Trapped in a tech ecosystem
Apple v Google v Microsoft: it’s impossible to know how to choose a tech ecosystem. Lee Suckling ponders a solution for future-proofing.
Joining one particular tech company’s ecosystem seems like the logical thing to do. You can get a phone, a laptop, a tablet, a smartwatch, a TV, a cloud storage system, a sound system... maybe throw in some virtual assistant products and virtual reality to boot, and everything will ‘‘just work’’.
The idealised experience has been made clear to us for decades: the future is a Jetsons-esque life where everything in home and work life is seamless. The trouble, in 2017, is market competition. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon: they all want to be your ecosystem. Every other month, another product, service, or piece of software launches to further bring the possibility of a single-brand ecosystem to reality. In practice, exclusively buying into one tech company’s ecosystem is somewhat creepy.
Absolute brand allegiance is not desirable; nobody thinks people who dress head-to-toe in Adidas stripes or Nike-tickedgarments are all that cool. You just look brainwashed, as if you have no agency to actually make choices in your consumerism.
Yet all tech companies seem to desire cult-like status. They want you to ‘‘buy in’’ and be happy about being stuck there.
This is particularly problematic because no single tech giant is currently offering a full-service experience.
Apple still doesn’t make TVs. Google still doesn’t have all its hardware available in New Zealand. Microsoft is slower than others in innovation and release. Amazon’s highly-attuned home shopping capability has not yet rolled out anywhere but the United States.
No tech company’s hardware/ software combinations can be defined as universally superior; they all have lists of subjective pros.
There’s cons even within ecosystems, too – sometimes the Airplay icon on a Mac will just disappear, making it impossible to send video to Apple TV. Likewise, my Sony Android smart TV technically supports Chromecast, but for some reason it’s not compatible for voice control with Google Home.
This begs the question, is a viable ‘‘pick and choose’’ multibrand solution possible? Something that enables you to get the best hardware, the best software, all the features you want, and still have all of your tech ‘‘talk’’ to each other?
Compatibility makes this a real challenge. To get the premium offerings from tech giants, they force you to buy into their ecosystem.
Google’s Pixel Buds, which let you translate up to 40 languages in real time, could be a gamechanging piece of technology. However, they can only be paired with Google’s flagship Pixel phones, not other Android devices, let alone Apple devices. Many similar issues come from Apple, for example, you must have an iPhone to operate the Watch.
What you’re left with is a mishmash of tech which ‘‘kind of’’ works together. Usually, you need to figure out a few hacks to get to a manageable solution – it’s always less-than-perfect, but you get the job done.
Much of this is achievable with cross-platform apps. There’s an Apple Music app for Android, Microsoft Xbox’s Smartglass is available on all platforms, Google services are iOS compatible, you can get iCloud for Windows . . . if you really want to cross ecosystems, you have options.
Yet these options are finicky at best. At worst, they just don’t work, even when they’re supposed to (like I see with my Sony TV).
If you do want to get a nearperfect solution for a tech ecosystem, you need to take a calculated risk and commit to one primary offering. You must play the long game and decide which proprietary system you’ll be happy with for a good decade.
And it is that kind of a commitment. It involves hedging your bets on a general product aesthetic, user-friendliness of an OS, historical rate at which that company releases new products, software update frequency, product lifespan, and the tech company’s overarching vision for the future.
With the above perimeters, for a long time I thought the smart choice was Apple. In the past year or so I’ve made a conscious decision to go Google (which, regrettably, means importing my hardware to New Zealand).
Google still has its problems but I appreciate its overall foresight and the fact it’s not a completely closed ecosystem. It’s also reasonably friendly with my Apple and Microsoft stuff. Additionally, I find content providers that have no allegiance to any tech company at all (eg Netflix, Spotify) to be most suitable.
As for the future, patience is key.
Tech brands will release innovative products and services to try to out-do each other: that’s the way of the market’s evolution.
When one tech company releases something that makes you froth at the mouth, you must just sit tight and wait a while. An alternative will soon come along that fits within your preferred ecosystem – tech companies just keep copying each others’ ideas, after all.