They’d figure it out real quick if manufacturers could ask agree to build sensors turned 90 degrees and disable recording in portrait. Obviously keep the possibility to take photos, but disable video recording.
Then I sit back and watch to see what happens next. I see a few possibilities.
1- Highly unlikely, but newer phone sales go in the toilet, while the second market goes crazy with people trying to get phones that still have the portrait camera. People will be confused at first, but most people tend to pick it up quick and just incorporate it as the new normal. It would have to be coordinated as a big launch at once, to force quick adoption.
2- People just kind of shrug and move on with it, like they did with changes like headphone jack removal, or charger non-inclusion. Except this time, it’s a good thing.
3- TikTok dies a horrible death, and YouTube shorts jumps on the market, finally becoming an actual thing that’s not just a backup copy of TikTok content. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a short that was made for YouTube, not for TikTok.