It's not even true on Verizon. They pushed an OTA to 4.0.2 soon after launch. Verizon did indeed decide to skip 4.0.3, for unstated reasons. Last I heard 4.0.4 (a month and a half old) was in the pipe, but who knows.

The broader point is valid, though. Google needs to make this happen, no one in the rest of the bucket brigade (not the handset vendors, and certainly not the carriers who bear the costs) cares about updates -- only Google and the users do. Or at the very least make it clear why, when AOSP "releases" a version, certain developer phones won't be getting it.

I absolutely agree with the broader point, and even the somewhat-shoddily-supported Verizon Galaxy Nexus is a shining example of up-to-date software in comparison to most released Android devices.

I think Google are going to be addressing this in a big way in the US with their recent move to sell unlocked devices directly to consumers. [0]

I am quite interested to see how CDMA (Verizon, Sprint) factors in to Google's latest device play (since CDMA devices, even "unlocked" ones, need to be approved by the carrier to be activated).

0: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230437150457740...

Their move to sell unlocked devices is not new- they did it with the Nexus One and it was a failure. They're trying it again now, but I don't expect much to be different.

How could Google create an incentive for carriers to upgrade the devices? Ask users to pay $10 for updates?

My preference would be to cleanly separate the API levels such that Android "compliance" requires the ability to update core components. But that's a software engineering problem, because right now the frameworks are evolving alongside driver and middleware stacks such that you can't just drop an "ICS" OS stack on top of a "Gingerbread" kernel and drivers and expect it to work.

Apple's answer, of course, is "... or else you won't get the next iPhone."

Sorry I couldn't fit "on Verizon" in the HN link (character limitation). I should have tried to fit "on VZ" in the title. This was my oversight, sorry for the confusion.

Maybe the title was edited after the post on HN... I don't know, just guessing.

Edit: Doesn't make sense, the link contains on-verizon.