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Google 'Doubles Down' on Pixel Hardware, Cuts Google Assistant Support (arstechnica.com) 29

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
A new report from The Information details more changes Google CEO Sundar Pichai's budget cuts are having across the company, with some divisions surviving and others getting ominous resource cuts. From a report: First, we have news that the hardware division, other than losing laptops, seems mostly safe. Google's biggest Android partner, Samsung, is in decline in many established markets, and Apple is hitting an all-time high in US market share last quarter. The report says Google views Apple as more of a problem than it has in the past, thanks to worries that regulators might shut down the usual multi-billion-dollar Google/Apple agreement to put Google Search on iPhones. If iPhones stop showing Google ads, the rise of Apple and fall of Samsung is one of the few things that could actually be a major problem for Google's revenue.

According to the report, Google views itself as the solution to this problem. As a hedge against what the report calls the "further decline" of Samsung, Google is "doubling down" on its investment in Pixel hardware. Google is apparently doing this by "moving product development and software engineering staff working on features for non-Google hardware to work on Google-branded devices." The goal here is to not spend more money, so Google is apparently sacrificing partner devices to focus on the Pixel division. So what projects are seeing cuts? Google TV is one, with the report saying: "Executives also have discussed moving some product managers working on Google TV software for television sets" to Wear OS and the Pixel Tablet. This is the only OS called out as specifically receiving less OS development. A lot of this report seems to focus on cuts to Google Assistant's support for specific form factors, which is strange since Google Assistant is more or less the same on every platform. The whole point of the Assistant is one reliable, predictable voice assistant that lives everywhere, and it's not clear what platform-specific support needs to be done other than whipping up an app that can receive audio and read back results.
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Google 'Doubles Down' on Pixel Hardware, Cuts Google Assistant Support More

Google 'Doubles Down' on Pixel Hardware, Cuts Google Assistant Support

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  • Definition... (Score:3)

    by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2022 @04:35PM (#62978099)

    Does "doubling down" for Google mean pixel model time until EOL will be half as long? Not sure what the multiplier is here.

  • platform-specific support (Score:3)

    by bill_mcgonigle ( 4333 ) * on Tuesday October 18, 2022 @05:00PM (#62978151) Homepage Journal

    > it's not clear what platform-specific support needs to be done other than whipping up an app that can receive audio and read back results.

    The Assistant feature on my Fitbit watch is so bad as to be unusable.

    Oddly the speakerphone works (I tried it once) so the hardware is fine (microphone and speaker) but there must be some bizzare bluetooth stack that doesn't just act like an Android microphone.

    Maybe it's not worth fixing. I found it to not be worth using.

  • Cutting back support? (Score:3)

    by Locke2005 ( 849178 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2022 @05:04PM (#62978157)
    Does that mean my Google Chromecast TV is _never_ going to reliably send audio to my paired Google Nest Speakers? Currently, the only way to do it is to keep reconnecting Bluetooth every time you turn the TV on, and that frequently fails.

  • Google not consumer company (Score:3)

    by fermion ( 181285 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2022 @05:04PM (#62978159) Homepage Journal
    Note that the pixel serves to get eyeballs on google ads, not provide a good customer experience. Samsung could sell millions of phones, but if it does not lead to ad revenue google does not care.

    Google becoming more involved in the consumer end, forcing design decisions based on ad revenue, will kill the Android phone.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      I see you have never used a Pixel phone. They are the most ad-free experience out there. Other manufacturers take money to pre-install shitty apps you don't want like Facebook and Netflix. The Google apps that they come with are mostly ad-free, and don't nag you to pay for services. Google give you more free cloud storage than Apple does (15GB vs 5GB) so there is less upsell there too.

      There are some ads in certain places, like in the Play Store app. Photos tries to sell you prints sometimes. Gmail, Assistan

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by fermion ( 181285 )
        The question is not related to the past. It is the future. and how google will implement their plan to monetize the phones
      • Google News's whole reason to exist is to insert more ads in the news story than you get by viewing the page directly. Google Now not have any ads? Please. Messages is about 60% spam these days. I guess I can't blame that entirely on Google, as they do try to detect spam, but they've been missing more and more lately. Gmail may not present ads to you, but it scans all your mail and monitors what you do so Google can push ads to you elsewhere. All of this is tolerable, but please take off the rose-colore
  • Since my Pixel 4 that Google said was water resistant... wasn't. The case wasn't sealed at all, water ran right in, and it immediately ceased working.
    • Only reason i picked up a new pixel 6a is because mint mobile is selling them for $120. Even at that price point i regret getting it.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by rykin ( 836525 )
      Pixel 6 claimed it was water resistant and it is. I took it to a water park with my kids and had no issues. Mileage may vary.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by fintux ( 798480 )
      In the case Samsung phones are to be replaced by Pixel phones, they better have longer SW update period. If the device is considered obsolete in 3 years, that's not going to cut it for me. I want to buy phones earliest when there's already a newer model to save on the cost (50% saving or even more in many cases), and I want to keep the phone for at least 4 years (further 50-75% savings compared to buying a new phone every year or every two years). That's having to pay 1/4 to even 1/8 of what I would pay buy
  • News like this makes me rethink continuing with the Google and Android ecosystem. I bought a Pixel phone in part for better integration with my other Google devices. If they start cutting back on support and updates for my devices with Google Assistant and Google TV my reasons to stay with Google start disappearing. Hearing about these changes reminds me Google is notorious for abandoning its tech (and users).

  • Doubling down... until they dropped it (Score:5, Insightful)

    by khchung ( 462899 ) on Tuesday October 18, 2022 @08:33PM (#62978603) Journal

    When Google can drop even Stadia, their gaming platform, what else they won't drop?

    Heck, even Microsoft stood by their XBox platform. I think even the SEGA Saturn lasted longer than Stadia.

    Google don't even have the grit keep one console through its full life cycle even though they have no lack of profit, how could anyone rely on Google for anything except as an interesting toy to play for a while? And "an interesting toy to play for a while" seemed to be just the attitude Google have towards their products.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bn-7bc ( 909819 )
      Oh stadia, a gaming platform that was doomed from day one, by 3 thhings
      1 games needed to be ported to stadua so pitifully cataloge at start.
      2 no possibility to take existing library from steam/epic/whatever to stadia, evry game gad to be re purchached .
      3: far from everybody lives close to a google dc and rtt is rather critical for some games.
      4: people struggle with flaky an/or slow( and sometimes even metered connections)
      Yea not exactly a glowing endorsement if stadia is it, Googles habit of killing

  • Remember, Google bought Android because it was afraid of the dominance of Apple and iOS cutting them off from the ad market.

    So maybe perhaps what Google needs to do is stop the silly 2+1 year support and offer ongoing support for their phones and encourage their partners to do the same.

    Because Google is making their own chips now, there's no reason why it should only get 2 years of updates and a year of security updates beyond that.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by bgarcia ( 33222 )

      So maybe perhaps what Google needs to do is stop the silly 2+1 year support and offer ongoing support for their phones and encourage their partners to do the same.

      Pixel 6 and later phones will get security updates for at least 5 years.

      https://support.google.com/pix... [google.com]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Unfortunately they only make the SoC, not the modem. They are as reliant as everyone else on the modem suppliers providing drivers for older models and newer versions of Android.

      It's actually quite expensive to do, because modems are heavily regulated in order to prevent problems with the cellular networks. One bad device can screw up cell reception for hundreds, even thousands of people. They have to test the actual emissions from the modem, and it's immunity to noise, every time they update the driver.

      Goo

  • The assistant feature absolutely sucks and I disable it, so far as that is possible, whenever it rears its head.
  • why is samsung declining?

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