“I’m focused on delighting a lot of consumers, but there are other folks focused on putting me out of business,” Rubin said, suggesting that Motorola’s patent portfolio will be a potent weapon in the intellectual property spats that riddle the mobile industry these days.

As for the hardware business, Rubin reiterated that a Google-owned Motorola would operate “at arm’s length” from its Android unit.

“I don’t think you should consider Google’s acquisition of Motorola as Google entering the hardware business,” Rubin said. “This is going to be an arm’s-length thing … Motorola isn’t going to get any special treatment.”

But Google is finally close to launching a music service with help from the labels, Android boss Andy Rubin said today, confirming earlier reports for the first time. When? “I think we’re close,” Rubin said onstage at the AsiaD conference in Hong Kong.

Both Amazon and Apple already sell music and offer cloud lockers, but Rubin promised that Google’s version “will have a little twist – it will have a little Google in it. It won’t just be selling 99-cent tracks.”

Still, Google needs all of the big labels on board, and the most recent reports said only EMI Music was close to a final deal. So, “close” could be a relative term.

Meanwhile, about those earlier label deals. Why did they fall apart, anyway?

Rather than accuse the labels of taking an unreasonable stance, as Google executives have previously done, Rubin takes a new tack — he says media companies in general haven’t been able to figure out what Google is up to. Just like Steve Jobs’s company used to be called “Apple Computer” and evolved into “Apple,” he says, Google is morphing, as well.

“Google is in the very, very early phases of adding consumer products to our portfolio,” he said. “The media industry didn’t see us as that. They saw us a search company.”

You can connect some dots here and make an educated guess: Rubin is probably referencing media companies’ insistence that Google help them fight piracy by making some sites harder to find. And the search giant has complied, to some degree. But there’s likely more to the story than that.

Google mobile kingpin Andy Rubin doesn’t think so.

During a Wednesday evening interview at AsiaD, Rubin, a former Apple employee, said he was confident that Apple will remain the innovator it has always been, even without its co-founder’s day-to-day leadership.

“Will Apple lose step with Steve’s passing? I don’t think so,” said Rubin. “The DNA in the people walking the halls at Apple is a very powerful combination of the arts and computer science, and I don’t think that’s changed with Steve’s passing. That combination of creativity and computer science, it’s still there. … Obviously, Steve had a big role at Apple and I think he gave guidance to a lot of the employees, but now it’s time for some of the other guys to kind of step up and demonstrate that they can do the creative plus computer science.”

That’s why we’re kicking off AsiaD with a little Ice Cream Sandwich. Google mobile chief Andy Rubin is taking the stage with Walt Mossberg to talk about the future of Android, just hours after unwrapping the latest version here in Hong Kong.

Rubin is just one of the many mobile-focused speakers here at the show, which will also include talks with Windows Phone head Andy Lees, along with executives from Samsung and HTC. Rubin is due to start speaking just after 6 pm local time. (That’s 3 am for you West Coast types, and 6 am on the East Coast.)

5:50 pm: Folks are just getting their seats, so feel free to do the same.

5:58 pm: Two-minute warning. And you have no time-outs left.

6:02 pm: Don’t worry folks. Still here. Just finishing up my bubble tea as the guests get seated. You probably have a couple minutes to grab a beverage yourselves, if you want.

6:08 pm: Um, still waiting.

What to do.

“Siri: Do you know a joke?”

“Two iPhones walk into a bar … I forget the rest.”

6:11 pm: Welcoming remarks are starting.

6:13 pm: The chief secretary of Hong Kong is on stage, and there is a very loud lion dance making its way through the tables in the convention hall.

6:17 pm: Lions still dancing. There will be ice cream. I promise.

6:19 pm: Walt Mossberg takes the stage.

“It’s the first time I’ve ever followed that kind of act,” Mossberg said.

6:19 pm: Apple’s Phil Schiller won’t be appearing at the conference, Mossberg notes, as he needs to be at the Steve Jobs memorial at Apple’s campus on Wednesday.

6:22 pm: And now, Andy Rubin …

6:26 pm: Mossberg: You had a big event here in Hong Kong as well today.

Rubin: With our partner Samsung, we launched the Galaxy Nexus, which is our next-generation lead device with Android 4.0 — Ice Cream Sandwich.

6:27 pm: Rubin is explaining what makes a “Nexus” phone, as opposed to any old Android phone. Basically, Google gets deeply involved in the design, working with the hardware maker and the chipmakers.

Rubin notes there are over a million lines of code in Android.

“You don’t want to build it generically and then throw it over the fence.”

“I look it as a reference design,” Rubin said of the lead device.

6:29 pm: Rubin explaining how Ice Cream Sandwich reunifies the tablet and phone versions of Android.

Android 4.0 will support both phones and tablets.

There’s a notion of fragments, introduced in Honeycomb, that lets apps run in different configurations for screen sizes.

Walt noted that Rubin said a year ago that Android was still for geeks, and maybe their spouses. Honeycomb was a little better about surfacing the hidden technology, Walt said. How does Ice Cream Sandwich stack up?

Rubin said the company has always been trying to improve the user interface.

“We want it to be intuitive,” Rubin said, saying Android devices should be an extension of people’s daily lives, and the company aims to keep getting closer to that goal.

“Ice Cream Sandwich is the best we’ve ever done,” Rubin said.

6:34 pm: Rubin is now showing off the just-introduced Galaxy Nexus, which bears both the Samsung and Google logos. It’s got a Texas Instruments processor and a sensor to tell how high off the ground it is, among other hardware features.

One of the features is the ability to unlock the phone using facial recognition (a demo that didn’t go so hot).

6:37 pm:

“We’re going to try it again here,” Rubin said. “Let’s see if this works.”

And it does.

“Hi, Andy,” the phone said.

Rubin notes the technology came from a recent acquisition.

6:38 pm: Now Walt is giving it a try.

“Sorry, don’t recognize you,” the phone tells Walt.

The Android phone is actually using the graphics chip on the phone rather than the main processor to do the facial recognition, Rubin notes.

Now Rubin is showing the phone doing some real-time effects on the camera, distorting Walt’s face in various ways.

“This will all reflect on the review,” Walt said.

The effects are similar to those found in desktop software for a while now.

6:42 pm: Let’s talk about competition.

Who’s your main competition?

Rubin doesn’t really answer directly.

“Maybe you need the translator,” Walt quipped.

“I guess my competitors would be anybody who is in the platform business. Apple builds an operating system. Microsoft builds an operating system.”

What’s your sense about RIM?

“I think they’re very smart. They’re Canadian.”

Rubin said he went there once and they were completely vertical, building their own antennas and even building whole phones in Canada. “There’s a lot to be said about that approach,” he said, noting it eliminates a lot of dependencies.

“The problem with it is it limits agility,” he said.

I think it is real easy to retool. They acquired QNX so they have some future they can seize.

6:46 pm: Are you, as a competitor of Apple, thinking they will lose a step with the death of Steve Jobs?, Walt asked.

“I don’t think anything like that,” Rubin said. “I used to work at Apple,” he said, noting it was his first big job.

Rubin noted that Apple still has the same ingredients that have made it a success, though it will miss Steve’s leadership. “Now it is time for some of the other guys to step up.”

6:48 pm: Asked about Windows Phone, Rubin noted that Microsoft did what smart companies do when they are late or behind in a market, which is to innovate on a different axis.

“I think that’s what Microsoft did with their Metro UI,” he said. “I think it is a bold move.”

That said, “from my taste and my perspective, it could be very dangerous for Microsoft,” he said. He suggested that Windows Phone leaves less room for creativity and for software and hardware makers to express themselves.

“If you want to take over the screen, you should be able to take over the screen,” Rubin said.

Rubin said it is kind of like what happened on the PC, which left hardware makers creating something of a commodity.

6:52 pm: “How come Android tablets have completely flopped in the marketplace?”

“I wouldn’t say completely flopped,” Rubin said.

Rubin said there are a little more than six million Android tablets out there running Google’s services, not counting other tablets (such as Barnes & Noble’s Nook Color)

“Six million is pretty healthy, but it is not 30 million,” he said. “Obviously, we need to get there.”

6:55 pm: Walt: When are you going to sell music?

“Today, it’s not there,” he said.

6:56 pm: “I feel we are close,” Rubin said of being able to offer some sort of music acquisition service — sales or subscription. “It will have a little twist … it won’t be just selling 99-cent songs.”

But others have gone in during the time that Google was unable to reach a deal with Hollywood and the record companies, Walt noted, point out that device makers such as Samsung now sell content on their own. “Obviously, people went in and they filled the gap,” Rubin said.

6:59 pm: Walt asked about tablets such as the Kindle Fire and Grid 10 that use Android under the hood, but do their own thing and hide Android from the user.

How do you feel about that? Is it good for Google?

Rubin: “I create an open operating system and somebody uses it. Am I okay with that?”

On Kindle Fire: “I think it is fine for Google. It is Android. It adheres to the APIs of Android.”

“I don’t view this as some kind of walled garden.” Rubin noted that Google can even create programs for Amazon tablets.

“Maybe this is going to solve the tablet problem,” he said.

7:03 pm: Walt is trying to get Andy Rubin to confirm that Galaxy Nexus will launch on Verizon first. Rubin doesn’t bite.

As for when Ice Cream Sandwich will show up on other Android devices, Rubin said it will be a matter of weeks after the Samsung device.

7:04 pm: Why should other Android makers not worry about Google buying Motorola?

Rubin: Part of it is clearly about patents. I’m focused on delighting a lot of consumers, but there are other folks focused on putting me out of business.

As for the hardware business, Rubin reiterated that a Google-owned Motorola would operate “at arm’s length” from the Android unit.

7:07 pm: On to Q&A.

First question is on how Google will protect app developers and others from patent issues.

Rubin: “In general, if we achieve patent peace where people aren’t suing each other for competitive advantage … that’s my goal.”

Rubin notes that there are mechanisms to license the patents for GSM and for MP3 and that would be a nice model to see for smartphones.

“It would be beautiful, in my view, if there was one clearinghouse to get all these rights,” he said.

7:11 pm: On Android Market

“It’s getting a lot better,” Rubin said, noting that the site finally uses Google’s actual search technology to find more relevant apps. “It’s going to get better exponentially very soon.”

Rubin acknowledged it hasn’t always been as good as it should have been.

“I recognize that we were a little behind.”

7:13 pm: Rubin on HTML5:

It’s not yet an alternative to building separate apps for different mobile operating systems.

“That would be the holy grail,” Rubin said, but it’s probably a way off.

7:17 pm: One of the pain points of Honeycomb has been the lack of tablet apps. When are we going to see ICS coming to tablets?

Rubin said he doesn’t think there should be apps specific for a tablet, necessarily. With Ice Cream Sandwich, Rubin said, all apps will run great on tablets.

Going forward, I think it would be wrong to make that distinction.

7:23 pm: Last question. Going to the digital home, what about televisions? How can we possibly see a single app working on phones, TVs and tablets?

Google TV is a product that exists, and it’s Android. The 2.0 version of Google TV is Honeycomb-based. There are differences, he said. TV is relatively passive. But Android can tie all of those together.

7:25 pm: And that’s a wrap for the keynote. I’ll have more later from Andy Rubin.

So why Asia? It seemed the most obvious choice for us, as we looked at the global landscape for tech. While the whole world has now been engulfed in the powerful trends of digitalization, perhaps nowhere else has been as important a place for understanding where it is headed next than this region, which is home to companies critical to the next phase of innovation.

There’s no question that Silicon Valley, which has been the base for most of the key players — such as Google, Apple, Facebook and more — has driven the digital revolution over the past decade. But as we look out onto what’s to come, it’s clear to us and many others that what’s coming next and even the next great company might be born here.

That’s why we have created a conference that mixes both important speakers from U.S. tech and also from all over Asia.

Given that smartphones are in ascendance globally, having Andy Rubin, who runs Google’s Android efforts, is a no-brainer. The longtime mobile exec is at the top of an aggressive push by the Internet giant to dominate the important sector across the world.

Speaking of domination, Alibaba Group’s Jack Ma efforts to make the company a powerhouse in China and elsewhere are hard to ignore. His recent tussle and interest in Yahoo, as he has built a wide-ranging Internet giant, should make for an interesting interview.

Expect a deep dive into what makes the future Web work with Twitter and Square founder Jack Dorsey, who is someone breaking new ground as he tears down old digital paradigms. With Twitter, Dorsey redefined the real-time world and how the virtual one communicates; with Square, he is upending the payments arena.

Nvidia is not only a pioneer of graphics chips, but now its processors are widely used in the latest mobile devices. That’s why its founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang has a lot to say about the future of the fastest-growing sector of computing, from smartphones to tablets and whatever’s next.

Asus Chairman Jonney Shih has presided over the Taiwanese tech giant since the early 1990s. Most recently, the company pioneered the netbook market and is now plunging deeply into the tablet business, making Shih perfect to discuss these key issues in Asia and around the world.

Kazuo “Kaz” Hirai is widely considered the second in command at the consumer electronics giant Sony, in charge of its key computer entertainment division, as well as now serving as executive deputy president of the whole company. As Sony struggles to reassert its dominance in tech, Hirai will be a key player in that effort.

Bradley Horowitz — as head of product management for Google+, the search giant’s aggressive effort to break Facebook’s hammerlock on social networking — has a perfect perspective to talk about the fast-growing area and where it is going globally. With locally-based social companies springing up all over Asia, can Google establish one the whole world will use?

At Microsoft, Andy Lees is leading one of the software giant’s most important initiatives, as president of its Windows Phone division. His come-from-behind-Google-and-Apple job includes mobile software and hardware, as well as its key partnership with Nokia, and Lees will need to win in markets globally, especially in Asia.

Peter Chernin is one of Hollywood’s top players and execs. But he’s also been increasingly active in media investing in Asia of late, and has a lot to say about the global nature of entertainment in the digital age.

John Roese heads the North American R&D team for Huawei, the Chinese telecom giant making everything from heavy-duty gear for networks to mobile phones and tablets. Roese will also talk about the phenomenon of a Chinese-owned company emerging on the world technology stage.

We also felt that it was important to hear from Silicon Valley start-ups, which have enjoyed unprecedented growth and funding in the Web 2.0 era. But as they seek to expand beyond the U.S., a critical move for them all, we’ve assembled a panel of entrepreneurs to discuss it, including: Brian Chesky, CEO and co-founder of Airbnb, the popular online vacation rental site; former Google exec Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, who is running the recently funded Joyus, a new premium video commerce site trying to pioneer a new way to shop online; and David Goldberg, who is now running one of tech’s most successful start-ups at SurveyMonkey, the dominant online survey company.

Yahoo co-founder and former CEO Jerry Yang, who will appear with the Internet giant’s Asia head Rose Tsou, needs little introduction. For all of the noise around the company these days, Yahoo has a huge footprint in the region, maintains a big e-commerce business there and holds massive stakes in key firms, such as Yahoo Japan and China’s Alibaba.

And so does LivingSocial, whose CEO and co-founder Tim O’Shaughnessy, who will appear along with founders of two of its Asian units, Daniel Shin and Paul Srivorakul, which the daily deals site just bought as part of its aggressive move into Asia.

Because of Samsung’s increasing importance as a global player in smartphones and tablets, it was natural to invite Dr. Won-Pyo Hong, who heads global product strategy for the Korean giant’s mobile business. That has surged in the past year to make Samsung a leader in Android-based phones and tablets, and a significant challenger to Apple.

Also key in the mobile arena is Cher Wang, chairman of HTC, the important and innovative handset and tablet maker which has been a key player in Android’s success story. Add to that HTC buying an operating system, which would further strengthen its hand in the competitive market, and it’s clear it is in a pole position on the critical mobile market going forward.

Finally, we are also glad to bring back Al Gore, who had a memorable interview at the fourth D: All Things Digital conference in 2006. The former VP and Nobel Peace Prize winner is now chairman of Current TV and also continues as a prominent environmental activist. He is also on the board of Apple, while also being a senior adviser to Google, as well as a partner in the famed Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins.

In total, along with some very cool demos to show off, it’s going to be an exciting AsiaD, and we are thrilled most of all to welcome our first international audience. So get ready for a busy three days here and we hope you will like what we have to show you.

The event, which is expected to see the debut of the next version of Android as well as the first device running the operating system, will now take place on Oct. 19 in Hong Kong. The new timing and locale is perfect for those coming to our AsiaD conference, which kicks off later on Oct. 19 in Hong Kong. Both Android chief Andy Rubin and a top Samsung executive are slated to speak at AsiaD.

Initially, Samsung didn’t explicitly say that its event was for Ice Cream Sandwich, though it did signal it would be an Android-focused event and sources indicated it would be for the launch of the next version of Android. The invite to the rescheduled event, however, features Google’s Droid guy in the shape of an ice cream sandwich.

The new version of Android is designed to bring together the phone and tablet versions of the operating system, which were forked in order for Google to hurry out the tablet-oriented Honeycomb. Google has yet to go into great detail on other Ice Cream Sandwich features.

The pair had been scheduled to announce the first phone based on Ice Cream Sandwich at an event Tuesday, coinciding with a wireless industry trade show in San Diego. However, on Friday the companies announced that the event was being postponed to an unspecified new date.

Sources said the companies just felt it was the wrong time to hold a launch event, as the world continues mourning Jobs, who died on Wednesday.

“Samsung and Google have decided to postpone the Samsung Mobile Unpacked event during the CTIA in San Diego, previously scheduled for Oct. 11,” Samsung said in a statement. “Under the current circumstances, both parties have agreed that this is not the appropriate time for the announcement of a new product.”

Although the event was being hosted by Samsung, Google’s Andy Rubin had been scheduled to speak.

The decision to postpone was made late last night at the top levels of both companies, sources said, with Jobs’s death being the reason. There are no delays with the product itself, sources insisted.

Jobs’s death has provoked a global outpouring of support, including tributes from many of those with whom Apple has clashed, of late. Adobe, for instance, had a tribute to Jobs on its home page, while Microsoft lowered its corporate flag to half-mast at all offices across the world.

UPDATE 9:04 am PT: In an updated statement, the companies confirmed they were making the move out of respect for Jobs.

“We believe this is not the right time to announce a new product as the world expresses tribute to Steve Jobs’s passing,” the companies said.

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Well, this is curious.

Samsung had scheduled an event for Tuesday at the CTIA show in San Diego, where it was widely expected to introduce the lead device running Ice Cream Sandwich, the next version of Android. Among those on tap to appear was Android boss Andy Rubin, AllThingsD had reported.

Now, though, that event appears to be off, according to a report from Stuff.

That report quotes a statement from Samsung’s Korean HQ, though a U.S. Samsung representative said he couldn’t immediately comment on things. A Google representative was not immediately available for comment.

The cancellation has been extremely sudden, as both companies were talking about logistics for the event as recently as yesterday.

UPDATE, 8 am PT: I’ve independently confirmed that the event is off. Still working on the “why” part though.

And then there was Schiller and Gore.

That would be Apple’s SVP of worldwide product marketing Phil Schiller and former Vice President Al Gore, who round out the stellar list of speakers at our upcoming AsiaD conference.

Taking place from Oct. 19 to 21 in Hong Kong, the lineup is already impressive, with a mix of speakers from China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, as well as Silicon Valley and elsewhere.

The previously announced speakers include: Alibaba Group’s Jack Ma; Google Android head Andy Rubin; Twitter inventor and product guru, as well as Square co-founder and CEO, Jack Dorsey; Nvidia founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang; Asus Chairman Jonney Shih; Sony president and second-in-command Kazuo “Kaz” Hirai; Google+ guru Bradley Horowitz; Hollywood big shot Peter Chernin; Huawei’s North American R&D head John Roese; Microsoft’s Windows Phone head Andy Lees; and a panel of Silicon Valley start-up stars — Joyus’ Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, SurveyMonkey’s Dave Goldberg and Airbnb’s Brian Chesky; Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang and Asia head Rose Tsou; LivingSocial’s Tim O’Shaughnessy, along with founders of two of its Asian units, Daniel Shin and Paul Srivorakul; Samsung mobile head Dr. Won-Pyo Hong; HTC CEO Peter Chou, who replaces Chairwoman Cher Wang.

Schiller, who reports to Apple’s CEO Tim Cook (and before that, Steve Jobs) is a member of the executive team of the tech icon, where he has worked for 17 years. He is responsible for a swath of Apple’s outward-facing businesses, including product marketing, developer relations and business marketing.

Today, in fact, he was onstage at Apple’s iPhone event, outlining some of its new product offerings. In addition, Apple just opened its first retail store in Hong Kong.

Gore, who had a memorable interview at the fourth D: All Things Digital conference in 2006, needs little introduction. The former VP and Nobel Peace Prize winner is now chairman of Current TV and also continues as a prominent environmental activist.

Gore is on the board of Apple, while also being a senior adviser to Google, which is a neat trick. At the same time, he is a partner in the famed Silicon Valley venture capital firm, Kleiner Perkins, and co-founder and chairman of Generation Investment Management, a partnership that is focused on sustainable investing.

And, as most people know, he knows a thing or two about the Internet.

Walt Mossberg and I could not think of two better people to add to the lineup we have for AsiaD, which has very few seats left.

See you in China in two weeks!

With AsiaD just a little over a month away, Walt Mossberg and I are adding even more speakers to the list, for what we hope will be an awesome event in Hong Kong.

Taking place from Oct. 19 to 21, the conference lineup is already impressive, with a mix of speakers from China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan, as well as Silicon Valley and more.

The previously announced speakers include: Alibaba’s Jack Ma; Google Android head Andy Rubin; Twitter inventor and product guru, as well as Square co-founder and CEO, Jack Dorsey; Nvidia founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang; Asus Chairman Jonney Shih; Sony president and second-in-command Kazuo “Kaz” Hirai; Google+ guru Bradley Horowitz; Hollywood big shot Peter Chernin; Huawei’s North American R&D head John Roese; Microsoft’s Windows Phone head Andy Lees; and a panel of start-up stars — Joyus’ Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, SurveyMonkey’s Dave Goldberg and Airbnb’s Brian Chesky.

Now, to add to the kitty:

Yahoo co-founder and former CEO Jerry Yang, who will appear with the Internet giant’s Asia head Rose Tsou. For all of the noise around the company these days, Yahoo has a huge footprint in the region, maintains a big e-commerce business there and holds massive stakes in key firms, such as Yahoo Japan and China’s Alibaba. One of Yahoo’s first big investments came from Asian investor Masa Son, in fact, way back when.

Also on deck is LivingSocial’s CEO and co-founder Tim O’Shaughnessy, who will appear with Daniel Shin, the CEO and co-founder of South Korea’s Ticket Monster, which the daily deals site just bought as part of its aggressive move into Asia. Competing there with its U.S. rival Groupon, as well as a myriad of local social buying services, the market is a tough one.

Because of Samsung’s increasing importance as a global player in smartphones and tablets, we thought it was important to have Dr. Won-Pyo Hong. He heads global product strategy for Samsung’s mobile business, which has surged in the past year to make the Korean tech giant a leader in Android-based phones and tablets, and a significant challenger to Apple.

Also key in the mobile arena is Cher Wang, the chairwoman of three Taiwan companies, including HTC, the important and innovative handset and tablet maker which has been a key player in Android’s success story. But just this week she talked about the possibility of HTC buying an operating system, which would further strengthen its hand in the competitive market.

That’s it for now, but we will have more big names to come, as well as some pretty cool demos we will be putting onstage at AsiaD. So stay tuned.

Mr. Rubin, 48 years old, has changed Google’s organizational structure and become one of the most powerful people at the company. Under his leadership, the operating system known as Android has become the most widely used software on smartphones — surpassing the creations of Apple Inc. and Nokia Corp. — and powering tablets from many companies.

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