From Gemini Spark to Daily Brief, Google’s newest Android AI features are increasingly locked behind subscriptions.

Buying Android phone is increasingly just the entry fee for Google’s AI ecosystem.

The direction of travel is clear: Google is pushing AI harder and harder to redefine its ecosystem and bring new, powerful features to users. Android’s core OS remains free, but Google increasingly appears to view it less as a product and more as a delivery mechanism for its AI services. As those services become more central to the modern smartphone experience, many of the platform’s most ambitious features are also becoming subscription products.

  • zoostation@lemmy.world
    28·
    4 days ago

    However, if you want to actually make use of Docs Live, Gemini Omni Flash, Gemini Spark, Information Agents, Google Pics, or the new Daily Brief, you’re going to have to hand over cash every month for a Gemini subscription.

    Okay? So the bullshit I don’t want costs money now? Fine. One of the convenient things about my Galaxy phone is that if I accidentally click on some AI bullshit feature, I can’t even use it because I never created a Samsung account.

    • 𝕱𝖎𝖗𝖊𝖜𝖎𝖙𝖈𝖍@lemmy.world
      10·
      4 days ago

      I got an email a little while ago about how they’re raising the cost of Workspace because of the “added value that AI has brought”. I immediately spent the next 15 minutes hunting down and disabling every AI feature. I really need to migrate away.