Yes the rumors are swirling that Google has designed and is going to sell its own mobile phone. And by rumors swirling, I mean Michael Arrington of TechCrunch is claiming it. Which doesn't really count for all that much, but the tech press is running with it anyway. Is it likely? Not really. While nothing can be completely ruled out and Google has demonstrated a willingness to jump into a lot of fields and toss its eggs in completely unpredictable places, the odds remain against it.

Why? For one thing Google is not a hardware company. Unlike Apple, which began as a hardware company, even their OS and software often came courtesy of the same Redmond Beast that makes Windows and is routinely sneered at by MacHeads, Google is not simply a software company, because it's not. Google is an ad subsidized internet applications company. And while Google has made its own browser and will release its own Netbook OS, it has done so in order to push those same apps. The apps that are at the heart of Google's strategy for the future.

Now while it is possible that Google may have decided that pushing those Apps in the mobile market would be best served by designing its own cell phone, and keep in mind that as with the servers at the heart of Google, its people can do hardware when they need to, but that would mean sabotaging their own efforts at integrating Google Apps through Android, a pure Microsoft move, and following Apple's example with the iPhone. But while Apple profits from the iPhone as a hardware company, the iPhone is essentially a gated community that has marginalized Apple. A death blow for Google.