Yes, but in China Google services aren't nearly as prevalent as they are in the US. Baidu is as popular, so naturally it'd be okay as a default standard.
The Samsung Fascinate (Galaxy S1) on Verizon had Bing included by default, and there were quite a bit of complaints about it - not to mention the fact that the device wasn't too competitive with other devices on the market at the time.
From Engadget's review:
"This was maddening to us. We don't have a personal issue with Bing, but it's not our engine of choice, and we'd be willing to bet that it's not yours either. Now, imagine buying an Android phone -- a Google phone -- only to discover that not only was Google not defaulted to as a search engine, it's not even an option! For us, this is actually a deal breaker. It's fine to throw a new choice a user's way, but to force them into using nothing but that choice seems pretty low. Even on the original iPhone you were given a choice between Google and Yahoo!. Here, you've got Bing unless you want to get hacking -- and most people actually don't want to get hacking. They just want to use their phones. Again, it's not that Bing is a bad search engine, but Google is the standard. If it's not even offered, what does that say?"
> Yes, but in China Google services aren't nearly as prevalent as they are in the US. Baidu is as popular, so naturally it'd be okay as a default standard.
And if Google's services became so crappy that people started using something else (like Bing) on their PCs, then it would be trivial for Android phones to switch over to that as well.
My point was that Android phones are not tied to Google services, and that Chinese Android phones are a good example of that.
> The Samsung Fascinate (Galaxy S1) on Verizon had Bing included by default, and there were quite a bit of complaints about it
Yes, because people didn't want or expect Bing, they wanted Google. The reason why almost all Android phones (outside of China) have Google as their default is because people want Google to be the default, not because Google has mandated it.
The Samsung Fascinate (Galaxy S1) on Verizon had Bing included by default, and there were quite a bit of complaints about it - not to mention the fact that the device wasn't too competitive with other devices on the market at the time.
From Engadget's review:
"This was maddening to us. We don't have a personal issue with Bing, but it's not our engine of choice, and we'd be willing to bet that it's not yours either. Now, imagine buying an Android phone -- a Google phone -- only to discover that not only was Google not defaulted to as a search engine, it's not even an option! For us, this is actually a deal breaker. It's fine to throw a new choice a user's way, but to force them into using nothing but that choice seems pretty low. Even on the original iPhone you were given a choice between Google and Yahoo!. Here, you've got Bing unless you want to get hacking -- and most people actually don't want to get hacking. They just want to use their phones. Again, it's not that Bing is a bad search engine, but Google is the standard. If it's not even offered, what does that say?"
http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/07/samsung-fascinate-review/