Meh, the Android laptop stuff was long dead before Pichai. Rubin was even stonewalling extending Android into tablets back in the day by insisting that Android was for phones.
And Atrix ended up going nowhere, because Motorola could not keep their designers in check. end result was that no two phones could share a dock, as the ports where spaced differently. their last, "universal", dock basically had two rubberized wires that the user had to manually fit each time.
As for Ara being locked down, you may be right. So far it seems that modules goes through a Google storefront, and they have yet to confirm or deny that trading used modules will be an option. Never mind that it seems Google will the lone provider of the endoskeletons. I find myself somewhat reminded of the early days of the PC, back when it was the IBM PC. I wonder if there will be a clean room endo firmware offered...
And Atrix ended up going nowhere, because Motorola could not keep their designers in check. end result was that no two phones could share a dock, as the ports where spaced differently. their last, "universal", dock basically had two rubberized wires that the user had to manually fit each time.
As for Ara being locked down, you may be right. So far it seems that modules goes through a Google storefront, and they have yet to confirm or deny that trading used modules will be an option. Never mind that it seems Google will the lone provider of the endoskeletons. I find myself somewhat reminded of the early days of the PC, back when it was the IBM PC. I wonder if there will be a clean room endo firmware offered...