Having been to India myself lately, one thing they are not playing around with is mobile phones. With movie megastar Aamit Khan plugging the Samsung Omnia and the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 being plastered all over Mumbai International Airport, their mobile phone industry has expanded far beyond clockwork Nokias with monochrome screens in the East…for the rich.

With smartphones priced way out of reach of many in India, industry commentators were looking to see a version of the Android-powered HTC Dream phone being released in this territory late in 2008 as an entry level alternative.  Well, we are now into 2009, and still no nearer to seeing the G1 having a concrete release date over there.

Reports say HTC are in advanced talks with a leading service provider and would prefer to introduce the HTC G1 Android phone in India through a close association with a single network, as they have done with T-Mobile in the US and Europe.

The HTC G1 Android phone is rumoured to be released at a cost of over 20,000 Rupees, far higher than the launch price overseas, but lower than astronomical 31,000 Rupees (£420!) they are charging for an 8GB Apple iPhone.

Perhaps there will be a cheap and cheerful resolution to the Android smartphone stalemate in India in the form of the Kogan Pro…we’ll wait and see.

Oh, the picture? That’s me (on the left) touching an elephant in Kerala. Any other questions? Didn’t think so.

Gizmodo sure knows how to stir the geek juices, and this three-way touchscreen battle between the T-Mobile G1, Apple’s iPhone and the new Palm Pre is certainly one of the juiciest.

They go into pretty graphic detail regarding the pros and not pros of each handset from hardware to web integration, and whilst the G1 doesn’t win quite as many rounds as it ought to (Cut & Paste? Really?), it still makes for some compelling reading.

Have a gander and make up your own minds.

My thoughts? Android is far more than just a new handset, and it is going to take a lot more than a banana QWERTY and a sweet user interface to take down the two big boys.

Let battle commence!

1. Search for the video you want.
2. Select the YouTube link, and the G1 will ask whether you want the video to be displayed in the browser or the dedicated Youtube player. Choose the browser in order to get the YouTube link. We’re saving, not just watching!
3. Press “Menu”, then “Go to URL”. The URL for the YouTube video should appear.
4. Press on the keyboard “Menu” and “C” together to copy the URL onto the G1.
5. Go to www.keepvid.com.
6. In the search box, press “Menu” + “V”on the keyboard to paste the url, then press Enter.
7. Scroll down and press the  “›› Download ‹‹ (video.mp4 – High Quality)“. This will open a new window and download the MP4 into your browser’s history!
8. If your video is not there, it will be in the downloads folder of the G1’s SD card.

And that is literally it! Can verify that it works, and it is very cool to grab all of your fave music videos to watch without wi-fi access…using Copy + Paste no less! In your face, iPhone!

After recompiling the kernel, reversing the polarity and getting the 1.21 gigawatts necessary (or something), RyeBrye managed to track simultaneous finger presses at the same time!

The fact that Apple have patented most of the swiping and poking interfaces might make some sense of why the G1 doesn’t currently support it. But who’s to say some enterprising individual won’t put up an app on the ‘open’ Marketplace, allowing that very thing?

All it would need then is some apps to support it, and another reason to favour the iPhone over the G1 evaporates!