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France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

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Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#171

This is so dumb. Apple has a lot of flaws but old hardware support certainly isn’t one of them. Firstly, they only slowed down older phones to prevent them from crashing as they had less and less reliable battery draw. Secondly, Apple’s support for legacy phone hardware is the best in the market. It’s absurd that they’re being punished for this.

The problem is they didn't tell anyone they were doing it. So people thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one, when they could have just replaced the battery and made it fast again.

This is total bullshit. I would bet real money that a grand total of ZERO users "thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one" as a result of this issue.

Zero.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#172
post #141

This is so dumb. Apple has a lot of flaws but old hardware support certainly isn’t one of them. Firstly, they only slowed down older phones to prevent them from crashing as they had less and less reliable battery draw. Secondly, Apple’s support for legacy phone hardware is the best in the market. It’s absurd that they’re being punished for this.

Funny they always released software to slow down your phone the week before the new iphone released. They also denied they were slowing down old phones for several years.

No, they didn't. Please cite a source for this claim, or retract.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#173
post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is they didn't tell anyone they were doing it. So people thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one, when they could have just replaced the battery and made it fast again.

This is total bullshit. I would bet real money that a grand total of ZERO users "thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one" as a result of this issue. Zero.

I literally nearly did.

It's what you normally do when the new phone comes out.

I did it with my iPhone 3G when they put the new iOS on it. It became barely usable and i got an iPhone 4.

That was real. The 3G was SLOW.

This time it was not real.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#174

Fined $27 million. Made $64 billion in the last 3 months. So that's about 1 hour of profit. I'm sure they've been taught a lesson they'll never forget. EDIT: as pointed out below, that was revenue not profit. But apple make so much damn profit it's not as crazy different as it would be for most companies. So it's more like 2.5 hours.

Well only the French have the stones to lay out a fine like this.

How about the 30k fine for Google because of a missing line in Google+ privacy policy (after it was discontinued)?

https://www.quechoisir.org/action-ufc-que-choisir-donnees-pe...

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#175
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple throttling phones to preserve battery life was the right thing to do. Doing it without telling users their batteries were expired and causing their phone to slow down was the wrong thing to do. Whether that merits a $27m fine is debatable.

I absolutely disagree. These phones were unusable with the throttling. I switched to Android because my iPhone 6 was unusable less than 3 years after getting it. This is like saying that an appropriate fix for a car manufacture is to limit the maximum speed of a car to 25 miles per hour. It breaks so many use cases that the car becomes worthless.

That actually happened to my car once, due to some defect it got stuck to 30km/h.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple replaced my battery for $29. Not bad. Replaceable batteries come with their own trade-offs, namely water intrusion through failing seals. I'd rather pay occasionally for someone skilled to replace the battery than replace the entire phone after a drop in the sink.

Honestly, how many times you damaged your phone with water? In the last 23 years I spilled a bit of water on the phone once and it survived.

I ski, kayak, and do a lot of hiking. The trend towards more waterproof phones has been a godsend to me.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#177

This is so dumb. Apple has a lot of flaws but old hardware support certainly isn’t one of them. Firstly, they only slowed down older phones to prevent them from crashing as they had less and less reliable battery draw. Secondly, Apple’s support for legacy phone hardware is the best in the market. It’s absurd that they’re being punished for this.

The problem is they didn't tell anyone they were doing it. So people thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one, when they could have just replaced the battery and made it fast again.

> The problem is they didn't tell anyone they were doing it.

That’s called design.

You have to make the decisions yourself. Customers are paying you to do that, not present them with a million checkboxes.

Apple deserves a lot of criticism but this is a complete non issue.

Having your phone slow down instead of shutting randomly down when the battery can’t supply the proper current is the best choice for the customer in pretty much every conceivable situation.

There are a lot of other decisions they are making on your behalf without warning you. And that’s how it should be.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#178

This is so dumb. Apple has a lot of flaws but old hardware support certainly isn’t one of them. Firstly, they only slowed down older phones to prevent them from crashing as they had less and less reliable battery draw. Secondly, Apple’s support for legacy phone hardware is the best in the market. It’s absurd that they’re being punished for this.

yes. I'm sitting here amused because a coworker is borrowing my 4 year old iPhone SE because her 3 year old ZTE is too slow and is not getting updates from Verizon...

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#179

I was glad when Apple “slowed down” my old iPhone. It fixed the sudden shut down issue for me that was driving me insane. The shut downs were unpredictable and rendered my phone unusable until it was plugged in to charge. It would have been better if Apple acknowledged the sudden shut down issue in the first place, rather than rolling out this secret fix. They denied all knowledge when I took my iPhone 6 in for servi…

They didn't want to acknowledge the shut down issue because people might then have asked - Hey! why is my 2 year old phone randomly shutting itself down? That doesn't seem like it should be happening to a 2 year old phone - maybe you guys should fix that, by, say, replacing the battery.

Re: France fines Apple €25M for iOS software that slowed down older iPhones

#180
post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is they didn't tell anyone they were doing it. So people thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one, when they could have just replaced the battery and made it fast again.

This is total bullshit. I would bet real money that a grand total of ZERO users "thought their phone was just old and slow and bought a new one" as a result of this issue. Zero.

I upgraded an iPhone 6S for this reason.

I wouldn't so arrogantly claim to know how consumers spend their money on technology.

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