This is somewhat strange news coming just a day or two after Motorola announced it would be charging royalties on Android phones for use of its patents.

My comments

Well, I guess this is one (expensive) way to avoid paying royalties on Android.

Given the reactions of HTC, Samsung, Sony, and LG (which we’re all versions of “We’re glad Google’s defending Android”), it seems Google’s reassured vendors that their intention isn’t to be the one and only Android manufacturer, but rather to have a stable basis to defend Android from Apple and the rest of the anti-Android gang.

Secondly, Nokia looks even more pathetic. Here’s their reaction:

“This further reinforces our belief that opportunities for the growth of Nokia’s smartphone business will be greatest with Windows Phone. This could prove to be a massive catalyst for the Windows Phone ecosystem.”

Uhm … what?! Google strengthens Android, and that’ll be a catalyst for Windows Phone? The fact that Google was willing to pay so much for Motorola seems to discredit Nokia’s line that they couldn’t come to a deal with Google (regarding whom they’d partner with). Their CEO, Stephen Elop, was just too much of a Microsoft fan to do anything else than hand the company over to Microsoft.

So… Winners: Google, Android, Android manufacturers. Losers: Microsoft and Nokia. Also Apple to the extent that there are a bunch of patents out there that can be used to prevent slow their patent war on Android.

What do you think?

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It has one screen which can display forward and back (one for when you’re using the keyboard and one when you’re not).

So, actually, there are three modes in which you can use it:

Use the screen towards the inside and folded out

Here the phone operates like a mini-laptop, well, actually a palmtop.

Motorola Backflip Cellphone Open

Use the screen towards the outside and folded in

In this mode, you have a hand-held video/music player without the keyboard or number pad taking space from the screen.

Motorola Backflip Cellphone Closed

Use the screen towards the outside and folded out

In this mode, you have a hands-free video player. Just put it on a table or desk and you can watch your movie or video clip without having to prop it up against anything.

Motorola Backflip Cellphone Open (Back)

Or you can use it as an alarm clock.

Features

The Backflip includes Motorola’s MotoBlur, which according to the company melds friends, pics, emails, messages, and Facebook, MySpace and Twitter into one feed. This is all displayed together on the screen so you don’t have check each website individually.

Other features:

Multinetwork 3G

• 6 hours talk time
• Android OS
• Wifi/Bluetooth
• Video/still camera (5MP) with flash
• GPS
• 3.1 inch 320×480 screen
• Voice dialing

More tech specs

Resources

Motorola Backflip

Backflip tech specs

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