Our friends at Phandroid got their hot little hands on the table below which shows that Verizon is about to really put the pedal to the metal on Android.

April doesn’t hold any big surprises with the very tough sounding Casio Commando and Droid Charge blazing the trail on April 7th.

The next week will see the launch of the long awaited Sony Xperia Play (The Playstation Phone). Casual gaming on phones has seen an explosion over the last couple years, but the gaming phone concept has not fared well in the past so we’ll have to see if Sony and the Playstation brand can succeed where others failed.

Rounding out April we have the HTC Incredible 2 launching almost a year to the day after the original. The Incredible was a huge seller last Spring for Verizon, but the Incredible 2 will have an uphill battle to see anywhere near that kind of uptake with the myriad options vying for buyers attention on Big Red.

The LG Revolution is the only device with a firm date on the books in May. The Revolution will be the 3rd 4G option for Verizon buyers and may have the distinction of being the first Android phone to offer Netflix.

The Droid Bionic is still looking to set a date in May to usher Verizon into the dual-core smartphone era.

The last two on the list come as the biggest surprises as their predecessors were released in July and September respectively. The Droid X2 remains somewhat clouded in mystery, as some of the reported specs seem to place it far too close to the Droid Bionic to seem logical for Motorola. The Samsung Galaxy S 2 on the other hand is crystal clear as it was officially announced by Samsung last month and spec for spec might be the most interesting phone on the list.

Unless you are a die-hard HTC fan that is completely sold on the Thunderbolt this may be one of the single worst weeks to buy a smartphone in Verizon history.

Our friends at Phandroid got their hot little hands on the table below which shows that Verizon is about to really put the pedal to the metal on Android.

April doesn’t hold any big surprises with the very tough sounding Casio Commando and Droid Charge blazing the trail on April 7th.

The next week will see the launch of the long awaited Sony Xperia Play (The Playstation Phone). Casual gaming on phones has seen an explosion over the last couple years, but the gaming phone concept has not fared well in the past so we’ll have to see if Sony and the Playstation brand can succeed where others failed.

Rounding out April we have the HTC Incredible 2 launching almost a year to the day after the original. The Incredible was a huge seller last Spring for Verizon, but the Incredible 2 will have an uphill battle to see anywhere near that kind of uptake with the myriad options vying for buyers attention on Big Red.

The LG Revolution is the only device with a firm date on the books in May. The Revolution will be the 3rd 4G option for Verizon buyers and may have the distinction of being the first Android phone to offer Netflix.

The Droid Bionic is still looking to set a date in May to usher Verizon into the dual-core smartphone era.

The last two on the list come as the biggest surprises as their predecessors were released in July and September respectively. The Droid X2 remains somewhat clouded in mystery, as some of the reported specs seem to place it far too close to the Droid Bionic to seem logical for Motorola. The Samsung Galaxy S 2 on the other hand is crystal clear as it was officially announced by Samsung last month and spec for spec might be the most interesting phone on the list.

Unless you are a die-hard HTC fan that is completely sold on the Thunderbolt this may be one of the single worst weeks to buy a smartphone in Verizon history.

(Read more about the launch of Voice Search in Latin American Spanish on the Google América Latina blog)

Today we are excited to announce the launch of Voice Search in Indonesian, Malaysian, and Latin American Spanish, making Voice Search available in over two dozen languages and accents since our first launch in November 2008. This accomplishment could not have been possible without the help of local users in the region – really, we couldn’t have done it without them. Let me explain:

In 2010 we launched Voice Search in Dutch, the first language where we used the “word of mouth” project, a crowd-sourcing effort to collect the most accurate voice data possible.The traditional method of acquiring voice samples is to license the data from companies who specialize in the distribution of speech and text databases. However, from day one we knew that to build the most accurate Voice Search acoustic models possible, the best data would come from the people who would use Voice Search once it launched – our users.

Since then, in each country, we found small groups of people who were avid fans of Google products and were part of a large social network, either in local communities or on online. We gave them phones and asked them to get voice samples from their friends and family. Everyone was required to sign a consent form and all voice samples were anonymized. When possible, they also helped to test early versions of Voice Search as the product got closer to launch.

Building a speech recognizer is not just limited to localizing the user interface. We require thousands of hours of raw data to capture regional accents and idiomatic speech in all sorts of recording environments to mimic daily life use cases. For instance, when developing Voice Search for Latin American Spanish, we paid particular attention to Mexican and Argentinean Spanish. These two accents are more different from one another than any other pair of widely-used accents in all of South and Central America. Samples collected in these countries were very important bookends for building a version of Voice Search that would work across the whole of Latin America. We also chose key countries such as Peru, Chile, Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia to bridge the divergent accent varieties.

As an International Program Manager at Google, I have been fortunate enough to travel around the world and meet many of our local Google users. They often have great suggestions for the products that they love, and word of mouth was created with the vision that our users could participate in developing the product. These Voice Search launches would not have been possible without the help of our users, and we’re excited to be able to work together on the product development with the people who will ultimately use our products.

Posted by Linne Ha, International Program Manager, Google Voice Search

We’ve known this was coming for some time, but the light finally turned green for in-app billing in the Android Market.

In-app billing has been a very successful model on iOS and is likely to entice some new blood to branch out to Android. Most commonly developers using this functionality make their apps available for free and then charge for upgrades, virtual goods or additional levels after users have gotten a taste of the app.

When used properly this can extend the life of an app or game and keep it interesting or useful, but when abused it can feel like you are being nickel and dimed to just play the game or use the app as it should have been originally designed.

The initial class of apps launching with in-app billing include; Comics, Deer Hunter Challenge HD, Dungeon Defenders: FW Deluxe, Gun Bros, Tap Tap Revenge, and World Series of Poker Hold’em Legend.

If you’re a curious developer you can find the instructions on implementing in-app billing right here.

As a user or developer what kind of implementations are you hoping to see or place in your apps?

(Read more about the launch of Voice Search in Latin American Spanish on the Google América Latina blog)

Today we are excited to announce the launch of Voice Search in Indonesian, Malaysian, and Latin American Spanish, making Voice Search available in over two dozen languages and accents since our first launch in November 2008. This accomplishment could not have been possible without the help of local users in the region – really, we couldn’t have done it without them. Let me explain:

In 2010 we launched Voice Search in Dutch, the first language where we used the “word of mouth” project, a crowd-sourcing effort to collect the most accurate voice data possible.The traditional method of acquiring voice samples is to license the data from companies who specialize in the distribution of speech and text databases. However, from day one we knew that to build the most accurate Voice Search acoustic models possible, the best data would come from the people who would use Voice Search once it launched – our users.

Since then, in each country, we found small groups of people who were avid fans of Google products and were part of a large social network, either in local communities or on online. We gave them phones and asked them to get voice samples from their friends and family. Everyone was required to sign a consent form and all voice samples were anonymized. When possible, they also helped to test early versions of Voice Search as the product got closer to launch.

Building a speech recognizer is not just limited to localizing the user interface. We require thousands of hours of raw data to capture regional accents and idiomatic speech in all sorts of recording environments to mimic daily life use cases. For instance, when developing Voice Search for Latin American Spanish, we paid particular attention to Mexican and Argentinean Spanish. These two accents are more different from one another than any other pair of widely-used accents in all of South and Central America. Samples collected in these countries were very important bookends for building a version of Voice Search that would work across the whole of Latin America. We also chose key countries such as Peru, Chile, Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia to bridge the divergent accent varieties.

As an International Program Manager at Google, I have been fortunate enough to travel around the world and meet many of our local Google users. They often have great suggestions for the products that they love, and word of mouth was created with the vision that our users could participate in developing the product. These Voice Search launches would not have been possible without the help of our users, and we’re excited to be able to work together on the product development with the people who will ultimately use our products.

Posted by Linne Ha, International Program Manager, Google Voice Search

We’ve known this was coming for some time, but the light finally turned green for in-app billing in the Android Market.

In-app billing has been a very successful model on iOS and is likely to entice some new blood to branch out to Android. Most commonly developers using this functionality make their apps available for free and then charge for upgrades, virtual goods or additional levels after users have gotten a taste of the app.

When used properly this can extend the life of an app or game and keep it interesting or useful, but when abused it can feel like you are being nickel and dimed to just play the game or use the app as it should have been originally designed.

The initial class of apps launching with in-app billing include; Comics, Deer Hunter Challenge HD, Dungeon Defenders: FW Deluxe, Gun Bros, Tap Tap Revenge, and World Series of Poker Hold’em Legend.

If you’re a curious developer you can find the instructions on implementing in-app billing right here.

As a user or developer what kind of implementations are you hoping to see or place in your apps?

The phone formerly known as the “Samsung 4G LTE Smartphone” has settled on the much more memorable moniker of the Droid Charge and according to the image above which was uncovered by PocketNow it will be sporting a shiny new stylized eye as further evidence of its Droid lineage. Why Verizon deigned to grant it the coveted Droid status, while leaving the Thunderbolt out in the cold is anyone’s guess, but it does perhaps explain the delay in committing to its name.

For those that don’t remember this phone; the Droid Charge impressed us at CES with its solid build, stunningly beautiful 4.3″ Super AMOLED Plus screen and of course the blazing fast Verizon 4G. The two knocks against it were the now less than screaming fast Hummingbird processor and the fact that it will launch with Android 2.2.

With those caveats in mind, if you aren’t particularly sold on the need for the dual-core power of the Droid Bionic I would advise at least taking one of these for a spin at your local Verizon retailer (whenever they get around to launching it) as the screen is gorgeous and it also offers a very distinct feel from the rest of the early 2011 lineup on Big Red.

Any screen enthusiasts looking forward to the Droid Charge or is the slightly outmoded processor and less than stellar OS upgrade record for Samsung enough to keep your wallet holstered?

The phone formerly known as the “Samsung 4G LTE Smartphone” has settled on the much more memorable moniker of the Droid Charge and according to the image above which was uncovered by PocketNow it will be sporting a shiny new stylized eye as further evidence of its Droid lineage. Why Verizon deigned to grant it the coveted Droid status, while leaving the Thunderbolt out in the cold is anyone’s guess, but it does perhaps explain the delay in committing to its name.

For those that don’t remember this phone; the Droid Charge impressed us at CES with its solid build, stunningly beautiful 4.3″ Super AMOLED Plus screen and of course the blazing fast Verizon 4G. The two knocks against it were the now less than screaming fast Hummingbird processor and the fact that it will launch with Android 2.2.

With those caveats in mind, if you aren’t particularly sold on the need for the dual-core power of the Droid Bionic I would advise at least taking one of these for a spin at your local Verizon retailer (whenever they get around to launching it) as the screen is gorgeous and it also offers a very distinct feel from the rest of the early 2011 lineup on Big Red.

Any screen enthusiasts looking forward to the Droid Charge or is the slightly outmoded processor and less than stellar OS upgrade record for Samsung enough to keep your wallet holstered?

Anyone remember the HTC Merge?  It turns out that Cellular South is planning on launching the Android 2.2 handset next month for an undisclosed sum.  The HTC Merge is essentially a twin to Sprint’s HTC EVO Shift 4G with HTC Sense and a pretty decent slide-out QWERTY keyboard.  The one thing that will really stands out on the HTC Merge from Cellular South is that it will be the first handset to launch with the Amazon Appstore pre-installed.

The Amazon Appstore is probably the best third party app store for Android devices, but we’re hoping that the HTC Merge on Cellular South will also include the official Android Market.  The official press release mentioned some of HTC’s custom software that will be on the Merge, but it does not mention Gmail, Google Maps, or any other the other Google apps we all enjoy so much. Let’s hope they simply forgot to mention the Google Apps and Services since an Android phone without Google doesn’t seem to have the same appeal.

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