4 ms·

A common believe among my non developer friends is that apple does it on purpose so their users need to keep buying new hardware. I don't know if they do, but a

by toshk 6y ago

A common believe among my non developer friends is that apple does it on purpose so their users need to keep buying new hardware. I don't know if they do, but at least their incentive is not very big to keep old devices running smooth.

ojnabieoot 6y ago
Apple and Samsung have both paid fines and settlements recently because of deliberately slowing down older devices - most recently Apple in November: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-u-states-reach-113-180435514.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-u-states-reach-113-1804...
- megablast 6y ago
  This was an attempt to save the battery. Where Apple messed up was not talking about this feature.
  - oblio 6y ago
    I'm a bit tired of this Apple apologism. Do you think that a corporation with their market cap is not fully aware of these kinds of decisions that impact their sales? This is the same company that removed the headphone jack for very cynical reasons, in order to increase the sale price of their phone by $150 (or however much the Airpods cost). The same company that repeatedly removed ports from the laptops in order to sell more dongles (so much so that there were running gags at the time about Apple, the dongle company). A company where the revenue from the sale of accessories for their devices could literally make a Fortune 1000 company (!!!). They definitely knew what they were doing and chose to do the thing that most benefited their bottom line. Let's stop giving the benefit of the doubt to the top tech companies. They don't deserve it like mom and pop stores. Oblio's Law: Never attribute to malice that which can be attributed to stupidity, unless the ones acting have an army of data scientists, researchers, market analysts and PR people at their disposal.
    - jlokier 6y ago
      > They definitely knew what they were doing and chose to do the thing that most benefited their bottom line. Imho there's a reasonable case that they did the thing which best protected users older devices and daily usable time, and I think most users would prefer their phone stays working for a day on a single charge, so they can make and receive calls and messages towards the end of the day. It's possible Apple wasn't thinking of the users, but it's not a clear cut case. It's also possible that if Apple hadn't slowed the older phones down as batteries wore out, they would have seen more sales as users needed to replace their phones more urgently as battery life dropped. So it's not obvious that the action they took favoured sales anyway.
      - oblio 6y ago
        > It's possible Apple wasn't thinking of the users, but it's not a clear cut case. Court cases are rarely won, especially with big companies. They have the money to drag them out so most are just settled. So in my eyes any class action lawsuit a company settles for millions is a case they lost. When will you admit that it was a clear case? They just admitted it themselves by settling! I give up :-)
      - raxxorrax 6y ago
        The new iPhone (12? 13? 293?) comes without an AC adapter. Because that is good for the environment :)
- Cthulhu_ 6y ago
  Even before that, people observed phones just get slower over time and with enough OS updates. An OS update should never make things feel slower or less responsive, yet here we are.
- mullingitover 6y ago
  This was done to keep the device from restarting in scenarios where degraded batteries were unable to supply enough power. It wasn't a nefarious scheme to get users to upgrade.
  - ojnabieoot 6y ago
    a) Prosecutors in the US and EU allege that both Apple and Samsung did in fact participate in a nefarious scheme to get users to upgrade. I realize that Apple and Samsung say they didn’t do that but I don’t think they are being honest. This thing where tech workers take tech companies at face value when said companies have repeatedly demonstrated their dishonesty is... really something. b) At any rate, “Apple deceitfully handicapped older products to cover up a more serious (but fixable) flaw, knowingly pushing customers into unnecessary upgrades” is really not any better than “Apple deceitfully handicapped older devices to push consumers into unnecessary upgrades.”
    - mullingitover 6y ago
      I don't see why we should take prosecutors (who have their own goals and ambitions, operating in a political environment) at face value either. There's little to lose in pursuing a company with deep pockets, and a lot to gain.
      - sorisos 6y ago
        What would they gain?
        gwd 6y ago
        Well one former prosecutor recently became Vice President of the United States. In any case, District Attorney is an elected position on most places, and having a reputation for being tough on the "bad guys" is a good way to get re-elected.
      - ojnabieoot 6y ago
        I would call this “being so skeptical that your brain falls out” since you could make the same argument (about either politics or money) with scientists, human rights advocates, programmers, etc. “Actually you can’t trust anybody and all viewpoints are equally suspect” isn’t as enlightened as you think. In this specific case Apple and Samsung have been proven dishonest and manipulative, and they have a far stronger legal/financial incentive to lie than separate groups of prosecutors in the US and many separate EU member states. I also find a conspiracy internal to Apple/Samsung much more plausible than a conspiracy across attorneys general from 34 US states.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

by toshk 6y ago

ojnabieoot 6y ago

Apple and Samsung have both paid fines and settlements recently because of deliberately slowing down older devices - most recently Apple in November: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-u-states-reach-113-180435514.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/apple-u-states-reach-113-1804...

megablast 6y ago
This was an attempt to save the battery. Where Apple messed up was not talking about this feature.
- oblio 6y ago
  I'm a bit tired of this Apple apologism. Do you think that a corporation with their market cap is not fully aware of these kinds of decisions that impact their sales? This is the same company that removed the headphone jack for very cynical reasons, in order to increase the sale price of their phone by $150 (or however much the Airpods cost). The same company that repeatedly removed ports from the laptops in order to sell more dongles (so much so that there were running gags at the time about Apple, the dongle company). A company where the revenue from the sale of accessories for their devices could literally make a Fortune 1000 company (!!!). They definitely knew what they were doing and chose to do the thing that most benefited their bottom line. Let's stop giving the benefit of the doubt to the top tech companies. They don't deserve it like mom and pop stores. Oblio's Law: Never attribute to malice that which can be attributed to stupidity, unless the ones acting have an army of data scientists, researchers, market analysts and PR people at their disposal.
  - jlokier 6y ago
    > They definitely knew what they were doing and chose to do the thing that most benefited their bottom line. Imho there's a reasonable case that they did the thing which best protected users older devices and daily usable time, and I think most users would prefer their phone stays working for a day on a single charge, so they can make and receive calls and messages towards the end of the day. It's possible Apple wasn't thinking of the users, but it's not a clear cut case. It's also possible that if Apple hadn't slowed the older phones down as batteries wore out, they would have seen more sales as users needed to replace their phones more urgently as battery life dropped. So it's not obvious that the action they took favoured sales anyway.
    - oblio 6y ago
      > It's possible Apple wasn't thinking of the users, but it's not a clear cut case. Court cases are rarely won, especially with big companies. They have the money to drag them out so most are just settled. So in my eyes any class action lawsuit a company settles for millions is a case they lost. When will you admit that it was a clear case? They just admitted it themselves by settling! I give up :-)
    - raxxorrax 6y ago
      The new iPhone (12? 13? 293?) comes without an AC adapter. Because that is good for the environment :)
Cthulhu_ 6y ago
Even before that, people observed phones just get slower over time and with enough OS updates. An OS update should never make things feel slower or less responsive, yet here we are.
mullingitover 6y ago
This was done to keep the device from restarting in scenarios where degraded batteries were unable to supply enough power. It wasn't a nefarious scheme to get users to upgrade.
- ojnabieoot 6y ago
  a) Prosecutors in the US and EU allege that both Apple and Samsung did in fact participate in a nefarious scheme to get users to upgrade. I realize that Apple and Samsung say they didn’t do that but I don’t think they are being honest. This thing where tech workers take tech companies at face value when said companies have repeatedly demonstrated their dishonesty is... really something. b) At any rate, “Apple deceitfully handicapped older products to cover up a more serious (but fixable) flaw, knowingly pushing customers into unnecessary upgrades” is really not any better than “Apple deceitfully handicapped older devices to push consumers into unnecessary upgrades.”
  - mullingitover 6y ago
    I don't see why we should take prosecutors (who have their own goals and ambitions, operating in a political environment) at face value either. There's little to lose in pursuing a company with deep pockets, and a lot to gain.
    - sorisos 6y ago
      What would they gain?
      - gwd 6y ago
        Well one former prosecutor recently became Vice President of the United States. In any case, District Attorney is an elected position on most places, and having a reputation for being tough on the "bad guys" is a good way to get re-elected.
    - ojnabieoot 6y ago
      I would call this “being so skeptical that your brain falls out” since you could make the same argument (about either politics or money) with scientists, human rights advocates, programmers, etc. “Actually you can’t trust anybody and all viewpoints are equally suspect” isn’t as enlightened as you think. In this specific case Apple and Samsung have been proven dishonest and manipulative, and they have a far stronger legal/financial incentive to lie than separate groups of prosecutors in the US and many separate EU member states. I also find a conspiracy internal to Apple/Samsung much more plausible than a conspiracy across attorneys general from 34 US states.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]