Google didn’t invent giving stuff away. Oprah did that. Google just made — or at least greatly popularized — the trend of companies giving their latest and greatest handsets to all the attendees of the developer events in hopes of spiking their interest.
The latest company to pull a Google: Samsung. At a Developer Day in South Africa, the company just passed out Bada Wavesto everyone around.
They also revealed a number of new details — some good, some.. not so good.
- The Bada app store will be manually moderated — if its got drugs, sexually-suggestive content, or anything that “incites violence or hate”, it’s a no go.
- In a one-on-one chat with PhoneReport, a Samsung rep confirmed that the next Bada phone will look much like the Wave with a sub-$200 pricetag, while the one after that will rock a full QWERTY keyboard. This is inline with what we saw on that leak back in April.
- The Bada App Store will launch in South Africa and 19 other (unspecified) countries, with plans to hit 80 countries within just a few months
- Apps can be free or paid
- Paid apps are paid for via credit card, though Samsung says they’re working with carriers to implement carrier billing.
- Samsung hopes to sell 10 million Bada handsets this year, and 20 million by the end of next year.
[Via PhoneReport]