3 ms·

Apple "complied" by putting USB-A on their chargers and calling it a day. EU authorities grumbled but didn't opt for a lenghty legal challenge; instead, they ta

by toyg 5y ago

Apple "complied" by putting USB-A on their chargers and calling it a day. EU authorities grumbled but didn't opt for a lenghty legal challenge; instead, they talked a bit more and came up with this updated legislation. Note how they give Apple something (the unbundled charger) while becoming more restrictive in other areas... if Apple continue taking the piss after this gets passed, I expect the hammer will come down.

rglullis 5y ago
> I expect the hammer will come down. So, what are they going to do? Fine Apple for a couple of million euros? Give another reason for Apple to increase the prices of their products even more?
- TazeTSchnitzel 5y ago
  They would block all shipments of Apple devices at the border of the EU after a certain point. The EU controls the customs rules for most of Europe.
  - rglullis 5y ago
    So, it's the latter. They will have another excuse to increase the prices further. "We had to spend $BILLIONS to change the design of the iPhone, so this is why the new iPhone EU Edition is going to be 1400€". This is the kind of thing that really makes me understand Brexit.
    - toyg 5y ago
      Nobody forces you to buy a consumer-unfriendly product that also happens to be arbitrarily expensive. If somebody in Milan can't afford a Ferrari made in Maranello because the damn company insists in pricing their cars beyond what is reasonable for a 4-wheeled vehicle, it doesn't mean Milan should secede from Italy, surely.
      - dmitriid 5y ago
        > Nobody forces you to buy a consumer-unfriendly product that also happens to be arbitrarily expensive. If anything, Apple's Lightning port (and the 30-pin connector before that) are significantly more consumer-friendly than USB. Where consumers are consumers of Apple products, but still. In the span of time when Apple only had two connectors, USB went through 3 or 4. USB didn't even have a charging standard until 2012 (the year Lightning was introduced). And even with USB-C it's still a hodge-podge of standards with multiple optional and non-optional parts, and it's not getting better: https://old.reddit.com/r/UsbCHardware/comments/mjz2pu/usb4_architectural_explainer_usb4s_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/UsbCHardware/comments/mjz2pu/usb4_a...
        toyg 5y ago
        A single, monopolistic market would also be "consumer friendly", given those parameters. Obviously we don't want that, do we? Getting multiple manufacturers to agree on anything is always going to be a challenge and produce some compromises. But it's still better for the market as a whole, which in turn is better for consumers. I look forward to the chance of buying a single, universal charger with great features that will last me decades, from a vendor that may or may not be a phone-manufacturer. Apple would gladly do their worse to stop me from doing that, if they could.
        dmitriid 5y ago
        > I look forward to the chance of buying a single, universal charger with great features that will last me decades I really highly doubt about the decades part. I also highly doubt about the "single charger with great features" because USB has so many optional parts that many manufacturers are unlikely to implement.
        alpaca128 5y ago
        I fail to see how any kind of proprietary product can be more consumer friendly than an open standard. As I see it that cannot be true by definition.
    - alwayseasy 5y ago
      I'm not sur if you know, but Apple complies with various local laws, and it impacts their margins. Interoperability favors competition, the EU is all about fair markets, not protecting Apple's margins.
      - rglullis 5y ago
        > EU is all about fair markets. If you really believe that, I have a bridge to sell you. The EU, just like any political entity that has grown beyond the original intended responsibilities, has become the stage for cronies and the elites to play their power games. If the EU was really for "fair markets", Dieselgate alone would have been enough to wipe the German auto industry off the Earth. That is certainly something that has caused more environmental damage and stopped healthier market competition than a fucking power connector. And don't even get me started on the subsidies given to French farmers and the market quotas for eastern countries that kill any chance for them to develop their industries. But, hey, at least the EU is giving Apple fans another way to greenwash their consumer behavior, so that counts for something...
        ClumsyPilot 5y ago
        "If the EU was really for "fair markets", Dieselgate alone" Dieselgate has resulted in criminal prosecution, remind me how many people went to jaill after 2008? 2?
        rglullis 5y ago
        "Criminal prosecution for Dieselgate" was political theater of the worst kind. It's an example of systemic and institutional corruption and all that has brought was a couple of scapegoats. If the same thing were to happen in a smaller country, say Poland or Czech Republic, it would be grounds for the bigger EU states to bulldoze the plants and to bankrupt the nations. Also, it's the second time that you try to counter an argument by throwing an American Whataboutism. Maybe you should let go of the nationalism and find better arguments?
        5y ago
    - rualca 5y ago
      > They will have another excuse to increase the prices further. This sounds like a very poorly thought out slippery slope argument, specially taking into account that iPhones' manufacturing cost is already a fraction of the huge price they sell it to consumers (i.e., $200 vs $1200)
      - rglullis 5y ago
        Excuses do not have to be based on objective truths.
    - linspace 5y ago
      If Apple thought they could charge more they would be already doing it, based on their considerable margins. If this makes you understand Brexit I doubt you really understand Brexit.
    - nindalf 5y ago
      I think Apple is moving in this direction on their own. They sell 4 products that charge by USB-C (Mac, iPad Pro, iPad Air, iPad Mini) and 4 that use lightning (iPhone, iPhone Mini, iPhone Pro, iPad). But it's a gradual change, each of the last few years has seen a product introduced using USB-C.
      - rglullis 5y ago
        Which is one more indication that the law is not needed. EU bureaucrats are so useless and full of themselves, they think they can teach birds how to fly.
    - alpaca128 5y ago
      > This is the kind of thing that really makes me understand Brexit. It seems a tad inconsistent to be against restrictions on imports but also for the kind of fallout that resulted from Brexit. That makes your understanding of Brexit seem incomplete. And if you don't like price increases on Apple products, don't buy them. That's the only language they understand.
      - rglullis 5y ago
        It's not the restrictions on imports that I am against. It is the all-encompassing political bureaucracy that the EU has become and how upside-down its priorities are. > And if you don't like price increases on Apple products, don't buy them. I don't buy them already, but the type of connector they use is way down on my list of reasons not to use them. Closed source? Hard to repair? Exploitative app store practices? Spyware that scans your data? An unwilling intermediary into developers and consumers? Greenwashed, overpriced hardware that can only be used by the terms dictated from Cupertino? Those are reasons to not use Apple. Yet, here we are discussing the most irrelevant feature of their devices like it is the only issue that is wrong with them.
        toyg 5y ago
        Note how many of the topics you mention as critical are actually discussed at EU level: GDPR, support for FOSS in various programs, ongoing examination of the appstore monopolistic practices, tax-dodging... And chargers too, yes, if anything because it's a pretty simple thing to mandate.
        rglullis 5y ago
        What is "simple to mandate" has not been effectively turned into results even after a decade of "legislation". The rest is nothing but "discussions" or big laws that don't really accomplish anything. What is the point again? To have "discussions" or to effect change? I wish I could say something like "keep waiting for the EU to being actually effective, I will be over there with the people that can get stuff done", but the main problem is that the more time passes, the more the EU finds a way to fuck with ordinary citizens and the more we have midwits asking to be supervised, afraid to step outside the lines and pointing out at those that fight the absurdity of it all.
- toyg 5y ago
  At worst, they can block sales across the Union. Somehow I don't think Cook would risk losing their second-largest market on a triviality like this, but who knows.

by toyg 5y ago

rglullis 5y ago

> I expect the hammer will come down. So, what are they going to do? Fine Apple for a couple of million euros? Give another reason for Apple to increase the prices of their products even more?

TazeTSchnitzel 5y ago
They would block all shipments of Apple devices at the border of the EU after a certain point. The EU controls the customs rules for most of Europe.
- rglullis 5y ago
  So, it's the latter. They will have another excuse to increase the prices further. "We had to spend $BILLIONS to change the design of the iPhone, so this is why the new iPhone EU Edition is going to be 1400€". This is the kind of thing that really makes me understand Brexit.
  - toyg 5y ago
    Nobody forces you to buy a consumer-unfriendly product that also happens to be arbitrarily expensive. If somebody in Milan can't afford a Ferrari made in Maranello because the damn company insists in pricing their cars beyond what is reasonable for a 4-wheeled vehicle, it doesn't mean Milan should secede from Italy, surely.
    - dmitriid 5y ago
      > Nobody forces you to buy a consumer-unfriendly product that also happens to be arbitrarily expensive. If anything, Apple's Lightning port (and the 30-pin connector before that) are significantly more consumer-friendly than USB. Where consumers are consumers of Apple products, but still. In the span of time when Apple only had two connectors, USB went through 3 or 4. USB didn't even have a charging standard until 2012 (the year Lightning was introduced). And even with USB-C it's still a hodge-podge of standards with multiple optional and non-optional parts, and it's not getting better: https://old.reddit.com/r/UsbCHardware/comments/mjz2pu/usb4_architectural_explainer_usb4s_and/ https://old.reddit.com/r/UsbCHardware/comments/mjz2pu/usb4_a...
      - toyg 5y ago
        A single, monopolistic market would also be "consumer friendly", given those parameters. Obviously we don't want that, do we? Getting multiple manufacturers to agree on anything is always going to be a challenge and produce some compromises. But it's still better for the market as a whole, which in turn is better for consumers. I look forward to the chance of buying a single, universal charger with great features that will last me decades, from a vendor that may or may not be a phone-manufacturer. Apple would gladly do their worse to stop me from doing that, if they could.
        dmitriid 5y ago
        > I look forward to the chance of buying a single, universal charger with great features that will last me decades I really highly doubt about the decades part. I also highly doubt about the "single charger with great features" because USB has so many optional parts that many manufacturers are unlikely to implement.
      - alpaca128 5y ago
        I fail to see how any kind of proprietary product can be more consumer friendly than an open standard. As I see it that cannot be true by definition.
  - alwayseasy 5y ago
    I'm not sur if you know, but Apple complies with various local laws, and it impacts their margins. Interoperability favors competition, the EU is all about fair markets, not protecting Apple's margins.
    - rglullis 5y ago
      > EU is all about fair markets. If you really believe that, I have a bridge to sell you. The EU, just like any political entity that has grown beyond the original intended responsibilities, has become the stage for cronies and the elites to play their power games. If the EU was really for "fair markets", Dieselgate alone would have been enough to wipe the German auto industry off the Earth. That is certainly something that has caused more environmental damage and stopped healthier market competition than a fucking power connector. And don't even get me started on the subsidies given to French farmers and the market quotas for eastern countries that kill any chance for them to develop their industries. But, hey, at least the EU is giving Apple fans another way to greenwash their consumer behavior, so that counts for something...
      - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
        "If the EU was really for "fair markets", Dieselgate alone" Dieselgate has resulted in criminal prosecution, remind me how many people went to jaill after 2008? 2?
        rglullis 5y ago
        "Criminal prosecution for Dieselgate" was political theater of the worst kind. It's an example of systemic and institutional corruption and all that has brought was a couple of scapegoats. If the same thing were to happen in a smaller country, say Poland or Czech Republic, it would be grounds for the bigger EU states to bulldoze the plants and to bankrupt the nations. Also, it's the second time that you try to counter an argument by throwing an American Whataboutism. Maybe you should let go of the nationalism and find better arguments?
        5y ago
  - rualca 5y ago
    > They will have another excuse to increase the prices further. This sounds like a very poorly thought out slippery slope argument, specially taking into account that iPhones' manufacturing cost is already a fraction of the huge price they sell it to consumers (i.e., $200 vs $1200)
    - rglullis 5y ago
      Excuses do not have to be based on objective truths.
  - linspace 5y ago
    If Apple thought they could charge more they would be already doing it, based on their considerable margins. If this makes you understand Brexit I doubt you really understand Brexit.
  - nindalf 5y ago
    I think Apple is moving in this direction on their own. They sell 4 products that charge by USB-C (Mac, iPad Pro, iPad Air, iPad Mini) and 4 that use lightning (iPhone, iPhone Mini, iPhone Pro, iPad). But it's a gradual change, each of the last few years has seen a product introduced using USB-C.
    - rglullis 5y ago
      Which is one more indication that the law is not needed. EU bureaucrats are so useless and full of themselves, they think they can teach birds how to fly.
  - alpaca128 5y ago
    > This is the kind of thing that really makes me understand Brexit. It seems a tad inconsistent to be against restrictions on imports but also for the kind of fallout that resulted from Brexit. That makes your understanding of Brexit seem incomplete. And if you don't like price increases on Apple products, don't buy them. That's the only language they understand.
    - rglullis 5y ago
      It's not the restrictions on imports that I am against. It is the all-encompassing political bureaucracy that the EU has become and how upside-down its priorities are. > And if you don't like price increases on Apple products, don't buy them. I don't buy them already, but the type of connector they use is way down on my list of reasons not to use them. Closed source? Hard to repair? Exploitative app store practices? Spyware that scans your data? An unwilling intermediary into developers and consumers? Greenwashed, overpriced hardware that can only be used by the terms dictated from Cupertino? Those are reasons to not use Apple. Yet, here we are discussing the most irrelevant feature of their devices like it is the only issue that is wrong with them.
      - toyg 5y ago
        Note how many of the topics you mention as critical are actually discussed at EU level: GDPR, support for FOSS in various programs, ongoing examination of the appstore monopolistic practices, tax-dodging... And chargers too, yes, if anything because it's a pretty simple thing to mandate.
        rglullis 5y ago
        What is "simple to mandate" has not been effectively turned into results even after a decade of "legislation". The rest is nothing but "discussions" or big laws that don't really accomplish anything. What is the point again? To have "discussions" or to effect change? I wish I could say something like "keep waiting for the EU to being actually effective, I will be over there with the people that can get stuff done", but the main problem is that the more time passes, the more the EU finds a way to fuck with ordinary citizens and the more we have midwits asking to be supervised, afraid to step outside the lines and pointing out at those that fight the absurdity of it all.
toyg 5y ago
At worst, they can block sales across the Union. Somehow I don't think Cook would risk losing their second-largest market on a triviality like this, but who knows.