If you’ve been following the rise of Android, you’ve probably seen some of the controversy around how open (or not) Google’s hugely successful mobile OS actually is. In October Android Chief Andy Rubin provided his first definition: a command that can be used to download the Android source. But that didn’t convince everyone, and the issue came to a head last month when it was revealed that Google would not be releasing the source code to Honeycomb for months — putting tablet manufactures who haven’t received early access behind the curve.

Today during a press Q&A at Google I/O, Rubin gave a more detailed explanation on how he views Android ‘sopenness, explaining that there is a difference between open source and a community-driven project (and that Android skews heavily toward the former). The reason, he explains, is that developers need to be able to count on certain APIs being available on all Android devices running a given version of the OS. Here’s a paraphrased quote: