Owen Williams* says our smartphones have become overrun with walled gardens, locking us into an entire ecosystem of devices and services.
Science fiction has long created the expectation that we would eventually be able to make a video call from any device, to anyone in the world, with just the flick of a wrist.
But no visionary writer predicted what that would actually mean, circa 2019: Installing six separate messaging apps on your phone and five video-calling tools, none of which work together.
Sure we can video call, Star Trek-style — but first, we have to decide whether we’re calling on Skype, Messenger, Snap, WhatsApp, or FaceTime.
The magic of technology brought us the ability to summon a car from the internet and ride with a stranger to any destination, but I still can’t figure out if I’ll ever be able to get my mum to call me on Google Duo instead of FaceTime, since I’ve switched to Android and FaceTime isn’t available here.
Our smartphones have become overrun with walled gardens, such that choosing a phone now means being locked into an entire ecosystem of devices and services around it — and being blocked from anything that isn’t sanctioned.
Companies like Apple have also started to find ways to extend their reach to other platforms in an effort to keep you in their ecosystems.
We’ve had to deal with some version of this battle for years now, of course.
But as the internet begins to creep into our homes in new ways — through devices like HomePod, Google Home, Alexa, and a myriad other smart devices — the battleground has shifted.
Now it feels as if we have no choice but to lock ourselves into a single ecosystem, leaving our most personal spaces to be defined by that choice.
Take smart speakers, the front line for tech companies’ battle over your home.
Products like Alexa or Google Home are usually the first smart devices consumers will purchase, and since any smart devices you buy after that must be compatible with your speaker, which one you choose is incredibly important.
A great example of the effects of that choice can be seen in two of the world’s most popular messaging apps: Facebook-owned WhatsApp and Messenger.
Both are used by billions of people, yet they’re conspicuously missing from major smart speakers like Amazon Echo and Google Home, which are selling in the millions.
Why?
Well, Facebook wants a piece of the smart speaker action with its Portal device.
If you want to make a video call with WhatsApp or Messenger through a smart speaker, you need to own a Portal.
You can control your Google-owned Nest thermostat via your Google Home by simply saying “turn up the heat” out loud.
But good luck making it work with an Apple HomePod.
Speaking of that HomePod: You’d better believe Apple’s smart speaker makes it a pain to use Spotify, Apple Music’s main competitor.
These aren’t technical barriers — they’re corporate barriers.
You can see evidence of this phenomenon even among the most basic of product lines.
The headphone market hasn’t traditionally been subjected to walled gardens because there’s only so much power a company can wield over the 3.5 mm audio jack, which has been the industry standard for decades.
And that helps explain why Apple removed the jack from its phones beginning with the iPhone 7 in 2016 — just three months before the wireless AirPods came out.
Apple argued that removing the headphone jack allowed for more internal component space — it put a plastic “barometric vent” there — but it also coincidentally meant that you couldn’t plug your headphones in without a dongle.
Perhaps that made you more likely to buy Bluetooth headphones, instead, and maybe you wanted the option with extra features designed just for your new iPhone: the AirPods.
AirPods can do a lot of cool things, like share music with a friend’s pair, or quickly connect to a new device without fidgeting with Bluetooth menus — but you need an iPhone for any of it to work.
While AirPods can technically function as normal Bluetooth earbuds on different hardware, they’re at their best when they take advantage of the proprietary system Apple built with its own headphone chips, allowing for these extra features.
Meanwhile, Sony’s latest headphones can read out your messages and other notifications proactively with Google Assistant — but only if you use an Android device.
If you buy one of these devices and find yourself wanting to switch to iOS, you’ll be sacrificing a significant amount of functionality.
It’s not that companies technically lack the ability to make everything play nice — it’s just that their own products can be made “stickier” by closing users in.
If you love your AirPods, maybe you don’t switch from iOS to Android.
Your Nest thermostat already works so well; why switch from a Google Home to an Apple HomePod, and sacrifice some of that seamless functionality?
If you love WhatsApping with your uncle, Facebook Portal may be the choice over an Alexa Show.
Thankfully, some companies are bucking the trend toward walled gardens.
Sonos, for example, has fought to allow its smart speakers to switch between voice assistants, offering both Alexa and Google Assistant on the same device.
IKEA is getting its toes wet in the smart home market with products like smart lights, but it’s making sure that its products are compatible with any device that might want to use them.
Tradfri, Ikea’s smart lights brand, works with both iOS and Android but uses open standards.
And there are physical controls, too, for those who don’t want to use a smart device at all.
Still, the norm for the most powerful tech companies is to seek market dominance by cutting off their competitors.
That puts the burden on consumers to maintain openness at home.
Consider each of your purchases well, and learn about the ecosystems they work in.
Otherwise, you may be locking basic functions in your home to the decisions tech giants make for you.
And no one wants to toss their blender just because Apple’s HomeKit won’t support it.
* Owen Williams is a freelance writer and coder and columnist for OneZero. He tweets at @ow. His website is owenwillia.ms.
This article first appeared at onezero.medium.com.
