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EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

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Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#161

Post by sandov »

dTal wrote: post #61
sandov wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It may be legitimate when the regulated action causes direct physical harm to someone else. For example: I think it's reasonable to regulate particulate emissions. It's not legitimate to regulate manufacture or commercialization of products when that manufacture or commercialization poses no direct threat to the physical well-being of other individuals.

Why draw the line at physical well-being? Why should it be fine to waste someone's time, cost them money, even destroy them emotionally, so long as you don't directly physically harm them? Your scope is absurdly narrow.

Because physicality is what defines if people are free or not, and freedom is the only moral principle that a reasonable, moral society can be based upon. If you forsake freedom, you might as well forget about morality altogether.

Regulating emotions is arbitrary. Maybe it makes me sad that you post comments on HN. Should your comments be regulated?.

Physical harm is where you draw the line, because it's the only line that makes sense.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#162

Post by int_19h »

chipotle_coyote wrote: post #145
tanilama wrote: post #46

I can't see a single reason why iPhone shouldn't use usb-c at the moment except to build Apple's own walled garden to charge a surplus against its customer.

The iPhone doesn't use USB-C at the moment in no small part because a large segment of Apple's customers would throw an incredible fit if they were asked to switch connectors "again," this "soon" after the switch from the original 30-pin connector to the Lightning. There were customers pissy about that for years and years. And there are still people real salty about them moving their laptops to USB-C charging rather…

Apple was quite willing to drop the 3.5mm audio port despite having plenty of customers with headphones that plugged into it - they simply included an adapter with new phones. Why should it be any different here?

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#163

Post by filoleg »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #140
martin-adams wrote: post #37

Let’s say this rule was in place 10 years ago and we standardised on micro USB. How would it have been possible to advance to the next generation of technology like USB-C. This feels that it’s banking on USB-C being forever future proofed or wireless connections does everything we ever need.

The standard can be changed, it's just that manufacturers have to agree between themselves on the new standard. No involvement from the government is required. They can make USB 4, 5,6, connector C, D,E,Z, whatever. That's fine. What's not cool, is creating proprietary connector and not letting anyone else use it. Mind you they only have to agree on charging, not data transfer. As to whether it's worth it: hard to te…

>The standard can be changed, it's just that manufacturers have to agree between themselves on the new standard.

If an agreement of all manufacturers is needed before introducing a new standard in production, it means that it will be delayed by the lowest common denominator of manufacturers until many years later. Which isn't good for the consumer, because they could've gotten a new superior charging standard on their phones many years earlier, as opposed to waiting multiple years until all manufacturers adopt it.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#164

Post by filoleg »

bagacrap wrote: post #110
birdyrooster wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USB-C ports wear out badly after a couple years of use and are loose. Lightning, as you are saying, still feels good after years of daily use. The duty cycle is higher for lightning and should be used for things which are often disconnected and reconnected like mobile devices.

I've used the same USB c charging port in my phone for 2 years without any noticeable wear. I did, however, need to scrape out accumulated pocket lint with a safety pin on two occasions. Are you sure there isn't lint in the port you're basing your assertions on?

Not the parent commenter, and I am not sure if there is lint in the port of my lightning powered devices, but I am confident that I have never had to clean it out to make it charge.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#165

Post by uxp100 »

alt_f4 wrote: post #157
crooked-v wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect a major factor in keeping the Lightning stuff is also because of how intense the complaining would be if they switched it to USB-C. The introduction of Lightning got endless negative PR over all the old 30-pin accessories, and this would be that plus the extra complaining about how they keep "constantly" changing it. For similar reasons, I suspect there's at least some factions in Apple that would be secret…

It's not quite an apt comparison because the vast majority of people already own USB-C chargers and accessories, whereas lightning was a brand new thing. Also if Apple were that bothered by complaining, it would not have taken them 5 years and 3+ years of service programs to replace their laptops' butterfly keyboards with regular scissors switch keyboards.

The vast majority? I suspect that is very very wrong. I own a single device that has a USB C port, and no peripherals that connect to it without an adapter, and I post on HN. It is very early for USBC yet.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#166

Post by marta_morena »

Wow, this is just yet another display of regulators complete ignorance of technology. They just don't learn. Regulation is about 10-20 years behind the current and their solution is to say: "You have to use this method of doing things"

Yeah right, and next year? What do we do next year? Will we just wait for regulators to approve a new way of doing things every 100 million years?

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#167

Post by tridentlead »

alt_f4 wrote: post #157
crooked-v wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect a major factor in keeping the Lightning stuff is also because of how intense the complaining would be if they switched it to USB-C. The introduction of Lightning got endless negative PR over all the old 30-pin accessories, and this would be that plus the extra complaining about how they keep "constantly" changing it. For similar reasons, I suspect there's at least some factions in Apple that would be secret…

It's not quite an apt comparison because the vast majority of people already own USB-C chargers and accessories, whereas lightning was a brand new thing. Also if Apple were that bothered by complaining, it would not have taken them 5 years and 3+ years of service programs to replace their laptops' butterfly keyboards with regular scissors switch keyboards.

Trust me, the vast majority of people do not own USB-C accessories.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#168

Post by TillE »

filoleg wrote: post #164
bagacrap wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've used the same USB c charging port in my phone for 2 years without any noticeable wear. I did, however, need to scrape out accumulated pocket lint with a safety pin on two occasions. Are you sure there isn't lint in the port you're basing your assertions on?

Not the parent commenter, and I am not sure if there is lint in the port of my lightning powered devices, but I am confident that I have never had to clean it out to make it charge.

I had to clean out the lightning port on my iPhone 6 constantly, it was awful. With the XS I almost exclusively use wireless charging because of that experience.

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#169

Post by qeqeqeqe »

bonzini wrote: post #159
henryfjordan wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And because it was only voluntary, Apple was able to innovate and create the lightning port which worked in either orientation and inspired the adoption of USB-C by the rest of the world

They could have proposed a USB connector which worked in either orientation to the USB implementers forum back in 2012, couldn't they?

And then wait 20 years for everyone to agree?

Re: EU lawmakers snub Apple's pleas, vote to push for charging cable standard

#170

Post by philwelch »

alt_f4 wrote: post #128
_bxg1 wrote: post #125

I'm not someone who's shy about regulation, but even I think this is totally unnecessary. As an Apple user, I should be the first to complain about their own internal (inexplicable) lack of a standard (Lightning for phones, USB-C for everything else). It's annoying, sure, but it's far from a material burden on my quality of life. Is this really the problem we need to be spending our regulatory energies on in 2020?

Every time you are buying a charger, wired headphones or any other iPhone accessory, Apple collects a hefty license fee and you, indirectly, are paying it. Originally, the lightning port was a big improvement over existing tech. Currently though, the only reason the lightning port still exists is because it is a good way for Apple to use their market dominant position to milk consumers. It is not good for consumers,…

> Originally, the lightning port was a big improvement over existing tech.

One that wouldn't have been invented if this regulation existed at that time, incidentally.

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