6 ms·

The cynical part of me thinks this is the real reason to get rid of the headphone jack -- to make it inconvenient to turn off bluetooth.

TaylorAlexander 7y ago
On the iPhone turning off Bluetooth using the control center doesn’t even turn it of fully, precisely so that these location services (and other features) are still available. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/evpz7a/turn-off-wi-fi-and-bluetooth-apple-ios-11 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/evpz7a/turn-off-wi-fi-and...
- brianzelip 7y ago
  This is such a dark pattern.
- ac4tw 7y ago
  Indeed. Sidenote, it behaves differently if you've enabled airplane mode (or at least so the UI would indicate). In airplane mode, it gives no message and the wifi/bt icon goes transparent. If you're not in airplane mode, the wifi/bt icon goes light gray and it says 'disconnecting <device type> devices until tomorrow' but the radio is still on as your article mentions. Personally I miss the old behavior where it just turns it off, but I'm often in airplane mode so I get the old behavior anyway and great battery life :P
shrimp_emoji 7y ago
On the other hand, I'll tolerate whatever dystopic hellscape before going back to the tangly shitshow of wired earbuds.
- delecti 7y ago
  Conveniently, thanks to modern technology, you can have a headphone jack and bluetooth support on the same device.
eddiecalzone 7y ago
A link from the article shows that turning off Bluetooth in Android is as futile as it is in iOS: https://qz.com/1169760/phone-data/ https://qz.com/1169760/phone-data/ If you don't want to be tracked, you can either turn off your phone or put it in a protective sleeve when not in use: https://silent-pocket.com/products/faraday-cage-sleeves-for-phones?variant=18335583010913 https://silent-pocket.com/products/faraday-cage-sleeves-for-...
clairity 7y ago
i believe on iphones, the fake off-switch for bluetooth disconnects the devices you actually want connected (airpods, watch), while not being completely off for everything else, like beacons. instead, it should only maintain bluetooth connections to devices already connected (or better yet, trusted), while being invisible to everything else. i know with bluetooth this is technically difficult, if not impossible, but that would be the more customer-friendly implementation.
- graeme 7y ago
  It keeps the watch, pencil and airpods connected. Disconnects my third party keyboard. Unsure how it works in the mall scenario. Anyone know? Occurs to me I could shut wifi fully off when leaving home, and turn bluetooth off with the toggle to still use my devices. Don’t know if that’s useful however. Used to use airplane mode all the time, but modern convenience became too great.
  - clairity 7y ago
    hmmm, are you sure these things stay connected? i just tried with those 3 items and none stayed connected when i fake turned-off bluetooth on my iphone/ipad. or maybe it's a feature of the newer devices? my apple devices are older and have bluetooth 4.2 still.
    - graeme 7y ago
      Dead certain. Are you on ios 12? If you're on an older version, that could explain it. When I turn it off, the bluetooth menu in settings says "new bluetooth connections have been turned off from control center"

TaylorAlexander 7y ago

On the iPhone turning off Bluetooth using the control center doesn’t even turn it of fully, precisely so that these location services (and other features) are still available. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/evpz7a/turn-off-wi-fi-and-bluetooth-apple-ios-11 https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/evpz7a/turn-off-wi-fi-and...

brianzelip 7y ago
This is such a dark pattern.
ac4tw 7y ago
Indeed. Sidenote, it behaves differently if you've enabled airplane mode (or at least so the UI would indicate). In airplane mode, it gives no message and the wifi/bt icon goes transparent. If you're not in airplane mode, the wifi/bt icon goes light gray and it says 'disconnecting <device type> devices until tomorrow' but the radio is still on as your article mentions. Personally I miss the old behavior where it just turns it off, but I'm often in airplane mode so I get the old behavior anyway and great battery life :P

shrimp_emoji 7y ago

On the other hand, I'll tolerate whatever dystopic hellscape before going back to the tangly shitshow of wired earbuds.

delecti 7y ago
Conveniently, thanks to modern technology, you can have a headphone jack and bluetooth support on the same device.

eddiecalzone 7y ago

A link from the article shows that turning off Bluetooth in Android is as futile as it is in iOS: https://qz.com/1169760/phone-data/ https://qz.com/1169760/phone-data/ If you don't want to be tracked, you can either turn off your phone or put it in a protective sleeve when not in use: https://silent-pocket.com/products/faraday-cage-sleeves-for-phones?variant=18335583010913 https://silent-pocket.com/products/faraday-cage-sleeves-for-...

clairity 7y ago

i believe on iphones, the fake off-switch for bluetooth disconnects the devices you actually want connected (airpods, watch), while not being completely off for everything else, like beacons. instead, it should only maintain bluetooth connections to devices already connected (or better yet, trusted), while being invisible to everything else. i know with bluetooth this is technically difficult, if not impossible, but that would be the more customer-friendly implementation.

graeme 7y ago
It keeps the watch, pencil and airpods connected. Disconnects my third party keyboard. Unsure how it works in the mall scenario. Anyone know? Occurs to me I could shut wifi fully off when leaving home, and turn bluetooth off with the toggle to still use my devices. Don’t know if that’s useful however. Used to use airplane mode all the time, but modern convenience became too great.
- clairity 7y ago
  hmmm, are you sure these things stay connected? i just tried with those 3 items and none stayed connected when i fake turned-off bluetooth on my iphone/ipad. or maybe it's a feature of the newer devices? my apple devices are older and have bluetooth 4.2 still.
  - graeme 7y ago
    Dead certain. Are you on ios 12? If you're on an older version, that could explain it. When I turn it off, the bluetooth menu in settings says "new bluetooth connections have been turned off from control center"