7 ms·

So it's lightning all over again? Lightning was better than micro-usb, then USB-C came out and was even better and people get pissy at Apple for creating someth

So it's lightning all over again? Lightning was better than micro-usb, then USB-C came out and was even better and people get pissy at Apple for creating something better than the standard (and donating some of that back to the standard). I know this will not be popular here but I really do not like the EU's most recent round of "no, you have to open up this feature".

meibo 2y ago
...what use is "donating" back to the standard if you don't adopt the standard, practically preventing its adoption through your position in the market?
- jeffhuys 2y ago
  It wasn't really prevented, though, right? Apple was late to the game, yes, but that by definition means that its adoption was already well on its way; most of my non-Apple acquaintances were mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone (such an important issue!)...
  - lxgr 2y ago
    > mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone (such an important issue!)... It really isn't that irrelevant in a world in which being able to charge a phone can mean the difference between being able to get on a flight/train etc. or missing it. Apple switching to USB-C has doubled (or more, based on the country) the odds of finding somebody with a compatible cable and power bank in a pinch.
    - jeffhuys 2y ago
      Right, I get the usefulness. Absolutely. But would you just randomly mock a person for not having a USB-C connection? They just saw my phone, I didn't even ask for a charger. Besides, I always carry a collection of cables, even for those who mock me.
  - dspillett 2y ago
    > non-Apple acquaintances were mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone I've not mocked an Apple user purely for having a non-standard port on their device, though I have more than once mocked the arrogance of an Apple user being put out because when they were wanting to borrow a charger/battery/cable I only had standard parts, those needed to support my devices, in my kit.
    - jeffhuys 2y ago
      Yeah, that's arrogance. I wish people were less simple-minded and throw everyone under a label; multiple times I've gotten the comment (irl) in the vein of "you actually know a lot about computers for an _apple user_". I always tell them that it's the reason I switched. I'm not accusing you of being simple minded btw! It's just that most people are like that. Dumb people use windows. Dumb people use apple. Reality is more complex than "X = Y".
fire_lake 2y ago
Lightning is still better than USB C in terms of physical connector design (Lightning puts the male part on the more easily replaced cable side). Annoying that it’s not a strict improvement being imposed.
- lxgr 2y ago
  At least as far as I can tell, this seems to be a solved problem. USB-C ports on iPhones are holding up just fine. I'll take a 1% higher chance of a port wearing out over a 100% chance of needing to always carry two cables and not being able to share accessories with Android users any day.
  - literalAardvark 2y ago
    The port connector is more reliable on USB-C. The fine springy wiry bits that are impossible to clean and easy to damage are on the cable, which is a massive improvement. See: the super common broken Ethernet ports.
    - emchammer 2y ago
      For those of us who used to fix PCBs and wire breadboards, it’s nice to see the traces are still there, like knowing where your food comes from, even if any hope of an analog baseband project is long past. Lightning is one of Apple’s hits.
      - literalAardvark 2y ago
        Yeah, let's make more things the wrong way for the nostalgic aesthetic. I'm old enough to have done that, and to really miss the old world, but an improvement is an improvement. None of the stuff I grew up with is "hackable" anymore. None of the design constraints of small, sleek, performant, high battery life and secure are amenable to that. Even (production) Linux has stopped being a hacker's paradise and is tightening the rope. And that's what the iPhone is: a production phone. You want some cool toys? Get Arduinos, hacker laptops, RPis, Arch. It's all still out there, but not every device needs to have its guts out. That being said I will always miss SoftIce, being able to look stuff up in memory, being able to look stuff up in network traffic... alas, it's gone, and the truth is we're better off for it.
fransje26 2y ago
> I know this will not be popular here but I really do not like the EU's most recent round of "no, you have to open up this feature". The EU did not ask Apple to open up AWDL to competitors, they asked Apple to comply with the Wi-Fi Aware 4.0 standard.
- joshuaturner 2y ago
  "Asked" might not be the correct word here, "demanded" is more fitting. I'm pretty torn, and I know this conversation has been beaten to death on HN, and I have nothing new or novel to contribute to it, but even though this pushes Apple in a direction I'd personally like to see them move - it just feels like regulatory overreach.
  - lillecarl 2y ago
    In Europe we like our regulators to step in and force megacorporations to do the right thing every now and then. What makes this overreaching? We already regulate RF heavily since it's a shared space that would all go to shit if everyone could roll their own incompatible thing
    - joshuaturner 2y ago
      The "right thing" is, of course, subjective, but you're completely correct in the wider point. This is something European elected officials have enacted; they were voted into office _by_ Europeans, and if Apple wants to sell their products there, they have to abide by the rules passed there. I completely agree with that. People have the right to decide how companies behave in their countries/regions. I just personally don't like the idea of governments dictating product decisions when no harm or risk is involved. If Apple wants to sell a product without a feature, it's my belief that they should be able to do that. This is doubly true when Apple developed and patented the feature they're being forced to drop in favor of an implementation they would rather not adopt.
  - connicpu 2y ago
    Apple isn't technically forced to do this, they're an American company. They could instead withdraw entirely from the EU market and then they don't have to follow any EU laws. Of course, Apple will never do that because selling their phones in the EU makes _way_ more money than complying with the regulations will cost them.
lxgr 2y ago
I absolutely love it. USB-C is easily among my top 3 changes for the better on iPhones in the last 10 years. If "Wi-Fi Aware" (almost as ridiculous a name as "Bluetooth Low Energy", but that's a different topic) ends up allowing Android to iOS file transfers without any third-party apps or network connectivity – like feature phones could, 20 years ago – that'll make the top three too.
- joshstrange 2y ago
  Apple was bringing USB-C to their entire line well before the EU "mandated" it. They were one of the first to put it on their laptops.
  - lxgr 2y ago
    Yes, and they even co-developed the standard to my knowledge. Still they were stubbornly refusing to bring it to their phones, which are their most popular product line by far, until the EU forced their hand.
    - joshstrange 2y ago
      You say "refusing to bring it to their phones", I say they were cautious about changing the port for the second time ever. I'd bet my retirement fund that Apple was going to bring USB-C to the iPhone that year already or at most 1 year later. It was slowly working its way down the line and I understand them being most hesitant about touching their golden goose. But I understand your viewpoint and, again, I love USB-C (and my iPhone). My biases are absolutely playing into my viewpoint on this. I just don't think they were dragging their feet due to wanting to make more from MFI/Lightning as some suggested, it was mostly just being slow to change something that would annoy people (and the change did annoy many people, even though I don't think they should have been annoyed).
      - lxgr 2y ago
        The longer they waited, the more (now obsolete) Lightning accessories were produced and sold as a result, no?
pjc50 2y ago
Lightning is proprietary and incurs high per-cable license fees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22209924 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22209924
OptionX 2y ago
Apple said it didn't ship chargers with their 1k+ phones in order to reduce waste right? Then having the EU force usbc for the same reason shouldn't be a problem.
beeflet 2y ago
lightning was worse by nature of being proprietary

meibo 2y ago

...what use is "donating" back to the standard if you don't adopt the standard, practically preventing its adoption through your position in the market?

jeffhuys 2y ago
It wasn't really prevented, though, right? Apple was late to the game, yes, but that by definition means that its adoption was already well on its way; most of my non-Apple acquaintances were mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone (such an important issue!)...
- lxgr 2y ago
  > mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone (such an important issue!)... It really isn't that irrelevant in a world in which being able to charge a phone can mean the difference between being able to get on a flight/train etc. or missing it. Apple switching to USB-C has doubled (or more, based on the country) the odds of finding somebody with a compatible cable and power bank in a pinch.
  - jeffhuys 2y ago
    Right, I get the usefulness. Absolutely. But would you just randomly mock a person for not having a USB-C connection? They just saw my phone, I didn't even ask for a charger. Besides, I always carry a collection of cables, even for those who mock me.
- dspillett 2y ago
  > non-Apple acquaintances were mocking me for having a non-usb-c phone I've not mocked an Apple user purely for having a non-standard port on their device, though I have more than once mocked the arrogance of an Apple user being put out because when they were wanting to borrow a charger/battery/cable I only had standard parts, those needed to support my devices, in my kit.
  - jeffhuys 2y ago
    Yeah, that's arrogance. I wish people were less simple-minded and throw everyone under a label; multiple times I've gotten the comment (irl) in the vein of "you actually know a lot about computers for an _apple user_". I always tell them that it's the reason I switched. I'm not accusing you of being simple minded btw! It's just that most people are like that. Dumb people use windows. Dumb people use apple. Reality is more complex than "X = Y".

fire_lake 2y ago

Lightning is still better than USB C in terms of physical connector design (Lightning puts the male part on the more easily replaced cable side). Annoying that it’s not a strict improvement being imposed.

lxgr 2y ago
At least as far as I can tell, this seems to be a solved problem. USB-C ports on iPhones are holding up just fine. I'll take a 1% higher chance of a port wearing out over a 100% chance of needing to always carry two cables and not being able to share accessories with Android users any day.
- literalAardvark 2y ago
  The port connector is more reliable on USB-C. The fine springy wiry bits that are impossible to clean and easy to damage are on the cable, which is a massive improvement. See: the super common broken Ethernet ports.
  - emchammer 2y ago
    For those of us who used to fix PCBs and wire breadboards, it’s nice to see the traces are still there, like knowing where your food comes from, even if any hope of an analog baseband project is long past. Lightning is one of Apple’s hits.
    - literalAardvark 2y ago
      Yeah, let's make more things the wrong way for the nostalgic aesthetic. I'm old enough to have done that, and to really miss the old world, but an improvement is an improvement. None of the stuff I grew up with is "hackable" anymore. None of the design constraints of small, sleek, performant, high battery life and secure are amenable to that. Even (production) Linux has stopped being a hacker's paradise and is tightening the rope. And that's what the iPhone is: a production phone. You want some cool toys? Get Arduinos, hacker laptops, RPis, Arch. It's all still out there, but not every device needs to have its guts out. That being said I will always miss SoftIce, being able to look stuff up in memory, being able to look stuff up in network traffic... alas, it's gone, and the truth is we're better off for it.

fransje26 2y ago

> I know this will not be popular here but I really do not like the EU's most recent round of "no, you have to open up this feature". The EU did not ask Apple to open up AWDL to competitors, they asked Apple to comply with the Wi-Fi Aware 4.0 standard.

joshuaturner 2y ago
"Asked" might not be the correct word here, "demanded" is more fitting. I'm pretty torn, and I know this conversation has been beaten to death on HN, and I have nothing new or novel to contribute to it, but even though this pushes Apple in a direction I'd personally like to see them move - it just feels like regulatory overreach.
- lillecarl 2y ago
  In Europe we like our regulators to step in and force megacorporations to do the right thing every now and then. What makes this overreaching? We already regulate RF heavily since it's a shared space that would all go to shit if everyone could roll their own incompatible thing
  - joshuaturner 2y ago
    The "right thing" is, of course, subjective, but you're completely correct in the wider point. This is something European elected officials have enacted; they were voted into office _by_ Europeans, and if Apple wants to sell their products there, they have to abide by the rules passed there. I completely agree with that. People have the right to decide how companies behave in their countries/regions. I just personally don't like the idea of governments dictating product decisions when no harm or risk is involved. If Apple wants to sell a product without a feature, it's my belief that they should be able to do that. This is doubly true when Apple developed and patented the feature they're being forced to drop in favor of an implementation they would rather not adopt.
- connicpu 2y ago
  Apple isn't technically forced to do this, they're an American company. They could instead withdraw entirely from the EU market and then they don't have to follow any EU laws. Of course, Apple will never do that because selling their phones in the EU makes _way_ more money than complying with the regulations will cost them.

lxgr 2y ago

I absolutely love it. USB-C is easily among my top 3 changes for the better on iPhones in the last 10 years. If "Wi-Fi Aware" (almost as ridiculous a name as "Bluetooth Low Energy", but that's a different topic) ends up allowing Android to iOS file transfers without any third-party apps or network connectivity – like feature phones could, 20 years ago – that'll make the top three too.

joshstrange 2y ago
Apple was bringing USB-C to their entire line well before the EU "mandated" it. They were one of the first to put it on their laptops.
- lxgr 2y ago
  Yes, and they even co-developed the standard to my knowledge. Still they were stubbornly refusing to bring it to their phones, which are their most popular product line by far, until the EU forced their hand.
  - joshstrange 2y ago
    You say "refusing to bring it to their phones", I say they were cautious about changing the port for the second time ever. I'd bet my retirement fund that Apple was going to bring USB-C to the iPhone that year already or at most 1 year later. It was slowly working its way down the line and I understand them being most hesitant about touching their golden goose. But I understand your viewpoint and, again, I love USB-C (and my iPhone). My biases are absolutely playing into my viewpoint on this. I just don't think they were dragging their feet due to wanting to make more from MFI/Lightning as some suggested, it was mostly just being slow to change something that would annoy people (and the change did annoy many people, even though I don't think they should have been annoyed).
    - lxgr 2y ago
      The longer they waited, the more (now obsolete) Lightning accessories were produced and sold as a result, no?

pjc50 2y ago

Lightning is proprietary and incurs high per-cable license fees. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22209924 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22209924

OptionX 2y ago

Apple said it didn't ship chargers with their 1k+ phones in order to reduce waste right? Then having the EU force usbc for the same reason shouldn't be a problem.

beeflet 2y ago

lightning was worse by nature of being proprietary