Google introduced its newest smartphone the Pixel 2 on Wednesday, and like Apple’s newer smartphones, it comes without the universal headphone jack.
Google’s decision arrives as somewhat of a surprise given the fact that the tech giant mocked its Silicon Valley counterpart just last year for removing the 3.5mm audio jack. At a press event in San Francisco in 2016, Google announced the Pixel device as the first ever made “inside and out” by the company. Google also displayed a promo video detailing its features.
“3.5mm headphone jack satisfyingly not new,” one portion showed, a not-so-subtle jab (among others) at Apple, which nixed the portal for the iPhone 7.
Google was evidently trying to capitalize on a clamorous dissatisfaction to Apple’s decision — manifested in the fact that startups across the country created tangible solutions to alleviate customer concerns of losing the wireless headphones that come with the newer products or not being able to plug their traditional headphones into the device. Apple itself was seemingly trying to capitalize on the situation by cornering the market and forcing both consumers and other companies to adapt. And while cornering the market for wireless headphones didn’t necessarily work, it may have contributed to other companies’, like Google’s, adaptation.
Vlad Savov of The Verge goes even further in an article titled “The Pixel’s missing headphone jack proves Apple was right.”
He says a number of mobile device manufacturers are already embracing the change or plan to do so. Google itself noted this new standard to The Daily Caller News Foundation and says it needed to make the substantial adjustment in order to achieve other design features.
Consumers, like Savov, aren’t so gleefully receptive.
“A whole bunch of people are carrying stupid, annoying, easy-to-misplace dongles for their ‘legacy’ wired headphones,” Savov wrote in reference to the accessories enabling the traditional headphones. “Nobody is especially overjoyed about the change, but we’re all adapting” — including Google.
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