There has been quite a bit of news on the mobile OS space lately. We're starting to see a trend of diversifying solutions, as opposed to the "me-too; Android" phones over the last couple of years. On the hardware side, Nokia is continuing its decline, but as this Guardian article shows, still delivers about a quarter of the handsets (smart and feature phones) to the Western European market. It is far surpassed by Samsung at almost 40%, while Apple, who only make smart phones, sold some 10% of the devices.

On the software side, Google released Android 4.1, including source code, while Facebook has announced their own customized OS, however it is likely to be Android based. Meanwhile, old Nokia employees still believe in their adopted child, MeeGo, and has forked off a company to continue development.

New on the block is Mozilla, with their Boot to Gecko, Mobile Firefox OS. They showed off screenshots this week. Mozilla has taken a bold step by basing all "native" applications and UI on HTML5. It should make applications easy to develop, however, there still has to be a OS specific API beyond HTML5 to handle features like cross-application intents (e.g. use this number to call), copy/paste, etc. and possibly hardware functions like camera, motion sensors, compass and so on.

To round off, a recent H-Online article by Andrew Back discusses how all the "open" alternatives still rely on proprietary hardware drivers for radio, and other auxiliary chips. As long as the fireware for these are closed there is a problem for security and freedom, he asserts. He mentions the OsmocomBB project as a free GSM implementation, but also that fully free and open software radios are unlikely to see the light, as it will not get certification by telecom regulators, and thus will be illegal to operate.