The Dongle: Google's $35 Bet on the TV

On Wednesday, Google did something it had failed to do twice before: it made a product for the living room that people actually wanted. The company unveiled Chromecast, a small device that plugs into a television's HDMI port and streams video from a phone, tablet, or computer, and it priced the device at thirty-five dollars. The dongle is the July 2013 story, and the story is the lesson: the simplest product often beats the smartest one, and the cheapest entry point can be the most powerful strategy.

The Dongle is the subject of this article: what Chromecast is, how it works, why it matters after the failure of Google TV, and what it says about the difference between building a platform and building a bridge. The device was announced on Wednesday at an event in New York, and it went on sale the same day in the United States. This is the story of the dongle, and the story is about the moment Google stopped trying to replace the television and started trying to help it.

1. The Announcement

The announcement came at an event Google called "Google in the Living Room," and the name was the confession. Google had tried before to own the living room, and the attempts had failed, and the event was the company's way of saying that this time would be different. The star of the event was a small black dongle that looked like a memory stick, and the dongle cost thirty-five dollars, less than a dinner for two.

The device went on sale the same day in the United States, and the immediate availability was part of the message. Google was not announcing a product for later; it was shipping a product now, and the shipping was the proof that the company had learned from its mistakes. The price was the headline, and the headline was the strategy: the cheapest way into the living room was a dongle that anyone could afford. The announcement was the beginning, and the beginning was humble.

2. The Device

The device itself was almost insultingly simple. Chromecast was a stick that plugged into the HDMI port on the back of a television, drew its power from a USB cable, and connected to the home Wi-Fi network. There was no remote, no interface, no apps on the screen, and nothing to learn. The phone or tablet in the viewer's hand was the remote, and the television was just the screen. The simplicity was the design, and the design was the point.

The way it worked was just as simple. The viewer opened an app on a phone or tablet, pressed the cast button, and the video moved to the television while the phone became a controller. The streaming happened on the dongle itself, so the phone could be used for other things while the show played. The supported apps at launch included YouTube, Netflix, Google Play, and the Chrome browser, and the list was enough. The device was the opposite of the complicated boxes that had failed before it.

3. The History

The history of Google in the living room was the context of the launch, and the history was full of failure. The company's first attempt, Google TV, had arrived in 2010 with great ambitions: a full television operating system with apps, search, and a remote that looked like a keyboard. The product was too complicated, too expensive, and too far ahead of its time, and the market ignored it. The second attempt was more of the same, and the story repeated.

The failure of Google TV taught the company a lesson that the Chromecast embodied: nobody wanted Google to replace the television, and everybody wanted Google to make the television they already had work better. The living room was not a platform problem; it was a bridge problem. The history was the teacher, and the dongle was the exam. The company that had tried to build a new television was now selling a thirty-five dollar stick to connect the old one.

4. The Competition

The competition in the living room was the reason the price mattered, and the price was the disruption. Apple TV cost ninety-nine dollars, and Roku players cost fifty dollars and up, and both were small boxes with interfaces, remotes, and app stores. Chromecast undercut them all, and the undercutting was the strategy: the device was cheap enough to buy on impulse and simple enough to use without reading a manual.

The competition also made the positioning clear. Google was not trying to win the set-top box war with a better box; it was trying to make the box irrelevant. The phone was the interface of the future, and the television was the screen of the past, and Chromecast was the bridge between the two. The competitors had spent years building better boxes, and Google had spent thirty-five dollars building a better bridge. The competition was the field, and the field had just changed.

5. The Strategy

The strategy behind the dongle was the strategy behind everything Google did in the summer of 2013: the content mattered more than the hardware. Google owned YouTube, the biggest video platform in the world, and the company wanted its content on every screen. Chromecast was the cheapest way to put YouTube on the television, and the television was where the viewing was moving. The hardware was a tool, and the content was the business.

The strategy also included the search giant's long game in advertising. Every hour of video watched through a Google service was an hour of data and an hour of ads, and the dongle multiplied the hours. The thirty-five dollar device was the entrance fee to the living room, and the living room was the most valuable screen in the house. The strategy was the reason the price was so low, and the low price was the reason the strategy could work.

6. The Response

The response to the launch was immediate, and the response was the surprise. The dongle sold out within days, and the sell-out was the kind of problem every company wants. The reviews were glowing, and the reviewers repeated the same theme: the device was simple, cheap, and useful, the three words that had never been associated with Google's television efforts. The response was the confirmation that the strategy was right.

The response also showed the power of the low price. People did not have to think about buying a thirty-five dollar gadget, and the lack of thinking was the magic. The device was an impulse purchase, and the impulse purchase became a living room fixture. The reviews compared it to the products that cost three times as much, and the comparison was the victory. The response was the market's verdict, and the verdict was the dongle.

7. The Lesson

The lesson of the dongle was about the power of simplicity, and the power was the product. Google had spent years building the smartest television platform in the world, and the world had yawned; it had then spent a few months building the simplest bridge, and the bridge sold out. The lesson was that the features nobody asked for were the features nobody wanted, and the simplicity everyone took for granted was the feature everyone wanted.

The lesson also applied to the price. The company that had built products for the enthusiasts had built a product for everyone, and everyone had answered. The thirty-five dollar price was not an accident; it was the strategy, the deliberate choice to make the decision to buy the product a non-decision. The lesson was that the cheapest entry point can be the most powerful strategy, and the dongle was the proof. The company that could not win the living room with a platform had won it with a bridge.

8. The Future

The future of the dongle was unwritten, and the unwritten future was the exciting part. The device launched with a handful of apps, and the apps were the beginning: the cast button was a standard that other developers could adopt, and the adoption would decide how far the bridge could reach. The device sold out, and the sell-out was the demand that the company would have to meet. The future was the expansion, and the expansion was the test.

The future was also the lesson in the making. The company that had learned from its failures was the company that was succeeding, and the success was the proof that the learning was real. The television was not replaced, and the television was not ignored; it was connected, and the connecting was the win. The dongle is the July 2013 story, and the story is the lesson: the simplest product often beats the smartest one, and the cheapest entry point can be the most powerful strategy. The bridge is thirty-five dollars, and the bridge is the future. The message for every product team is the same: the features that win are the features that disappear, the ones that make the hard thing easy without asking the user to think. The dongle did not ask anything of the viewer, and the not asking was the asking of the sale. The simplicity was the strategy, and the strategy was the product.

The Dongle: Google's 35 Dollar Bet on the TV