8 ms·

It's conceivably politically incorrect to use this reference, but Apple was begging the EU not to throw them into that briar patch.

llm_nerd 10mo ago
Begging? Apple filed a couple of light objections -- basically a "don't regulate us, bro" -- and then moved on. Their resistance was laughably superficial Look, Apple is a predatory, extraordinarily greedy company, but these sorts of "thanks EU!" discussions are a riot. Thanks EU, for making Apple support a clone of an Apple feature that didn't exist until Apple made it, and for "forcing" Apple to transition their line to USB-C, which they were already almost completely done doing.
- gambiting 10mo ago
  >> which they were already almost completely done doing Honest question - why did they stick with lighting on iphones for so long, given that usb-c has been ubiquitus on phones for years before that point. I mean we can sit here and say "duh apple was going to do it anyway" but like.....why didn't they? Why did samsung have usb-c phones long before apple?
  - llm_nerd 10mo ago
    Apple's resistance was presumably user inertia. Users had billions of cables and accessories for lightning, and Apple saw during a prior transition that people get really pissed off about this sort of change. And let's be real about Samsung et al -- before USB-C, they were using the utter dogshit micro USB connector (funfact -- this terrible connector became prevalent because the EU made a voluntary commitment with manufacturers to adopt it). micro-USB is a horrible connector from a user-experience and reliability perspective. USB-C was a massive, massive upgrade for those users. In Apple land, everyone already had a bidirectional, reliable connector. Even today to most Apple users the switch from lightning to USB-C was just a sideways move.
    - koyote 10mo ago
      > In Apple land, everyone already had a bidirectional, reliable connector Wait, I thought the Apple 30-pin connector was not reversible? USB-C has been out for over a decade now. There was only a small window of about two years where iphones had lightning and other phones did not yet have usb-c.
      - MBCook 10mo ago
        GP meant Lightning. It was reversible. You are correct, the dock connector for was not. And they couldn’t go to USB-C instead of Lightning initially as Lightning came out first.
      - llm_nerd 10mo ago
        Samsung released the first USB-C Galaxy S device five years after the iPhone moved to lightning (2012 vs 2017). They had Galaxy A devices on micro USB a year later in 2018. A couple of devices like the Pixel (4 years after lightning - 2012 vs 2016) got it a bit earlier, but no, it wasn't two years. The iPhone rocking a massively better connector half a decade earlier than the vast majority of the competition is legitimately a thing.
        koyote 10mo ago
        The Nexus 5x (and all models after that) had a USB-C connector in 2015, so did the OnePlus 2 (and all models after that).
        llm_nerd 10mo ago
        Two devices that sold absolutely minuscule numbers are not remotely relevant to this discussion. For non-Apple smartphone users, the overwhelming majority were rocking the atrocious trash that is micro USB half a decade after the iPhone moved to lightning.
    - systemtest 10mo ago
      Don't forget the USB 3.0 micro-B on the Galaxy S2, the 18-pin connector, the 20-pin connector, mini-USB and various barrel connectors. USB-C was a blessing for Samsung, they could finally ditch their sub-par connectors.
  - techpression 10mo ago
    They openly said why, millions upon millions of devices (speakers etc) people wanted to use with lightning connectors. There was never a good time and EU putting a deadline on it gets Apple free of the e-waste accusations.
    - hshdhdhj4444 10mo ago
      No one was accusing Apple of e-waste when for decades the world had decided common standards were a great way to reduce e-waste. Outside of America this has been obvious since the mid 2000s when people complained about a proliferation of chargers with phones because pre-iPhone the non US cellphone market was far more advanced.
      - MBCook 10mo ago
        Really? Do you remember the user shit storm when they dumped the dock connector and went to lightning? People wouldn’t shut up for years, even though lightning was way way better.
        xp84 10mo ago
        So, your position is that some users whined about that… so what? Apple knew those users were, quite frankly, wrong, the 30-pin was fragile and one-way. And the cables themselves were never expensive, and used scarcely more resources than many disposable items we throw out every day. Apple never apologized for the changeover, the iPhone 5 sold like hotcakes, everyone quickly loved having a reversible and small cable that was less fragile than 30pin, and everyone lived happily ever after. The whiny boomers annoyed that they had to finally replace a dock they bought in 2004 for an iPod made zero difference to anything. People whining online are not a problem at all unless they stop buying — and nobody stopped buying. After all, switching to Android would have necessitated buying a new cable anyway, at any point prior to 2023!
  - smallmancontrov 10mo ago
    Because they were getting a reputation for churning the ports too quickly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyTA33HQZLA&t=19s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyTA33HQZLA&t=19s and then they went all-USBC on the MBP before the ecosystem was ready, got absolutely slammed for it, and went back (on magsafe). 4 times bitten, once shy. I'm sure the cynical money reason played a role too, of course, but nobody else is mentioning the 4 times bitten so I felt obliged.
    - Dylan16807 10mo ago
      The MBP would only be an example if they were scared of being too new to USB-C on phones. That stopped being possible once a quarter of new phones were USB-C. So they weren't scared of that.
    - crazygringo 10mo ago
      Seriously. I upgraded my iPad to a USB-C version and discovered I couldn't use my 1st-gen (Lightning) Apple Pencil with it even though it's compatible -- because I first had to buy a special female-female USB-C<->Lightning dongle just to be able to plug it in to pair it. (Even though I can keep using my Lightning charger to charge it separately from my iPad.) Moving from Lightning to USB-C hasn't been too bad for me since I use wireless charging with e.g. my Lightning AirPods. But the transition is a huge pain. Because of weird cases like the Pencil, it's not even enough to just have a USB-C charging cable and a Lightning charging cable.
      - MBCook 10mo ago
        I wouldn’t blame USB-C for that, personally. The Pencil situation is a disaster. There are at least 3 first party versions plus the 3rd party ones. And when version X + 1 comes out they don’t drop support for version X, they use it in a different product for some stupid reason. Probably because the tooling already exists. So you can find entire matrices online attempting to explain which iPads support which pencils. It’s horrible. The Lightning -> USB-C transition is probably one of least objectionable parts of pencil history.
  - jauntywundrkind 10mo ago
    I think this whole narrative being spun here that Good Guy Apple was Being Oppressed by the lowly end users & wanted to do the right thing (be thrown into the briar patch) all along, just never could form the political will for it and needed EU intervention is some insane fucking weird ass made up nonsense. WTF wtf wtf? Surely you must be joking. Apple has had MfI certification on Apple compatible products for decades & has actively wanted to protect that revenue stream & domain of control. If folks could just plug in devices & have them just work, that would erode their ownership. And just as bad, it would raise all sorts of questions like "why does this mouse not do anything on my iPhone" and obscure the careful market delineations Apple vigorously has established between its products (which makes people buy more products than they need). Apple never wanted to be a good guy, Apple never wanted to lower itself to the common market of peripherals and standards. Their involvement with USB-C was likely far far far before it was apparent their device teams would have to give up MfI controls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MFi_Program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MFi_Program
- stouset 10mo ago
  I think you missed GP’s point. The briar patch is a reference to the story of Br’er Rabbit, which involves pretending to object to a punishment that one really doesn’t mind at all (and might even prefer). The GP is suggesting that Apple was more than happy to have this mandate. I tend to agree: they wanted to switch the iPhone to USB-C anyway, but there’s always people who are going to be upset that their Lightning accessories no longer work or need an adapter. But this way they can say that the EU forced their hand. They get what they wanted all along, but they also get a scapegoat who can take the blame for the remaining downsides.
  - tristanj 10mo ago
    My understanding is that Apple didn't add USB-C to iPhones because they planned to remove all ports from the iPhone entirely. They envisioned it as a wireless only device. EU regulation stopped this from happening, and now once they added USB-C it's difficult to take this feature away. I predict we'll be stuck with the USB-C port and form factor on most phones for the next decade.
    - raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
      This is completely illogical. There is no world that wireless charging or data transfer was going to be as good as wired. Was the iPhone all the sudden not going to work in the millions of cars that had wired CarPlay?
      - 1718627440 10mo ago
        I share that view, but I don't think Apple would care. I mean Ethernet is way better than Wifi, yet the iPhones don't have an Ethernet port.
        raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
        But they can use a standard USB C to Ethernet adapter that computers use.

llm_nerd 10mo ago

Begging? Apple filed a couple of light objections -- basically a "don't regulate us, bro" -- and then moved on. Their resistance was laughably superficial Look, Apple is a predatory, extraordinarily greedy company, but these sorts of "thanks EU!" discussions are a riot. Thanks EU, for making Apple support a clone of an Apple feature that didn't exist until Apple made it, and for "forcing" Apple to transition their line to USB-C, which they were already almost completely done doing.

gambiting 10mo ago
>> which they were already almost completely done doing Honest question - why did they stick with lighting on iphones for so long, given that usb-c has been ubiquitus on phones for years before that point. I mean we can sit here and say "duh apple was going to do it anyway" but like.....why didn't they? Why did samsung have usb-c phones long before apple?
- llm_nerd 10mo ago
  Apple's resistance was presumably user inertia. Users had billions of cables and accessories for lightning, and Apple saw during a prior transition that people get really pissed off about this sort of change. And let's be real about Samsung et al -- before USB-C, they were using the utter dogshit micro USB connector (funfact -- this terrible connector became prevalent because the EU made a voluntary commitment with manufacturers to adopt it). micro-USB is a horrible connector from a user-experience and reliability perspective. USB-C was a massive, massive upgrade for those users. In Apple land, everyone already had a bidirectional, reliable connector. Even today to most Apple users the switch from lightning to USB-C was just a sideways move.
  - koyote 10mo ago
    > In Apple land, everyone already had a bidirectional, reliable connector Wait, I thought the Apple 30-pin connector was not reversible? USB-C has been out for over a decade now. There was only a small window of about two years where iphones had lightning and other phones did not yet have usb-c.
    - MBCook 10mo ago
      GP meant Lightning. It was reversible. You are correct, the dock connector for was not. And they couldn’t go to USB-C instead of Lightning initially as Lightning came out first.
    - llm_nerd 10mo ago
      Samsung released the first USB-C Galaxy S device five years after the iPhone moved to lightning (2012 vs 2017). They had Galaxy A devices on micro USB a year later in 2018. A couple of devices like the Pixel (4 years after lightning - 2012 vs 2016) got it a bit earlier, but no, it wasn't two years. The iPhone rocking a massively better connector half a decade earlier than the vast majority of the competition is legitimately a thing.
      - koyote 10mo ago
        The Nexus 5x (and all models after that) had a USB-C connector in 2015, so did the OnePlus 2 (and all models after that).
        llm_nerd 10mo ago
        Two devices that sold absolutely minuscule numbers are not remotely relevant to this discussion. For non-Apple smartphone users, the overwhelming majority were rocking the atrocious trash that is micro USB half a decade after the iPhone moved to lightning.
  - systemtest 10mo ago
    Don't forget the USB 3.0 micro-B on the Galaxy S2, the 18-pin connector, the 20-pin connector, mini-USB and various barrel connectors. USB-C was a blessing for Samsung, they could finally ditch their sub-par connectors.
- techpression 10mo ago
  They openly said why, millions upon millions of devices (speakers etc) people wanted to use with lightning connectors. There was never a good time and EU putting a deadline on it gets Apple free of the e-waste accusations.
  - hshdhdhj4444 10mo ago
    No one was accusing Apple of e-waste when for decades the world had decided common standards were a great way to reduce e-waste. Outside of America this has been obvious since the mid 2000s when people complained about a proliferation of chargers with phones because pre-iPhone the non US cellphone market was far more advanced.
    - MBCook 10mo ago
      Really? Do you remember the user shit storm when they dumped the dock connector and went to lightning? People wouldn’t shut up for years, even though lightning was way way better.
      - xp84 10mo ago
        So, your position is that some users whined about that… so what? Apple knew those users were, quite frankly, wrong, the 30-pin was fragile and one-way. And the cables themselves were never expensive, and used scarcely more resources than many disposable items we throw out every day. Apple never apologized for the changeover, the iPhone 5 sold like hotcakes, everyone quickly loved having a reversible and small cable that was less fragile than 30pin, and everyone lived happily ever after. The whiny boomers annoyed that they had to finally replace a dock they bought in 2004 for an iPod made zero difference to anything. People whining online are not a problem at all unless they stop buying — and nobody stopped buying. After all, switching to Android would have necessitated buying a new cable anyway, at any point prior to 2023!
- smallmancontrov 10mo ago
  Because they were getting a reputation for churning the ports too quickly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyTA33HQZLA&t=19s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyTA33HQZLA&t=19s and then they went all-USBC on the MBP before the ecosystem was ready, got absolutely slammed for it, and went back (on magsafe). 4 times bitten, once shy. I'm sure the cynical money reason played a role too, of course, but nobody else is mentioning the 4 times bitten so I felt obliged.
  - Dylan16807 10mo ago
    The MBP would only be an example if they were scared of being too new to USB-C on phones. That stopped being possible once a quarter of new phones were USB-C. So they weren't scared of that.
  - crazygringo 10mo ago
    Seriously. I upgraded my iPad to a USB-C version and discovered I couldn't use my 1st-gen (Lightning) Apple Pencil with it even though it's compatible -- because I first had to buy a special female-female USB-C<->Lightning dongle just to be able to plug it in to pair it. (Even though I can keep using my Lightning charger to charge it separately from my iPad.) Moving from Lightning to USB-C hasn't been too bad for me since I use wireless charging with e.g. my Lightning AirPods. But the transition is a huge pain. Because of weird cases like the Pencil, it's not even enough to just have a USB-C charging cable and a Lightning charging cable.
    - MBCook 10mo ago
      I wouldn’t blame USB-C for that, personally. The Pencil situation is a disaster. There are at least 3 first party versions plus the 3rd party ones. And when version X + 1 comes out they don’t drop support for version X, they use it in a different product for some stupid reason. Probably because the tooling already exists. So you can find entire matrices online attempting to explain which iPads support which pencils. It’s horrible. The Lightning -> USB-C transition is probably one of least objectionable parts of pencil history.
- jauntywundrkind 10mo ago
  I think this whole narrative being spun here that Good Guy Apple was Being Oppressed by the lowly end users & wanted to do the right thing (be thrown into the briar patch) all along, just never could form the political will for it and needed EU intervention is some insane fucking weird ass made up nonsense. WTF wtf wtf? Surely you must be joking. Apple has had MfI certification on Apple compatible products for decades & has actively wanted to protect that revenue stream & domain of control. If folks could just plug in devices & have them just work, that would erode their ownership. And just as bad, it would raise all sorts of questions like "why does this mouse not do anything on my iPhone" and obscure the careful market delineations Apple vigorously has established between its products (which makes people buy more products than they need). Apple never wanted to be a good guy, Apple never wanted to lower itself to the common market of peripherals and standards. Their involvement with USB-C was likely far far far before it was apparent their device teams would have to give up MfI controls. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MFi_Program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MFi_Program
stouset 10mo ago
I think you missed GP’s point. The briar patch is a reference to the story of Br’er Rabbit, which involves pretending to object to a punishment that one really doesn’t mind at all (and might even prefer). The GP is suggesting that Apple was more than happy to have this mandate. I tend to agree: they wanted to switch the iPhone to USB-C anyway, but there’s always people who are going to be upset that their Lightning accessories no longer work or need an adapter. But this way they can say that the EU forced their hand. They get what they wanted all along, but they also get a scapegoat who can take the blame for the remaining downsides.
- tristanj 10mo ago
  My understanding is that Apple didn't add USB-C to iPhones because they planned to remove all ports from the iPhone entirely. They envisioned it as a wireless only device. EU regulation stopped this from happening, and now once they added USB-C it's difficult to take this feature away. I predict we'll be stuck with the USB-C port and form factor on most phones for the next decade.
  - raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
    This is completely illogical. There is no world that wireless charging or data transfer was going to be as good as wired. Was the iPhone all the sudden not going to work in the millions of cars that had wired CarPlay?
    - 1718627440 10mo ago
      I share that view, but I don't think Apple would care. I mean Ethernet is way better than Wifi, yet the iPhones don't have an Ethernet port.
      - raw_anon_1111 10mo ago
        But they can use a standard USB C to Ethernet adapter that computers use.