Following my Google Android post earlier today, I just received an invite to easily the hottest high-tech ticket (at least on the so-called “right coast”) of the year, the launch of the first Android-powered phone from T-Mobile.
The date is, as Reuters and the Wall Street Journal reported, Sept. 23. Unlike with the iPhone 3G, people won’t be spending hours in line to buy one Tuesday. Indeed, TechCrunch claims the actual phone will go on the market Oct. 20.
Instead, media and analysts will be flocking to a banquet hall in midtown Manhattan for a quick event scheduled to run from 10:30 a.m. EDT until noon.
T-Mobile wrote in the invitation: “The event will include presentations from T-Mobile, Google and other company executives and an opportunity for you to get hands-on with the phone during a live product demonstration following the speaking portion of the event.”
That live demo is what I’m most interested in. Will the handheld be as clunky compared with the iPhone as early reports suggest? Will the keypad be comfortable?
Can I fit the darn thing comfortably in my pant pocket like any other phone? Those are all important questions — not to mention, When will I see an Android phone on my carrier, AT&T?
An HTC-built Dream from T-Mobile isn’t going to cut it for most people, but is anyone really surprised T-Mobile is the first company to run with Android?
Google Android mastermind Andy Rubin, you’ll recall, created T-Mobile’s Sidekick, a device famously used by hotel heiress Paris Hilton and entrepreneur Mark Cuban, who expressed his love for the gadget last week at TechCrunch50.
Note that the Android has some similar attributes, such as a slide-out keypad. LinuxDevices.com’s Eric Brown adds schematics and pictures here.
Anyway, this is easily the most widely anticipated event in the mobile industry since the iPhone 3G launch in July. Would anyone disagree?