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View Full Version : Apple Asked Google to Not Do Multitouch? Doubt It

Vincent Ferrari
02-11-2009, 05:00 PM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/apple-asked-google-not-to-use-multi-touch-in-android-and-google-complied/' target='_blank'>http://venturebeat.com/2009/02/09/a...oogle-complied/</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"One of the bigger complaints about T-Mobile&rsquo;s G1, the first phone based on Google&rsquo;s Android platform, is that its touch screen doesn&rsquo;t use multi-touch, the technology which allows for a screen to accept multiple points of contact as simultaneous input. Now we may know why. Apple, which of course makes the signature multi-touch mobile device, the iPhone, apparently asked Google not to implement it, and Google agreed, an Android team member tells us."</em></p><p><img height="326" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/at/auto/1234357423.usr18053.jpg" style="border: 1px solid #d2d2bb;" width="326" /></p><p>Sorry.&nbsp; Not buying it.&nbsp; I'm not buying that Apple asked, and I'm not buying even more that Google agreed.&nbsp; The only source is an "Android Team Member," and the post that's been shot around the world and requoted (linked above) doesn't really have any firm proof; just conjecture and circumstantial evidence.</p><p>Sorry.&nbsp; Not buying it.</p>
doogald
02-11-2009, 05:08 PM
I find that it's possible. Google and Apple have a great relationship - Eric Schmidt sits on the board of Apple - and, while I do not think that this source proves anything, I could believe that Google went to Apple to ask about Android and Apple pointed out that they have patents on multi-touch that they were not willing to license.
Vincent Ferrari
02-11-2009, 10:54 PM
I find that it's possible. Google and Apple have a great relationship - Eric Schmidt sits on the board of Apple - and, while I do not think that this source proves anything, I could believe that Google went to Apple to ask about Android and Apple pointed out that they have patents on multi-touch that they were not willing to license.

I think the fact that they work so closely together goes more to prove that they wouldn't ask. Apple wouldn't hold back Google, in my opinion.

Either way, we'll never know, and if the screen is capable of multitouch nothing is going to stop people from hacking it in regardless of whether or not Google lets them have it.