Microsoft has a secret weapon in its fight to save the 3.5mm headphone jack

Apple was not the first one to remove the 3.5mm headphone jack from a phone, but the iPhone maker was the only one to receive unrelenting backlash as a result. Meanwhile, Google explained a few weeks ago why you can't have a headphone jack on an all-screen smartphone, and that's why it removed it from the Pixel 2 phones -- so the company can prepare for the all-screen Pixel 3 handsets coming next year. Microsoft, meanwhile, does not make smartphones of its own any longer, but the company patente...