Tuesday  Sony released the binaries needed by a project started by no less than Jean-Baptiste Queru , Technical Lead of AOSP.  The project is creating a stock Android rom for the Xperia S smartphone.

This means  Google itself will be creating a stock rom for a non-nexus device  with all the benefits that has (like OTA updates).

This rocks for two different reasons.

First of all, Google is taking upon themselves the titanic task of mantaining more devices, even if they are not  theirs, not a Nexus.

Also, removing the custom launchers and personalization layers the manufacturers blend with their phones is  always  good. Less load, less excuses and more pure Android flavor. After Ice Cream Sandwich UI revamp the custom layers are definitely not needed.

If this applies to more devices in the future we might be seeing a way out in the impossible task of fighting the fragmentation. And this is awesome.