All-In on Pixel (Premium)

Thanks to a variety of factors---a better-than-expected experience with my Pixel 8 Pro, a free Pixel Watch 2, and an incredible 40 percent off deal on Pixel Tablet, not to mention my Google Drive shift and the growing capabilities in Chrome OS---I've dived more deeply into the Pixel and broader Google ecosystems than ever before this year. And that means that my day-to-day in 2024 is going to look very different than my 2023.

To be clear, nothing is ever final in the life of a tech reviewer and none of this precludes my normal testing and use of alternative platforms. That is, among other things, I will continue to keep up with what Apple is doing with hardware, software, and services, and I still have a lot of Linux exploration ahead of me.

But … it’s impossible to ignore that there’s been a shift. And as I prep some of my end-of-year recaps for such things as new apps, favorite podcasts and books, and the like, it’s very clear that Google, which has held a solid place in my life for decades now, has grown in importance this past year. And that this shift involves both my personal and work-related lives. It's not something I would have predicted or expected even a year ago. But there it is.

That this mini-revelation comes in the still-raw wake of Google's Epic antitrust loss is entirely coincidental, but it’s also personally interesting. My opinion on this loss is rock-solid and certain: Google, like Apple, is a monopolist that abuses its dominance to harm developers, competitors, partners, and customers, but it also makes products and services that I rely on every day and recommend to others. These two seemingly contrary positions aren't mutually exclusive, and if there's a New Year's resolution that I'd recommend to everyone reading this---and to the broader world---it would be to open your eyes to the nuance and complexities in life. There isn’t a single Big Tech company that doesn't do exactly what Google does in some areas. I'm looking at you, Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft. They are all horrible in some ways.

Getting past that, you probably know that I write and speak about workflows, tools, and efficiency a lot. I test things constantly, probing to see whether some app, service, or other product might somehow be better than what I'm currently using, "better" being a bit of a moving target because my needs are specific and perhaps different from those of you and others. I try to balance that with how these things might benefit non-technical ("normal") people, like my wife and friends. And no matter the outcome, this testing is always useful. When I do make a change, which is semi-rare, I celebrate it. When all I've done is prove that what I'm using or doing is still the right choice for me, I celebrate that.

And this has been an interesting year in which blockers, those things that prevent me from switching, have fallen by the wayside more frequently than in any year in the past. This will come up in a coming...