> If it was made industry standard back then, USB-C would have probably never come along or would have taken much much longer. USB-C is a clusterfuck of a conn

> If it was made industry standard back then, USB-C would have probably never come along or would have taken much much longer. USB-C is a clusterfuck of a connector, and I'm not just talking about the various voltages and how using the wrong cable can fry your equipment. I'm talking about the physical connector itself. See, the USB-C port has a shroud around the outside and a "tongue" in the middle where all the contacts are. The USB-C plug has a shroud which fits into the port's shroud, but inside the plug's shroud are all the contacts which align with the contacts on the tongue. This tongue is fragile, necessitating replacement of the whole port if it breaks or is otherwise damaged. If I am not very careful with my phone's USB-C connector, it can get flaky and make even charging (let alone data transfer) difficult and annoying within a year. Do you want to see an example of a good design? Look at Apple's Lightning connector, where the fragile tongue is on the more easily replaceable plug, and the port is just the shroud. Meaning my wife just plugs or unplugs her iPhone all the time, never worrying about what kind of damage dirt or lint might cause if it gets into the port or whether inserting or removing the plug too hard might permanently harm the port. It Just Works, every time. Mandating USB-C just made the connector situation worse for everybody. Mandating an open standard doesn't really help much if it's a shitty standard. It just squelches any improvements a company might make.