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The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

arstechnica.com

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Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#281

Post by ExoticPearTree »

lmm wrote: post #194
itopaloglu83 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who’s stopping anyone from competing with Apple? Let’s force ASML to open up its manufacturing line and cancel their patents for squandering innovation, but wait they’re an incredible company that dominated the field with their hard work and diligence, so it’s not fair for them. Similarly, the open markets should apply to everyone, not just dominant American firms. Though, I’m not saying they’re innocent and I think…

> Who’s stopping anyone from competing with Apple? Apple's dominant market position and abuse of network effects via their proprietary standards, like the one we're talking about from this article. > Let’s force ASML to open up its manufacturing line and cancel their patents for squandering innovation No-one's arguing for any equivalent of that to happen to Apple. Just that when there's an open standard for inter-dev…

I think it is wrong to force Apple to support various "open standards". Other device manufacturers should make better devices and have people switch naturally to them because they are better.

Like Google cried to every possible regulator that Apple is the big bad wolf that doesn't want to support RCE. Why? If it was that good, more people would use Androids for that.

The problem, as I see it, is that everyone else besides Apple spends very little on physical devices build quality and software polishing, and you end up with crap devices that are slow, with weird interfaces and so on.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#282

Post by dzonga »

sillyfluke wrote: post #248
dzonga wrote: post #150

the real kick to the teeth for apple is when they will be forced to adopt different browser engines across all markets. btw safari is a fine browser but on iOS it seems crippled a bit. we are already getting there with support for web-gpu.

>btw safari is a fine browser but on iOS it seems crippled a bit. it's not a fine browser if laymen have to update the OS just to get a new browser update.

sadly, I agree with your take.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#283

Post by 1718627440 »

raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #269
1718627440 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I share that view, but I don't think Apple would care. I mean Ethernet is way better than Wifi, yet the iPhones don't have an Ethernet port.

But they can use a standard USB C to Ethernet adapter that computers use.

Sure after plugging in an USB-C extender, an USB-C to headphone adapter and an USB-C to HDMI adapter. I'm sure that will be as convenient as a phone, that directly has these interfaces. At that point you could even design the phone without any port and buy a Bluetooth to USB-C adapter instead.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#284

Post by georgefrowny »

LexGray wrote: post #255
pjc50 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Once something becomes so widely used that almost everyone has one, the public interest is involved. In the same way that cars are essential public infrastructure and have to comply with public safety standards, interoperable fuel nozzles, etc.

Public interest does not seem to be the driving factor. Everyone owns kitchen appliances and even if there is network support it generally requires a specific app that is out of support very early in the device lifetime. Vehicles barely support operability with phones at all and there is no standard UI or phone side vehicle monitoring. At least personally I would like enforced open device standards on home appliances…

Manufacturers fucking hate being made to be interoperable and will try to swing a lock-in whenever they can.

They only do it in a green field when:

* They have big customers who demand it to avoid lock-in. Either the fear being left with orphaned equipment (e.g. car chargers being specified with MODBUS rather then a custom fieldbus), or they think their own gear will sell better with standard widgets (e.g. computer builders and USB). Militaries are especially keen on these requirements, and MIL standards drove loads of 20th century standardisations by economies of scale.

* They are forced to at regulatory gunpoint (some overlap with the above when the customer is a government).

* They think it'll be cheaper than the return from lock in, (e.g. easily cloned/replaced commodities like screws)

In a brown field where there are other standards or implementors around, they may also

* want to break into someone else's walled garden (everyone else wanting into Tesla chargers)

* Figure that there's a win-win as an attempted lock-in opportunity has passed (e.g. car makers trying to do a proprietary nozzle for lead free fuels would have just made their cars get a reputation for being a hassle to fuel).

When it comes to consumer goods, the asymmetry in the relationship is severe and regulators are constantly playing catch up. Everyone from Soda Stream to car charger manufacturers are trying to throw up walls and lock in customers before anyone can do anything about it.

Regulators only have limited bandwidth and if they act too early they get dragged by the companies (and their lackeys) for market interference.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#285

Post by jeroenhd »

gertop wrote: post #34
jeroenhd wrote: post #20

An additional benefit is that the Wi-Fi standard also means that the weird account requirements on Google's Nearby Share can be avoided by independent implementations (i.e. on Windows or Linux or maybe rooted Android, iOS and macOS already have it of course). "Contacts only mode" will always be a challenge, but at least the "I just want to share a file without Google watching me" use case is now resolved by Google im…

Have you confirmed that the new feature works without an account or is that speculation? The account requirement for nearby share never made sense yet they still did it the way...

The account requirement for nearby share is, as I understand it, to enable "contacts only" mode, which is how you prevent people from receiving random dickpics the second they try out the protocol and permanently turn the feature off afterwards. I think NS also has some kind of cloud transfer backup connection in case local transfers don't work (using Samsung's cloud), but I'm not 100% sure if that's related.

The account requirement can already be avoided using existing implementations of standard QuickShare (i.e. https://henriqueclaranhan.github.io/rquickshare/) but those are limited to devices sharing the same WiFi connection. However, as there is no contact sharing between iOS and Android, interoperability basically forces Google to pick between "Google account optional" and "doesn't work with iOS".

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#286

Post by morshu9001 »

JustExAWS wrote: post #273
cyberax wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, there weren't. Lightning cable have an authentication chip, and while it was cloned towards the end of the lifecycle, most accessories still utilized official chips.

I have been buying cheap knockoff lightning devices since my iPhone 5 at least. I can guarantee that random Chinese manufacturer wasn’t selling lightning cables in bundles of 5 for $10 using officially licensed anything from Apple.

Same here. They tended to stop working, not because of a shoddy cable but because the phone rejects it.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#287

Post by morshu9001 »

JustExAWS wrote: post #147
morshu9001 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They had Macs on USB-C for like 7 years before the iPhone. It was going to stay like that. Mac on USB-C meant more dongles to sell, iPhone on Lightning meant cable fees and control.

There were hundreds of devices on Amazon that never paid Apple a fee to use Lightning. And as far as USB C on Macs, are you complaining that Apple used an industry standard port?

USB-C wasn't exactly standard when Apple put it in Macs. Nothing else used it yet, and they didn't have any transition period. Its sole purpose for years was to get adapted to other ports. And if you wanted to use it as Lightning, you basically needed the Apple cable.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#288

Post by raw_anon_1111 »

1718627440 wrote: post #283
raw_anon_1111 wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they can use a standard USB C to Ethernet adapter that computers use.

Sure after plugging in an USB-C extender, an USB-C to headphone adapter and an USB-C to HDMI adapter. I'm sure that will be as convenient as a phone, that directly has these interfaces. At that point you could even design the phone without any port and buy a Bluetooth to USB-C adapter instead.

- Ethernet - I have to do the same for every MacBook for the past decade - use an adapter. The iPhone can use the same adapter.

- I don’t need a USB-C to headphone adapter, there are plenty of USB C headphones and the mixer my wife uses has a USB C interface for computers and it works with her iPad and I assume my phone. It shows up as an audio input/output device. You plug up a regular old USB C to USB C cable.

- you don’t need an “HDMI adapter”, you use the same USB C to HDMI cord that computers have used since USB C was introduced on computers over a decade ago.

USB C has supported video natively for over a decade. I use the same USB C - USB C cable to plug up my phone to my external monitor that I use for my Mac

Bluetooth doesn’t transmit data at 10Gbps like USB C does on an iPhone Pro or even USB 2 speeds of the cheaper iPhones.

You don’t need special Apple compatible dongles for any of these use cases. They all support the standard USB protocols

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#289

Post by varenc »

darkwater wrote: post #200
varenc wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just `tcpdump -i awdl0` while Airdrop-ing to a Mac to observe it's still using AWDL. (unless the interface named awdl0 is actually using WiFi Aware...) Another fun thing to do: `ping6 ff02::1%awdl0`. Pings all nearby Apple devices with AWDL active. Including things like your neighbor's phone that's not even on your local network. (but addresses rotate I believe so can't track persistently)

> (but addresses rotate I believe so can't track persistently) But maybe you can infer presence tracking the response time? Could be exploited anyway, no?

yes! I've had the same thought. If you have only one neighbor in range, seems like you could definitely infer their presence and approximate range based on latency. Phones don't keep AWDL active all the time, but every time you swipe control center it perks up I think.

Could also detect when someone is hosting a party or something.

Re: The EU made Apple adopt new Wi-Fi standards, and now Android can support AirDrop

#290

Post by Diesel555 »

pfannkuchen wrote: post #193
grimblee wrote: post #191

Oh, look what "over-regulation" does, forcing companies to comply to standards so they can't vendor lock-in their users (this happened with the iphone charging port too, from the apple specific port to usb-c). Guess this type of consumer-benefic changes wouldn't happen in the land of "freedom".

A positive effect from regulation does not rebut the general argument against government regulation of industry. The problem with regulation isn’t that there are never any positive effects, of course there are. The problem is it’s impossible to reliably avoid adding substantial friction to life via overly broad regulation that is not applicable but has to be followed anyway, or outdated but still-in-effect regulation…

I really wish microeconomics was a high-school or secondary school required course. It's one of the most applicable to life and voters well-studied disciplines that describes the effects of certain actions towards or away from a competitive market, market elasticity and barriers to entry, explains positive and negative externalities of government action, and how those actions affect consumer pricing and supply (a lot of the topics here and below). Without studying this topic we view words with different underlying assumptions or definitions and it's a lot more effort / time / replies to not talk around each other. It's like two people who only use Windows for Instagram trying to argue about why Apt requiring Rust is good or bad. I'm not weighing in for or against the topic in this thread or its replies, just a plug to study Microeconomics if this stuff interests you!
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