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Apple has been moving their entire lineup to USB-C for a while already (iPad Pro in 2020, iPad Mini in 2021, more devices this year) . Sure, in public they have
by ribit 4y ago
Apple has been moving their entire lineup to USB-C for a while already (iPad Pro in 2020, iPad Mini in 2021, more devices this year) . Sure, in public they have to oppose tech sector regulation, but I wouldn't be surprised if they were secretly happy as it provides them with an excuse. If some customers who have heavily invested into the Lighting ecosystem complains then can always say "look, it was the EU, blame them".
- CharlesW 4y agoAbsolutely. If Apple would've switched to USB-C without an EU mandate, they would've received mountains of bad press about the unprecedented amount of e-waste and confusion that will result because of this switch. So they pressured the EU to mandate the change to a standard that Apple helped pioneer, so that Apple's environmentally-friendly record would remain unblemished.
- adam_arthur 4y agoThe mountains of e-waste created by keeping around a zombie protocol far exceeds a transition to a widely used and accepted standard. The majority of people with iPhone likely already have USB-C cables anyway, so requires no net new purchase
- scarface74 4y agoHow many of those users have USB C cables capable of video over USB, USB3 speeds etc? If the EU were going to “mandate” something, don’t be half assed about it.
- adam_arthur 4y agoI dunno, but lightning doesn’t support that anyway, so who cares?
- scarface74 4y agoActually, Lightning can support USB 3. The first generation iPad Pro did. But I thought EU was trying to prevent incompatibility?
- adam_arthur 4y agoLove seeing all the Apple zombies malding over making society convenient for people. This legislation wouldn’t have even happened if Apple had done the right thing to begin with. Instead of trying to eek out margins on proprietary cables
- scarface74 4y agoYes because out of the billions Apple makes, the few pennies that Lightning makes is really meaningful. My issue is not the USB C mandate, it’s the usual incompetence of the EUs half way thought out laws. If you are going to mandate a standard, mandate a good one - including minimum data transfer, power delivery and video - all parts of the standard.
- adam_arthur 4y agoI agree the law could have been written better. It could have just enforced that vendors must use an agreed upon standard by X% of industry participants or similar. Thus if you want a competing connector, you have to propose a new standard and get buy in from others. But the end result is the same regardless. When the need for a new standard comes, the spec will be updated or abandoned in favor of a new one. As to Apple’s reasoning for not using USB-C, who’s to say? I would think cable revenue is minuscule at the end of the day, yet here they are still using lightning almost a decade after the rest of the industry standardized on USB-C At their scale they need to operate in a somewhat sensible way or regulators will target them, that’s life. Society is not going to be beholden to Apple’s design choices if it negatively affects enough people
- sdfhbdf 4y agoCorrection, my iPad Pro from 2018 also has USB-C