Google is Purposefully Making Products worse, here’s why.

Google is about to intentionally release products worse for users because they don’t want to pay royalties to Sonos for stealing their speaker software. However, Sonos isn’t simply a company in which their sole purpose is to scoop up patents and sue those who use their patents, Sonos makes plenty of products considered some of the best in their class. The way Google acquired this information, was Sonos casually gave the search giant an inside look at their technology, something that didn’t seem risky at the time because Google wasn’t making speakers and it wasn’t in the smart home business. Sonos says that as a result of that inside look, Google “blatantly and knowingly” copied its technology and included it in its own products.

            The Technology in question refers to the ability to connect speakers in groups and control their volume. Now Google has blatantly taken the software out of their speakers instead of paying their fine, which may not seem like a big deal but the software marketed as of late has the ability to do so, so they’re in some ways now lying to their clientele. An article from Inc.com better summarizes the proceedings:

“Basically, Google lost a fight, didn't get its way, and decided to take its toys and go home. The problem is, it already sold those toys to customers and it's intentionally breaking them.”

         Rather than lose an insignificant amount of money for the conglomerate that is Google, they have decided to break their products, a low spiteful blow to Sonos and their clients.