Google announces 7" tablet from USD $199

[Rii]

No Flash from Android 4.1 onwards? My dreams of tablet porn are shattered.

I should probably twirl my mustache like a super-villain now but I'm in Austria and "Devices from Google Play are currently not available in your country".

Oic. And here I thought you just misspelled 'Australia'.

Been waiting for something like this, and it looks pretty great.
Though as Japan has no free wi-fi, and my data plan is kinda expensive/limited I'm a little worried about getting content on and off.

I think you're confusing wi-fi with cellular/mobile networks? The device has 802.11b/g/n wi-fi, but no cellular (3G/4G/etc.) connectivity.

You can use the mini-USB port for data transfer with the aid of a converter cable.

Ok, turns out you can't.

[soldant]

No Flash from Android 4.1 onwards? My dreams of tablet porn are shattered.

Don't see why, the rise of the iPad has seen a lot of places swap from Flash-based players to HTML5-based players.

Which is fine, because Flash is a bloated POS that needs to die.

[Rii]

Well I knew that Android couldn't begin to approach the elegance of Windows Phone, but between a quad core CPU and all the noise they made about waging a war on lagginess with Android 4.1 I was at least expecting it to be smooth. The extra flexibility is nice but until I can find a media player that can reliably handle MKV, OGM, FLV, etc. it seems more an invitation to frustration than anything else. Can't see this remaining in my possession long past the launch of Windows 8. Nice form factor tho.