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Andy Rubin's Essential Phone Considered Anything But (theregister.co.uk)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Andy Rubin's ambitions to create a new consumer electronics ecosystem are floundering at base camp. Sales of Essential's phone, which forms a key part of the strategy, are tepid. Google Play reports a mere 50,000 download of Essential's Camera app so far, the Android Police blog notes. This doesn't paint the full picture, but it can be assumed a fairly complete one, barring a few brush strokes. Essential launched in the US with support from Sprint, at a recommended SIM-free retail price of $699. After reported sales of just five thousand in the first month, this was slashed to $499 and could be grabbed for $399 in the post-Thanksgiving sales. As devices from different manufacturers proliferate in the home, Rubin has alluded to "a new operating system so it can speak all those protocols and it can do it securely and privately." But rather than launching a new software platform he's had to launch hardware.
Just make the damn thing as thick as the phone+case everyone carries now, but robust enough that the case isn't necessary. Then use the extra space for batteries (and not removing the headphone jack).
Seriously, the problem is that everyone tries so hard to make the phone look as "shiny" as possible on a store shelf, without giving a damn about what its *actually* like to the *actual* user a month later.