Google announces partnership with carriers and OEMs. Timely Android updates now a reality.

Yet another major announcement in the opening keynote session came out and one that everyone should be happy about. Google has partnered with 10 OEMs and carriers to guarantee timely Android updates to devices. This is in order to combat OS fragmentation which has been happening a lot. One device gets their update while others wait for months.

However, that will be a problem of the past. Google and everyone in the new alliance will guarantee timely Android updates for 18 months after the a new device is released. All four major carriers here in the US are apart of the alliance as well as Vodafone in the UK. As for manufacturers, Motorola, HTC, LG, Samsung and Sony Ericsson are on board as well.

This is a huge deal considering how many people are generally unhappy with how long it takes their device to get an update to the Android OS due to things such as custom skins companies put over the OS. At the same time, people with vanilla Android get their updates fairly quickly since their version of Android is stock and there really isn't a need for making sure custom skins and bloatware are compatible.

This is definitely something the majority of us can be happy about and look forward to taking advantage of.