're going to - oh, here's one all the shopping applications. So there are actually 3 shopping applications I recently took a look at and wrote a little review about. Compare everywhere, Shop Savvy, actually those are the 2 that use GPS but what you do is this was me. Do you have anything with a bar code?
>>No, not right now, other than the one on the back of my neck.
>>Jessica: [Laughter] We're gonna pretend I have a bar code on my hand and you basically use turn it on and you hold it, oh my earring just fell out, and it buzzes and it will actually try to find you retail stores near you that have the item you're looking for and it will compare prices.
>>Cool. Ok, now a question that we are getting a bunch is tethering. Is tethering available for the G1? Currently it's not but in the future it might be and the reason why we say that is when they actually, when T-Mobile announced the G1 they said at least they wouldn't lock down or prevent users from creating tethering apps. Now who knows how much of a tax that puts on the actual 3G network but they have at least not said they won't allow them. Whereas in the iPhone world there was a tethering application that came out, lasted for about a day, was pulled off immediately but at least with the G1 side it's still a possibility. They haven't shot it down or even they haven't been grey about it but let's just say they could always go oh our networks are getting taxed. We just can't do the tethering anymore but at least right now it's still a possibility and it's up to the numbers that pop that thing out. So, I think that's it's hard for me to think that cell phone carriers are willing to let us use our phones to tether for free when they're reaming us for doing text messages. I don't see why they would let us if they're gonna ream us up the butt with text messaging why they would be oh, well, you know what, let's just be cool with y'all and we'll let you tether your phone now and use our network for free.
>>Jessica: But then the text rates would go up. [Laughter]
>>Yeah maybe they'll use the texting to subsidize allowing people to tether on their networks for free.
>>Jessica: Let me grab this one from KeyJ Dan WS, How does the Compare Everywhere software work? Does it seem like something you could use on a day to day basis? I would say for Shop Savvy and Compare Everywhere, these are apps that you can use on a day to day basis. In the future the data basis aren't really filled out yet so I didn't find a lot of common things like my breakfast cereal, gum, lotion, I think the database just wasn't filled out that well. So Compare Everywhere is actually the only one of those apps that successfully found me a retail store. It does a lot better with books and media and so I guess the idea is you kinda like walk into a store and you scan the book and you see if you can find it anywhere cheaper nearby. So right now I would say it's more of a concept all though there is much more support for online stores and I would say out of those two, Compare Everywhere was a more fulfilling experience based in San Francisco.
>>Ok, now it's 12:02. We'll take 2 more quick questions. I just wanted to jump on this because maybe this person jumped into our chat a little later but its from Dastity [Assumed spelling] and he said "It seems like you guys are not G1 fans". Probably cause he came up right when we were complaining about certain aspects of it. But earlier we said there is a whole bunch of potential in this phone. It just fills like this is really more of a beta
>>Jessica: Trial run
>>It's the trial run. The hardware is probably, I would guess, Google would say we wish the hardware was a little different. And this is what it's gonna be, you know, starting off on but there's a lot of hardware aspects that hamper but the OS itself has tons of potential, tons of potential
>>Jessica: And some people really like this clicking noise.
>>[Laughter] No one likes the clicking noise. So I'm not hating, we're just giving you our raw opinions of how feel about it in it's current state.
>>Jessica: I actually really like working the applications on it. I think it has a really nice logical flow to pick the applications and to use them. Which actually is the perfect segway into the next question from Pat Gamer, [Assumed spelling] it says "Do I feel that the G1's lack of multi-touch support could be an annoyance when using applications?" I would say off hand, no not really because the applications aren't designed for multi-touch support at this point. They're designed for exactly what's here. So the only annoyance would be maybe if there's a little inconsistency between the developers and some of them design, you know, hide some of the functions within the menu key. There's a hard key right here and then there's also a little menu key on the keyboard so you have 2 ways to pull it up. I usually just use this. And I would say that's maybe the only, you know, if the developer doesn't make an app that's intuitive to you that's a problem.
>>That's the developers fault.
>>It's the developer and just send them some feedback but I would say, you know, within the logic of what the operating system is things work pretty well.
>>Last question, how is the Amazon MP3 store app? Can you edit the track info on the phone? Do you know if you can edit the track info phone. Look, she got all bright eyed.
>>Jessica: Oh no, I thought you meant something else.
>>What did you think I meant?
>>Jessica: Can you like edit the track on the phone?
>>Oh, is there such thing?
>>Jessica: Yes there is. I haven't actually pulled down any files from the Amazon MP3 storing them but Bonnie really liked it and she played around with it a little bit. Enter editing track info, I'll check. [Laughter] But in terms of actually editing tracks which you may not have known you wanted to know, there's this really great app called Ring Droid
>>Ring droid
>>Jessica: Ring droid and you can actually use it to use it to edit the lengths of songs. You can make ring tones, alarms notifications or actually just edit music and it gives you, here maybe they'll be able to see some of the, oh, there you go. But it gives you nice little graph you can zoom in to look at the time line and really you can say but there aren't a whole lot of special effects on this. Some of them like fading in and fading out should be made available in the next version but a lot of the advanced sound editing probably will not be supported by the phone just because of limitations to the LS.
>>And the quick thing, Amazon MP3 store, love it. It's about time someone put a DRM free music store on a phone. I love it. I love the Amazon store. It's killer. I finally shifted my taste away from iTunes to go over because it's DRM free. How can you beat that? You know.
>>Jessica: There we go and it's go top 100 albums, top 100 songs and browse by genre and search, so pretty easy to use.
>>We're gonna wrap this up but quick question that was in the chat. Is there an SD card slot and what is it? It's actually a micro SD card slot on the phone so you can pop in your media. Jessica's kinda diggen at it but you can, you know load on additional videos and photos and things like that on that card. So thank you so much for coming. We hope you guys enjoyed it. There's a lot of talk about the G1 and Jessica
>>Jessica: And I'll come back and talk about it some more.
>>You know. Ok on Friday we're gonna take a break on Thursday because that's when we have Ask The Editor's live but Editor's Office Hours will return on Friday. I got my man Eric Franklin comin back to talk about monitors and whatever else he feels like talkin. Thanks for coming out. Ok, alright, we'll see you guys. Thanks for comin out. Next time on Editor's Office Hours.
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