Motorola's Flipout: Don't, Like, Hold Your Breath, America

The blogosphere's flipping out over Motorola's newly announced Android offering, the Motorola Flipout. The Flipout, a square-shaped Android phone that looks a bit like Microsoft's Kin device, will run Android 2.1 along with a customized version of Motorola's Motoblur interface.

Hang on, though: Before you flip out over the Flipout, there are a couple things you need to know.

Meet the Motorola Flipout

Not to be confused with Motorola's similarly named Backflip Android phone -- you know, the one locked down Apple-style by AT&T -- the Flipout features a five-row QWERTY keypad that pivots from its 2.8-inch display. On the hardware side, the Moto Flipout runs on a modest Texas Instruments 600-MHz processor. It has 512MB of internal memory and a 2GB SD card that can be expanded up to 32GB.

All that said, the Flipout isn't really meant to be a power-user's phone; like the Microsoft Kin, it's billed more as a starter smartphone for social networkers. Between Motoblur's update-streaming home screen widgets and the Flipout's cheerfully named colors -- you can select from such tasty hues as "raspberry crush," "brilliant blue," and "poppy red" when buying the device -- it's not difficult to tell what demographic Motorola has its eye on.

Motorola Flipout: The Country Factor

As excited as I am by the prospect of a "raspberry crush"-colored Android phone -- I mean, come on, that'd totally match my new Hello Kitty lip gloss -- there's just one problem with the Motorola Flipout: It isn't actually slated to reach America. Not yet, anyway.

Right now, Motorola's planning to launch the Flipout only in Europe and Latin America. While an American rollout is still possible, it certainly doesn't appear to be in the cards for the immediate future. The press release announcing the Flipout came from Motorola's UK-based offices and wasn't even directed to American journalists. Officially, Motorola says only that "no announcement had been made" about an American Flipout phone so far, and if anything changes, we'll hear about it.

So, my fellow U.S. Android fans, our "poppy red" fix isn't upon us yet. For the meantime, this highly colorful Flipout video -- complete with a club-ready dance jam -- will just have to do.

Author JR Raphael writes the new Android Power blog at Computerworld. Come say hello on Facebook: facebook.com/The.JR.Raphael

This story, "Motorola's Flipout: Don't, Like, Hold Your Breath, America" was originally published by Computerworld.