Verizon: Bing Not on ALL Future Handsets, Google Voice Search Available With Android 2.2

• Quentyn Kennemer
• 14 years ago

There’s hope yet! Verizon’s caught wind of all of the commentary going around the blogosphere (from writers and readers alike) regarding Bing on their Android devices. Namely, the Samsung Fascinate was launched with Bing preloaded as the default search engine with no apparent way to change it. I can vouch for others’ professed difficulty in getting Google search installed onto the device as I tried finding it in the market with no luck, and downloading the .APK file from XDA proved to be a waste of time as I was met with errors installing it (the same file is said to install just fine on other Galaxy S devices, though they already have Google Search installed.)

Anywho, the second piece to this puzzle was a rumor that Bing would be on all future Verizon handsets as it is on Fascinate, something our friend The Droid Guy said he had good authority on. There was a reason I hadn’t entertained the rumor just yet, and this statement from Verizon is it:

“…that is not true. We have a relationship with Microsoft and Bing is the search engine on our multi-media phones but we have never said it would be exclusive on all of our devices.”

Be careful in noting the wording, however: they’re only going to install it as default on their “multi-media” phones. My first question: what does Verizon consider a multi-media phone? How is the Samsung Fascinate not a smartphone just as much as the Droid X or Droid 2? That’s another story for another day, however. So the Droid Guy wasn’t completely wrong, but if we assume Verizon only considers phones with the Droid name smartphones (because the Fascinate does everything those phones can do, and probably more), then is it safe to say that any non-Droid Android on Verizon’s network won’t be coming pre-installed with Google Search and Maps?

That question will be answered over time, I suppose, but Verizon’s got another trick up their sleeve to cap this story off. According to them, once the Fascinate receives its upgrade to Android 2.2 (and it will), users will be able to download the new Voice Search app that Google introduced a while back for all Froyo devices. With that should come the traditional Google Search we all know and love. It still doesn’t explain why Google Search was blocked in the first place, but we’ll roll with it.

[via Engadget]