The Pixel 2’s Biggest Trick Could Be Its Best Feature
Just over an hour after the Google Pixel 2 event on October 4, Senior Director of Product Management Sabrina Ellis did something unusual:She squeezed a new smartphone . Then, without pressing a single button, she uttered the words “take a selfie”, picked up the phone and took a group photo of the crowded conference room.
The Pixel 2, which the company unveiled yesterday along with a line of new gadgets , is not the first device designed for compression. HTC tried the same thing with its U11 smartphone this summer, before Google bought the Taiwanese company’s mobile division. But the U11, with its “Edge Sense” feature, was written off as a useless gimmick , while the Pixel 2, slightly renamed “Active Edge”, can actually prove to be quite useful.
The difference lies in Google Assistant, the artificial intelligence assistant that’s built into all of Google’s new hardware. The Google Assistant squeeze dedication gives you an easy way to access one of the best features of the Pixel 2. Just pick up your phone and you can do anything from taking a photo to setting a calendar reminder.
To be honest, the HTC U11 did offer a similar feature. You can squeeze it to launch Google Assistant, but you can also configure Edge Sense to turn on the flashlight or open another app instead, making it easy to ignore what should have been a useful addition to your phone.
Another big advantage Google has with Active Edge is that it has complete control over both hardware and software. This means it can give Google Assistant a deeper level of access to the phone than the HTC U11, making AI even more useful than third-party devices. Active Edge is a great example of what that means for the Pixel 2.
It remains to be seen if anyone actually squeezes their phones in real life. But if any phone can convince people to start squeezing, it is this one.