Because it serves as a virtual desktop, it brings Cisco’s Quad, as well as Show and Share into the mix. Quad is a highly flexible user interface that serves as a repository for all the widgets, gadgets, applets or feeds that can be packed into a personal portal. Cisco Show and Share is positioned as a “social video community” platform which, as the name implies, provides a mechanism for employees to share videos to support the projects that they are working on with a broader team.

Cisco calls Cius an “enterprise tablet”, which differentiates it from the Apple iPad (while taking advantage of many of the technical attributes that are iPad-like). For instance, the ability to access an enterprise’s secure VPN (virtual private network) is baked in at the factory. Many of the features support quick and seamless transitions from the Cius’s “virtual desktop” to an employees physical desktop in support of mobile employees.

From a competitive standpoint, it is a nice, pre-emptive strike by Cisco against not just Apple, but any incursions by makers of Windows boxes, like Dell or Lenovo, but especially HP. Cisco is also making a bold appeal to the Android developer community by inviting them into the Cisco Developer Network (CDN).

CDN may not rival the iTunes AppStore, but building apps that conform to API’s that can be dropped into Quad and displayed on the Cius out in the wild should be a provocative challenge to Web app developers around the world.

Addendum: Cisco told the trade press that the device will be generally available in “early 2011″. It will be equipped with both front-facing and rear-facing cameras. It will connect with peripherals wirelessly through Bluetooth (in addition to WiFi) and physically through USB ports. Finally, the targeted street price is “less than $1,000.

Greg Sterling has an interesting angle on the competitive impact Cius may have on Rim’s plans to introduce a tablet here.

The optimist in me wants all of the piece parts to work together seamlessly. The reality is bound to be quite different. As was demonstrated by interference in the conference venue, things are bound to go wrong (as the display of Nicolas Cage “animal sex diet” during the demo dramatized). But that did not blind the developer community (or indeed the CEO’s from Intel, Best Buy, Sony, Adobe and DishTV) of the transformative potential of adding “seamless” and simultaneous search to accompany the five hours of TV watching that people are ordinarily doing.

From the RC (Recombinant Communications) perspective, Google claims that development of new applications will benefit from its “open” approach. As described on the Google Developers Blog, the software, OS guts and APIs are the household names of open computing: Android, Chrome and Ajax. The application development toolkits are not fully developed, but they start with the SDKs for Chrome and Android.

From a competitive point of view, Google is treading where Apple (with AppleTV) and Cisco (with its “ownage” of ScientificAtlanta and LinkSys for couchside products), along with Motorola, Philips, Tatung and the mainstream set-top box makers have already done their best to fragment the market. What Google brings to the game as differentiaters is the power of its advertising-based business model along with its experience (and existing functionality) in real-time search/social search, voice search and speech-to-text transcription/translation.

Each of these elements has the potential to spark the imagination of users, as well as the development community. But they are also fraught with risk. Speech-to-text transcription (much less translation) has already created fodder for all sorts of ridicule. Quality is bound to improve over time, but neither transcription nor translation will ever be perfect and much of the early energy should be dedicated to managing expectations.

Lassa asserts that the GM/Google relationship would place emphasis on a better phone-to-car interface, as opposed to the voice control and voice user interface that Microsoft’s Speech Application Group has played up. Thus GM’s approach will enable drivers to use their phones to do such things as start or turn off their cars, lock and unlock doors, and make other adjustments. It was not spelled out explicitly in the article, but given Google’s efforts to invoke automated speech recognition whenever a keyboard comes into play on a mobile device, it is highly likely that all of these functions can be voice controlled – making starting your car another “speechable moment”.

As for the supposition that Android in the car spells the end of OnStar, that is highly unlikely. Lassa notes that turn-by-turn directions through OnStar would become unnecessary because Android phones using Google Maps and a special mount have been successfully deployed for in-car navigation. But OnStar has been sold more as a safety feature and remote diagnostic service. The Android operating system in the car is more likely to augment, rather than compete with OnStar.

The prospects for more automobile-based Android apps is provocative. The car is destined to be the most fertile spawning ground for speech-based apps and the prospects for Android-oriented developers to define a range of “hands-on-the-wheel/eyes-facing-forward” capabilities and activities is very promising. Meanwhile, Ford remains ahead of the game with a well-defined, and now time tested, suite of voice control applications for frequent activities like carrying out phone conversations, messaging and controlling the car’s entertainment system.

In its press release, the company claims to be the first to offer “voice addressing” for text messages. The company claims high levels of accuracy because it is the only application to be “fully integrated with the Android SMS client and uses Smartword, Promptu’s editing tool that lets users see and select from likely word alternatives.” The application debuts today (April 26) for the Motorola Droid with features taht include: voice addressing, “full integration with the phone’s messaging service (including message exchanges threaded by recipient), thumbnail images displayed for contacts and “one-touch navigation to all recent incoming and outgoing messages.

As reported here, Promptu’s revenue model will test the value that users attach to transcription services. If it remains true to form it market bundles of “voice credits” in increments of 50 for $1.99; 150 for $3.99 or 250 for $4.99, as it does for iPhone users. This is in contrast to its closest functional rivals Vlingo (which has charged for a $17.99 for its application on the Blackberry) and Nuance Dragon Dictate, which has not yet announced a revenue model. Vlingo, by the way, has a “beta” of its application for the Android, which has been available since mid-March.

Along with Google, Microsoft and (to some extent) AT&T, these are the initiatives that are shaping the way that spoken words will be integrated into the mobile messaging flow.

Add Logitech to the mix and can imagine how the master of the mouse and the multi-function TV remote will finally solve some of the sticky issues that arise when a single screen is called upon to serve up video entertainment, display photos, render social networking “activity streams” and otherwise accommodate the whims of the multi-tasking, attention-challenged public. If it works as suggested, it is one of the key outcomes of taking a recombinant (rather than a unified) approach to computing and communications. The family TV is transformed not just into a media or entertainment center, but into a big screen on which all manner of icons could invoke the widgets, apps and “links” that make each of our lives what they are.

Like the iPad, it is a tabla rasa or empty slate today. It’s just neat to contemplate how it could transform TV viewing into a much more engaging or social activity. Based on the backlash surrounding Google’s Buzz (and even Wave for that matter), we can only hope that the roll-out is done in a way that reflects an understanding of the different human factors that prevail in the TV room, as opposed to at a cubicle or among the mobile phone toting public.

The description of the range of services to be offered sounds exactly like the Skype application offered on the iPhone. The most salient difference will be that the app will be running constantly in background on the nine devices described (which is not possible on the iPhone). It also marks the symbolic end to Verizon’s (as well as its wireless cohort’s) long-standing concern that VoIP services offered over the data link will cannibalize their core voice revenues. John Stratton, Verizon’s Chief Marketing Officer, told attendees of the Mobile World Congress that he was not concerned about either erosion of the voice traffic on its network or a decline in quality that would result from congestion caused by massive demand for Voice-over-3G.

Stratton said that the application was jointly developed from the ground up, leaving many details up for interpretation. My own belief is that the always-on Skype will be “link agile” using WiFi when available, 3G in some cases or the Verizon cell network if required to sustain qualities. At least that’s how I would architect the service given that subscribers must contract with Verizon for one of its Voice and Data plans. According to an article by Roger Chen in the Wall Street Journal, the “cheapest monthly voice plan now costs $40 for 450 minutes, and a $30 data plan is required with any smart phone.” So you may as well make the best use of all the links you can.

As for the impact on the wireless VoIP world at large, the application seems underwhelming. Sure it rattles AT&T Mobility’s cage by offering a nailed up voice-over-3G service one week after AT&T made it clear that it would continue its WiFi only approach. Yet, the range of services that are offered have an entry-level feeling to them. Meanwhile, Mobile World Congress was brimming with some really impressive X-over-wireless-IP services. Of special interest to me is a “video calling over the Internet” offered through the iTunes store by Fring and this intriguing voice-to-voice universal translator service offered by wireless personal assistant specialist VoxOx.

Harking back to my post about “satsificing”, I’m not sure that any of the services will work at high-levels of quality in all instances, but they are working well enough to make them ready for prime time.

By positioning the site as an effort to “beat Microsoft” the press and analysts cast the search giant Google in an underdog role. Google claims to have about two million businesses using either free or paid versions of Google Apps (I would be inthe “free” category). By comparison, the WSJ reporters observe that there are “around 500 million users of Microsoft Office”, according to the Microsoft spokespeople. That means there’s a long way to go to reach parity.

Yet, as Google adds more store-like qualities to the Solutions Marketplace, the site will take on the “recombinant qualities” of Salesforce.com’s AppExchange, which actively enlists third-party developers to build solutions that incorporate their software with resources in the SalesCloud or ServiceCloud. It is also expected to take on some of the qualities of the AppStore in Apple’s iTunes site, featuring product reviews, success stories and perhaps mechanisms to support user ratings.

Today, in classic Google style, the site features a lot of white space and blue links to landing pages which, in many cases, are blogs running on the original Blogger resource (Blogger’s parent, Pyra Labs, was acquired by Google in 2003). I’m not sure how the idea that Google is launching a “store” for business apps became “news”. Clearly it’s already up and running in the Solutions Marketplace. For instance, if you search the marketplace for “telephony” products you already find four products/services ranging from a unified directory utility to tools for building mashups based on the Android mobile operating system or Asterisk “open source” PBX.

Nonetheless, the news story was good stimulus to revisit the Google Web site to see how far The Sultan of Search has come in enlisting third-party software to augment its own cloud-based offering.

Moto is not alone in its efforts to foster innovation on the Android platform. Elsewhere around the Cellular Telephone and Internet Association’s Internet and Entertainment Expo (CTIA-IE) Verizon made a huge splash by announcing a the intent to act as partners in a venture chartered to co-develop devices that run a broad spectrum of applications on the Android operating system.

In front of the press and in the presence of Google CEO Eric Schmidt, Lowell McAdam, CEO of Verizon Wireless (VZW) made it clear that it sees an advantage to making both its network and devices fully “open.” That means that, unlike Apple and AT&T, Verizon will provide its subscribers full access to the call management and messaging features of Google Voice through Android phones. While Verizon and Google will collaborate on the specification, it is broadly believed that the usual list of OEMs and ODMs will actually make them. That means that Verizon will continue to distribute the smartphones from HTC, Motorola, Samsung and a few others as they introduce Android-based devices.

Schmidt and McAdam also made the right noises about fostering activity among third-party developers. Pledging that the devices will ship with easy access to an AppStore that has more than 10,000 titles. Coupled with all the activity among the MotoDev Summit attendees, as well as the formal launch of Windows Phone, we continue to wonder how application developers will decide how to allocate their resources for design, development and support of popular apps across so many platforms.

Following his initial presentation, Dr. Jha’s presentation was joined by conference host Om Malik and Google’s VP of Engineering for a “fireside chat.” In this relatively informal discussion, the three discussed how how the marriage of Google and Motorola came about, with Jha likening it to “two drunks at a bar” discovering that they belonged together. We’re not sure that’s the most ringing endorsement of the Android operating system, but it does have a social ring to it.

As for the Motoblur experience, a video demo illustrated that Motorola expects the smartphone to emerge as a highly personalized (or customized) social networking device – that is also a phone. The new user interface makes it easy for CLIQ owners to bring all their “favorites” – referring to feeds, contact lists, social media – on to the glass so that it can be accessed “at the swipe of a finger.” Simplifying the complex aspects being “always on” is an important design criterion for motoblur. But this puts the onus of the initial set up on the user and, if past experience is a performance indicator, the general public might be up to the task of setting up and maintaining their initial settings. Frankly, it looked a lot like Yahoo!’s old OneConnect application, at least aspirationally.

Branding confusion aside, the introduction raised many more questions than it answered. We know that Motorola is introducing a new phone based on Android and that T-Mobile will be selling it to its subscribers in the U.S. We don’t know when it will be introduced and we don’t know its price, or how it will compare with T-Mobile’s G-1 phone, from the Taiwanese manufacturer HTC. We do know that Motorola and T-Mobile are going to sell “CLIQ with Motoblur” to help subscribers deal with their addiction to social media. It’s not the Crackberry; it’s the Blurberry.

From Google’s point of view, the ability to have multiple applications open at the same time and to enable users to multi-thread through their messages and feeds is a precursor to the promise of Google Wave. The Motorola folks have done the heavy lifting of Wave emulation in advance of the coming of HTML5. It’s a bunch of widgets running on top of Android on a pretty fast central processor. We’re looking forward to the marketing campaign, when T-Mobile’s roll-out begins. That’s when the speed of adoption will be dictated by end-users.