Is the search giant really making its own mobile device? Does it matter?

For months, tech blogs have been salivating over the possibility that Google will soon release a cell phone of its own. This discussion has always been a little strange. Google launched its mobile operating system Android two years ago, and we've seen the release of several Android devices since then, including the much-acclaimed Motorola Droid. So aren't all Android phones really "Google Phones?" Not according to the rumor mill, which insists that Google—forced to deal with outside cell manufacturers and mobile carriers—has never had the chance to build the phone it really wants to build. The "real" Google Phone would be designed from top-to-bottom by Google, and the company would sell it directly to customers without any interference from cell carriers. "Like the iPhone for Apple," TechCrunch's Michael Arrington has written, "this phone will be Google's pure vision of what a phone should be."

Over the weekend, we got a hint that this mythic Google Phone might be for real. At the company's "all-hands" meeting on Friday, Google gave employees a slick new phone to try out. In no time, descriptions of the device began to leak out on Twitter. Later, the Wall Street Journal added more details: The phone is called the Nexus One, and though it will be manufactured by the Taiwanese company HTC, it will carry only Google's logo and will be sold online directly to consumers, not through a carrier. Thanks to Engadget, which managed to get a gallery of pictures, we also know that the phone is a real looker.

But so far, that's all we know—and that's not a lot. Google's only on-the-record statement is vague—on the company blog, it says that it gave employees the device so they can test out "new mobile features and capabilities." So is the Nexus One the true Google Phone, a device set apart from every other Android phone—or is it just the next incarnation of Android, a device meant to show off features that will soon be available on all phones that run Google's OS?

The future of the cell phone business may hang on that question. If Google really does plan to sell a phone that carries exclusive features—if it is really producing software that it won't share with other device manufacturers—the move would mark a huge rift in the wireless industry.

Indeed, that's precisely why I'd argue that the Nexus One isn't anything special. It's entirely possible that Google will experiment with selling a phone directly to consumers, but I'd be shocked if the device did anything that other Android phones can't do. Why? I've compiled several reasons:

Google doesn't care about hardware. Google makes software—fantastic, awesome, world-changing software. That is pretty much all it does. I don't mean that as criticism; Google's obsession with software is one of its greatest strengths. From its inception, Google has focused on bringing amazing code to people all over the world, across all devices. Most of its products run on the Web and can be accessed on any computer or phone on the planet. Even its non-Web software shows no bias toward any single platform: Chrome, its Web browser, runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux. Even though it makes a rival phone OS, Google offers several apps for the iPhone—in fact, Google would make a lot more iPhone apps if only Apple would let it.

Google's platform independence isn't meant as altruism—it's good strategy. The company gets the vast bulk of its revenue from advertising. Thus Google has no business reason to care whether I got on the Web using an iPhone, a Droid, a BlackBerry, or a Windows 7 desktop—all it cares about is that I got on the Web at all and that I stay on the Web all day, every day.

But all that will have to change if Google gets into the hardware business. How do you market a phone? By promising that it will do things that no other phone can do. In other words, for the Google Phone to be truly stellar, Google would have to imbue it with exclusive features—violating the core Google principle of platform independence.