I hear that comment often when it comes to microsd. I don't think it has anything with google wanting you to use their cloud services. External storage is horrible for the user experience. Where do my photos go when I take them? What about my apps? If you mount external storage to /sdcard, where does internal storage go?

Previously phones would mount the external storage to /sdcard/_external and /sdcard would be the internal storage. It is really crappy and horrible. What happens to my installed apps on external storage when I suddenly yank out the card? What about if I take the microsd card and then delete a bunch of app data on it and put it back in?

Personally I don't want to have a complicated exposed file system on a phone. I don't want to have the option of moving apps between internal and external storage. This sort of stuff is why Android gets a bad reputation.

I think people who want onboard removal storage are in the minority. Not to say its not important (I myself would love a microSD slot on the Nexus 5), I just don't think that many people are not going to buy a phone over it.

Anyway, I'd much prefer simplified file sharing/connectivity between my Android phone and my Macbook Air. I already have all my music, data, etc on the Mac in Dropbox, I just need an easier way for my phone to get to it (adhoc wifi?).

Pretty sure it's more to do with most people likely not ever needing more than 16/32GB over the lifetime of their phone, meaning adding a microSD slot would be simply a waste of time, effort and space.

I've always thought it's to allow price gouging for the 32GB version over the 16.