There is a very interesting ARS Technica article on how Google is increasingly gaining control over the originally open source Android.
Ron Amandeo the author says that Google is intent on locking Android phone manufacturers into using the Google official version, rules and vision of Android rather than third party derivatives based on the open source code. Some like Amazon and many Chinese manufacturers are bucking the Google system but as the article describes Google is making it as hard for them as it can. Ron Amandeo’s article by is here.