It's here, it's launched, and it's called the T-Mobile G1 (a significantly better name than the Dream).
First thoughts on picking it up, it's got a nice slinky mechanical schwip motion, as the QWERTY keyboard slides out. Yes, people, that's the little seen 'schwip'. We've seen a white and a black version, the black one is obviously photographed. The touchscreen is decent in terms of sensitivity, but it's not even close to the brightness of the iPhone.
Apps are a really big thing here, and there's a 'markets' button on the main screen (think Apple app store, although they'll hate me for saying so). There's an app which tracks your location and brings up relevant wikipedia content, there's a barcode scanner for price comparison, but of course all this is US based at the moment.
UK launch date is going to be November, so we're running about a month behind.
There's a 3.2 megapixel camera (no flash, and no video functionality), and built-in memory is as good as nothing (192 MB). Out of the box, you get a 2 GB MicroSD card, although this can be expanded to 8GB.
When it launches on T-Mobile, it won't be available on PAYG, but given the direction Apple have taken, it wouldn't be suprising to see this change.
What the basic message is here, is that this phone is all about what you can add to it to make it yours - the handset is your basic HTCness - it's the Google Andriod OS that makes this exciting.
So far, on the handset we've been playing with, I've seen a Pacman game, an Amazon MP3 app (don't get excited, it probably won't be available at launch date in the UK) and of course, the Google Browser.
The screen doesn't have apps in the traditional grid, it's more of like the LG OS, where there are widgets you can drag around the screen.
Oh, and as far as what it's missing, there's no accelerometer, no flash playback(on launch, although it's predicted that it'll quickly be developed), no flash on the camera, and at this point, no one in the room could work out how to do cut and paste. Oh, and there's a proprietry headphone jack. Boo.
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I believe there is an accelerometer. Many of the apps that have been shown would require one. Google Maps Street View is supposed to support the panning of the phone, for example.
There is a cut and paste functionality (see youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wzk9dhocPbw) and accelerometer.
Yeah there is definitely an accelerometer. Not sure where you got that wrong info from.
Also, there is definitely copy and paste.
Oh and regarding Google Maps Street View, the phone panning works because there's also a built-in compass. So that specifically does not depend on the accelerometer.
But I repeat, there is an accelerometer.
Fair enough. My assessment was based on the fact that when you turned the phone sideways, it didn't automatically switch to landscape mode (having said that, it was a prototype). And the spokesperson said he hadn't managed to find the c&p functionality, but I'm very very relieved someone else has!