According to a report from Bloomberg, Apple-BFF and mobile-telecom-extroidinaire AT&T is in talks with Google about joining the Open Handset Alliance. In an interview today, Ralph de la Vega -- chief executive officer of the company's wireless unit -- said that the provider is, "Analyzing the situation," concerning the use of Google's Android operating system for some of its handsets. Although Mr. de la Vega hasn't personally met with the search-engine giant, the fact that AT&T is even considering joining the Alliance could have a palpable impact on the industry's perception of the forthcoming mobile OS contender. As you'll recall, T-Mobile and Sprint have already jumped on the OHA bandwagon (though to what extent no one knows), and adding the de facto US leader to the mix might really get this stew boiling over. [Warning: read link requires subscription]

[Via Information Week]

You can't help but love Steve Ballmer. Besides being the ultra-rich, ultra-faithful CEO of Microsoft, you can always count on him to deliver some choice words -- especially if the competition is in the news. His latest efforts come in the wake of Google's Android announcement, a project which clearly stands to compete with Redmond's ubiquitous Windows Mobile platform. When asked what he thought of the forthcoming phone OS at a news conference in Tokyo, Ballmer noted that, "Their efforts are just some words on paper right now." Okay, let's be perfectly honest: that statement is true -- but don't you think that when a monolithic company like Google aligns itself with other giants such as Intel, T-Mobile, Samsung, and LG (amongst others), Microsoft might take it a little more seriously? Ballmer went on to say that, "They have a press release, we have many, many millions of customers, great software, many hardware devices and they're welcome in our world." Thanks for allowing Google into "your world" Steve, we're sure your subjects will appreciate it.

C'mon, you knew this was coming. Not a moment after Google does its big reveal on the Android OS and forthcoming multi-manufacturer GPhone, the rumor mill has already starting churning with wild imaginings and fantastic leaps of logic. A not-so gigantic jump comes as speculation that HTC's Omni -- which we first heard about nearly a year ago -- is actually the phone that has been referred to as the "Dream," Google's OS demo unit. We have to admit, there are some similarities between the two, not the least of which are the 3-inch by 5-inch size, rectangular touchscreen, full QWERTY that swivels out (which according to this earlier rendering, goes in more than one direction), and a beveled edge that "nestles in the palm." We remind you, of course, that this is just the first in a long line of rumors trying to pinpoint the "real" GPhone -- HTC or otherwise -- so don't get too excited just yet.

Update: As a commenter points out, the "earlier rendering" is actually the precursor to the Omni, the HTC Universal, though its screen mechanism bears a resemblance to the one described in the original Forbes article.