Does Google have what it takes for winning tablets?

Just this week, Verizon announced it would be teaming up with Google on a tablet to rival the Apple AT&T alliance.
The announcement was made during an interview between the Wall Street Journal and Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam, where McAdam is quoted as saying:
“We’re looking at all the things Google has in its archives that we could put on a tablet to make it a great experience.”
Many, however, are questioning just what it is that Google actually does have – in its archives or elsewhere – to bring to the table [or should that be tablet? – Ed].
As some in the press have rightly pointed out, Google is hardly a Time Warner and the Google vault is hardly packed to the brim with premium content.
Instead, the firm’s archives consist of bits and bobs of web based and user generated content à la YouTube, a few free web apps and some services – hardly “a great experience” to swoon over, argue critics.
Google advocates, on the other hand, point out that it isn’t just the media itself which is important, but the means to deliver content through them. Thus, combining what Google does have with the search giant’s powerful Android operating system and developer relations strategy, the firm could yet provide value to the tablet kingdom.
Probably the best example of this is Google Books. For years, Google has been busily scanning millions and millions of volumes whose copyright has expired, from Moby Dick to Homer’s Iliad to Winnie the Pooh. Whilst it’s true that anyone theoretically has the right to use books which have outlived their copyright, only Google has been actively doing the scanning, so whereas Apple has maybe 50,000 free books on tap, at last count Google had over 10 million.
Google has even said it will be launching a digital book store called Google Editions which will compete with the likes of Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple and other electronic book sellers. The advantage being that the books will be online and will not require a specific device like the Kindle, Nook, iBook to read them with.
“Well, so what?” You may ask yourself. “Who cares if I can read old classics from Google’s scanned archive, I’d rather read something on the latest bestseller’s list.” Well, Google has taken that into account too and Google Books also contains more recent titles for you Oprah book club fans out there.
Google has achieved this by working with authors and publishers to digitize their works and make them partially viewable online, in something dubbed the Publisher Partner Program. Customers can browse through parts of the books and then find links to websites where the full book can be downloaded, or to libraries, where the book can be borrowed.
Therefore, while it is indeed true that Apple has nurtured its relationships with content and copyright holders, business is business and Google has the same pull with an arguably better deal to publishers.
After all, Google doesn’t make any commission from the books sold through its Publisher Partner Program, instead, satisfying itself with earning some cash from the targeted ads running alongside the content of the books.
Adding incentive to partners, over half of that ad revenue goes to the publisher.
In terms of other content Google can offer tablet partners, there are of course the obvious ones like Google Earth, Google Maps, Google Talk, Google Health and the rest of Google’s free offerings, along with a host of as yet unannounced partnerships.
Is there an app for all of the above on the iPad? Probably. But lest we forget, one pays very dear for Apple’s one of a kind tablet, whereas Android tablets will likely come in all different shapes, sizes and price points.
Of course there are also those who would posit Google simply doesn’t have Apple’s pizzazz, and couldn’t possibly create a tablet as sexy as Cupertino’s.
By controlling every single little piece of the supply chain Apple, the Google doubters maintain, can effectively ensure that the finished product is exactly up to its exerting standards of design.
By contrast Google, which gives its free Android OS out to anyone and his Taiwanese mother, could be leaving itself open by allowing for substandard tablets to be made using its brand. This could not only damage Google, but do Apple a great service.
On the other hand, one could argue that the same has been true of Microsoft in the PC space, which also licenses out its Windows software to any PC maker that wants it, although its products are not free by any stretch of the imagination.
In its defense, Google is known to control access to the next build of Android, and some of that early access is dictated by how the operating system is going to be used by Google’s partners – so allowing a tablet that would damage Google’s cause to be created seems rather far-fetched.
Ultimately, however, until any of these Android powered tablets really emerge as competitors to the iPad in the mainstream, it will be hard to tell whether Google’s contribution to the emerging space is valuable, or simply a second-rate compromise.