"For years people have been seeing us as a speaker company,"
Yes Brandon, this is the thing that people generally like. When the speakers work, they sound very good.
"What we actually are is an audio operating system." ...And this is the part that has been somewhere between tolerable and the biggest liability. Yes, when it works, it's great, but it's been so focused on being "automagic" that when there's a problem, it's like a Bugatti hitting a speed bump.
If Sonos wanted to claw back some good will, all they had to do was to implement a "generic Bluetooth mode" and an aux jack. This way, it ensures people can still use the speaker (the most liked and most reliable part) irrespective of whether the software is good or bad. ...But, since they'd rather cram AI into it, they'll likely continue to bleed users and installers, who will implement Bluesound or WiiM instead and become the Oracle of multi-room audio - obscenely priced, running on an increasingly niche user base, and circling the drain for a while longer than most, but ultimately fail as more and more people consider the Sonos "operating system" radioactive.