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Comment by crazygringo | Hacker News Reader

The entire product is a copy of the AirPods.

But you know what? I'm fine with that. That's how competition works, and competition is what brings down prices.

And I personally find the scrolling page design (both Apple's and Google's) pretty cool. It would drive me nuts if a site I used daily implemented something like that, like if it became a trend for news sites. But to show off a new product where I'll scroll through once in my life? It's pretty slick as far as I'm concerned. (Provided you've got the CPU to handle it.)

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How are they a copy of the AirPods? The AirPods, to me, look hideous. You take the original Apple headphones and cut off the wire. But putting that aside I'm finding it hard to see how these headphones resemble anything like AirPods. I mean, they're wireless headphones...? Is that the issue?

That's an interesting thought I hadn't considered. The AirPods do indeed seem like Apple accidentally invented (or at least popularized) a new product category while trying to reference the old headphones, which were pretty iconic in their advertising. All of the "copycats" are taking that same product category and designing around the formfactor. I agree that most of the copycats are more aesthetically pleasing, including the Pixel Buds.

I think the Pixel Buds look like someone shoved bright colored play-dough in your ear.

That's an aesthetic judgement you're entitled to. I happen to like how they look.

The (rounded, white, shiny) charging/carrying case is definitely heavily inspired by the AirPods. While the headphones, visually, don't look a lot like the AirPods, in terms of functionality they're very similar, as they're wireless earbuds that don't have a wire even between the earbuds, and they feature noise cancellation that adapts to the environment.

If your criteria is that loose, then iPhones were a copy. And I think airpods were certainly a copy too.

Bragi did a Kickstarter back in 2013 for The Dash. They were fully wireless in-ear headphones, with included microphone, activity tracking with a heart rate monitor, built-in memory for listening to music without having to carry your phone, and a charging case. Oh, and they worked underwater for listening to music with the built-in memory while swimming.

IMO every wireless pair of buds I've seen released so far is a 'copy' of Bragi's Dash, and usually has only a subset of the features.

I still love my Dash Pros. Only downside with the experience is you can't pair to multiple devices. But the UX, the look, the in-ear seal, the sound quality -- all seem to me to be superior to anything that's hit the market, and they were designed ~6 years ago.

"wireless earbuds that don't have a wire even between the earbuds" ... face palm

Wow, Apple has some serious brainwashing in the PR department for you to think that they actually invented true wireless earbuds.

The original AirPods looked hideous, so hideous I stopped wearing them outside of my home.

But the AirPod Pros have fixed up the dimensions a bit, now they look like a communication device rather than a piece of jewelry resembling a miniature cigarette.

Airpods were not the first true wireless earbuds. Samsung released the Gear IconX in 2016.

You could say Apple took an idea and made it better, and that's exactly how it should work. Google is simply trying to do the same thing here

To be fair it looks quite different in shape.

Scroll-jacking is notoriously bad for accessibility. Can't tab through the sequences and maintain proper focus, using the down arrow key moves the screen 1px per tap it feels like.

From my abled point of view, it's a terrible implementation; if I scroll using mouse wheel it should not be so slow. I would rather see each flick of mousewheel anchor the next or previous slide in place rather than having to do all the scrolling to get there. And that's really what this is, a vertical PowerPoint.

Seems like a really inefficient system. Bringing down the price of a finished good requires another entity's ability in making a separate clone of it?

I'm not sure how that's inefficient, it's pretty normal market dynamics. If the demand for a thing is high enough and the supply is low (or artificially controlled), then the provider can just freely set the price wherever they want.

Enter a competitor, and now the competitor has incentive to undercut the original producer to capture their market segment, and then it's a battle between the two between the cost to produce, market price, and value of the good to consumers.

I suppose there's 'inefficiency' in that both producers are now providing identical goods, but very rarely are the goods actually identical. In this case there's also the surrounding product ecosystem of Apple and Google, which is a significant difference at the very least.

I guess I will eagerly await the price drop from these highly competitive products that aren't designed to be used in the others ecosystem.

That's how competition works

No. Competition is you inventing a better mousetrap, not copying someone else's mousetrap.

not in applied capitalism, no. ever wonder why there are three gas stations at a four-way intersection? Because someone saw two gas stations there, and said to themselves, "I want a piece of that action."

There isn't a strict motive to make something better than someone else .... there's only a motive to make something that someone will buy instead of something else. Big difference.

If your mousetrap's very easy to copy maybe your mousetrap isn't good to begin with.

Patents, design patents, trademarks, and trade dress are all completely reasonable ways to protect your product. Failing the ability of any of those methods to product your product, I'd argue copying is fair game.

Sometimes better is defined as [more colors|more available|lower price|supports my phone].

So it is competition, for sure!

A mousetrap is still a mousetrap, though. They didn't copy the Air Pods, you should be able to see the differences for yourself if you just look at the product pages. Can you honestly not?

> The entire product is a copy of the AirPods.

as if airpods were the 1st rechargable wireless earbuds anyway

Genuine question: has anyone ever made the claim that being rechargeable is what makes AirPods unique?

To me, the biggest thing that makes AirPods unique is that they look pretty weird. The Google ones don't, so I see them as clearly differentiated from AirPods.

What _is_ unique about AirPods?

All I can come up with is the look. These ones from Google look way different. Are they really clones in some way?

When you're selling a luxury good, one of the important aspects is it being recognizable. Other people in the target demo need to be able to see and understand that your customer owns and uses a status symbol without it being tastelessly obviously flashy.

Think the Birkin bag.

The easy pairing / switching between devices. There are cheaper wireless headphones out there, ones with longer batter life, ones with better sound (haven't tried the pros yet myself), but none pair as easily. Supposedly the next version of bluetooth will enable all devices to do that, but we're not there yet.

What is the source for this claim? They only work perfectly with Apple devices. For other devices, they're function just as generic Bluetooth earbuds

This is a well-known feature. From the cnet review (https://www.cnet.com/reviews/apple-airpods-review/):

"W1 chip makes for seamless pairing: Apple's custom Bluetooth chip, the W1, is designed to allow for automatic pairing with Apple devices running iOS 10 or later, WatchOS 3 or later or MacOS Sierra or later. And it totally delivers: Just place the headphones near your compatible device and they'll automatically be detected and ask for pairing, no diving into settings menu needed. You can also transition easily between Apple devices, toggling between the sound of your computer to that of your iPhone or iPad. For Apple Watch owners, that seamless transition between Watch and iPhone is critical, and it's one reason that AirPods are something of an appealing accessory for Watch owners. "

> They only work perfectly with Apple devices

You're correct that the seamless pairing feature only works on apple devices. On non-apple devices, they work equivalently - no worse or better really - than competing headphones. That doesn't mean that the pairing feature isn't very valuable for those of us willing to own more than one apple device.

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