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I don't understand your comment - are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense? Maybe for you there's

I don't understand your comment - are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense? Maybe for you there's no distinction, but population effects on behavior always occur in the margins, and there's a considerable difference between $30 and $120 for a lot of people. Otherwise why not make it $200 or $300 for a battery replacement? Why is $120 just perfect?

tpmoney 2y ago
> are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense? I'm saying the number of people who: 1) Would buy a used iPhone 2) Would buy said iPhone so late in its depreciation cycle that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device 3) Are unwilling to entertain any other form of battery replacement for such an old phone (like 3rd party vendors who will replace it for say $70) 4) Are the buyers of last resort for the given iPhone and because they didn't buy it the phone has gone instead to the landfill because no one else would buy it except for them is so vanishingly small a quantity of people, that they have no measurable impact on the speed which with iPhones become e-waste relative to a world where iPhones had batteries easily replaced with a $30 amazon purchase, and also have no measurable impact on the rate of new iPhone purchases such that it would even be a factor in how Apple chooses to design or not design any given iPhone model.
- fsflover 2y ago
  > that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device Why does it matter? It doesn't have to be the difference between buying and not buying. It just could help students to save money.
  - tpmoney 2y ago
    It matters because the original claims I was responding to was that Apples iPhone battery designs are accelerating their path to e-waste relative to a world where these cheaper easily replaced batteries were available and that the (or at least a significant) reason Apple chooses this design is to sell more $1k+ new phones instead of selling batteries. For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people who either replace their phone with $1k+ new phones when their old battery dies because for some reason spending $120 on a battery replacement is too much or a significant number of people who would buy/use them second hand, but refuse to because $120 for a battery replacement (or any of the available cheaper options) is too much. And such a significant number that they are actively moving the needle on the number of new iPhones sold and the speed at which otherwise wanted iPhones are being sent to the trash.
    - fsflover 2y ago
      > For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people No. For this effect to be significant, there must be a significant enough fraction of such people. For this effect to exist, there must exist any fraction of such people.
      - tpmoney 2y ago
        If the effect exists but has no net impact, then that effect might as well not exist. It is meaningless and irrelevant to a discussion on whether a given design is good or bad or what its intentions are. Let's say that one such person exists, and they personally have caused 5 iPhones over their lifetime to go to the trash pile earlier than they would have if the design was different. In the mean time, in a parallel world, we have different design. And in this other world, 6 iPhones over the same time period go into the trash earlier than they otherwise would have because of faulty water ingress protection where the battery contacts penetrate the shell, or because of a broken battery contact, or because someone put a cheap 3rd party replacement in that caught fire. When we compare the two worlds side by side, we discover then that the "replaceable battery" world is one where the iPhone battery design is the one that drives iPhones to become e-waste faster and drives the sale of more $1k phones. Since we can't have two parallel worlds, the best we can do is compare the iPhone to other phones and/or look at the size of the effect and whether it's significant enough to show up in design planning. If it does not generate a significant effect on the market, then claiming the effect of this minuscule fraction of people makes iPhones "destined to become e-waste faster than necessary" or that they factor into the design decision because apple wants "to sell entire $1000+ phone/$3000+ laptop upgrades, not replacement batteries." is fallacious. It's fallacious in the same way that claiming that butterflies flapping their wings in Beijing are causing more iPhones to become e-waste sooner than necessary because they contribute to hurricanes and many phones are damaged or lost in such storms. Butterflies might indeed create a very real effect on air currents when they flap their wings. But I'm not about to start an advocacy program for slaughtering butterflies to keep iPhones from becoming e-waste in a hurricane without some evidence that the effect is significant. And no one would accept the claim that butterflies cause iPhones to become e-waster sooner than necessary as true because the effect butterflies have exists, no matter how insignificant it is.

tpmoney 2y ago

> are you saying that there should be no difference in behavior between a $30 expense and a $120 expense? I'm saying the number of people who: 1) Would buy a used iPhone 2) Would buy said iPhone so late in its depreciation cycle that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device 3) Are unwilling to entertain any other form of battery replacement for such an old phone (like 3rd party vendors who will replace it for say $70) 4) Are the buyers of last resort for the given iPhone and because they didn't buy it the phone has gone instead to the landfill because no one else would buy it except for them is so vanishingly small a quantity of people, that they have no measurable impact on the speed which with iPhones become e-waste relative to a world where iPhones had batteries easily replaced with a $30 amazon purchase, and also have no measurable impact on the rate of new iPhone purchases such that it would even be a factor in how Apple chooses to design or not design any given iPhone model.

fsflover 2y ago
> that the difference between a $30 and a $120 expense is the difference between buying and not buying the device Why does it matter? It doesn't have to be the difference between buying and not buying. It just could help students to save money.
- tpmoney 2y ago
  It matters because the original claims I was responding to was that Apples iPhone battery designs are accelerating their path to e-waste relative to a world where these cheaper easily replaced batteries were available and that the (or at least a significant) reason Apple chooses this design is to sell more $1k+ new phones instead of selling batteries. For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people who either replace their phone with $1k+ new phones when their old battery dies because for some reason spending $120 on a battery replacement is too much or a significant number of people who would buy/use them second hand, but refuse to because $120 for a battery replacement (or any of the available cheaper options) is too much. And such a significant number that they are actively moving the needle on the number of new iPhones sold and the speed at which otherwise wanted iPhones are being sent to the trash.
  - fsflover 2y ago
    > For these claims to be true, there must be a significant enough fraction of people No. For this effect to be significant, there must be a significant enough fraction of such people. For this effect to exist, there must exist any fraction of such people.
    - tpmoney 2y ago
      If the effect exists but has no net impact, then that effect might as well not exist. It is meaningless and irrelevant to a discussion on whether a given design is good or bad or what its intentions are. Let's say that one such person exists, and they personally have caused 5 iPhones over their lifetime to go to the trash pile earlier than they would have if the design was different. In the mean time, in a parallel world, we have different design. And in this other world, 6 iPhones over the same time period go into the trash earlier than they otherwise would have because of faulty water ingress protection where the battery contacts penetrate the shell, or because of a broken battery contact, or because someone put a cheap 3rd party replacement in that caught fire. When we compare the two worlds side by side, we discover then that the "replaceable battery" world is one where the iPhone battery design is the one that drives iPhones to become e-waste faster and drives the sale of more $1k phones. Since we can't have two parallel worlds, the best we can do is compare the iPhone to other phones and/or look at the size of the effect and whether it's significant enough to show up in design planning. If it does not generate a significant effect on the market, then claiming the effect of this minuscule fraction of people makes iPhones "destined to become e-waste faster than necessary" or that they factor into the design decision because apple wants "to sell entire $1000+ phone/$3000+ laptop upgrades, not replacement batteries." is fallacious. It's fallacious in the same way that claiming that butterflies flapping their wings in Beijing are causing more iPhones to become e-waste sooner than necessary because they contribute to hurricanes and many phones are damaged or lost in such storms. Butterflies might indeed create a very real effect on air currents when they flap their wings. But I'm not about to start an advocacy program for slaughtering butterflies to keep iPhones from becoming e-waste in a hurricane without some evidence that the effect is significant. And no one would accept the claim that butterflies cause iPhones to become e-waster sooner than necessary as true because the effect butterflies have exists, no matter how insignificant it is.