Epic Games Asks Supreme Court to Hear Apple Case

[bgillander]

We do know, for sure, that Apple didn’t decide, in 2022, to release a USB-C smartphone in 2023, these decisions are made years ahead of time (especially considering that USB3 support is built into the A17 Pro chip). Based on what we know from past releases, we’re talking about a 3-4 year lead time, maybe more. So, by the time the EU said “Two years from 2022”, Apple was already locked into a 2023 release.

And, others put it better than I could, when Apple says “the proposal would hurt innovation and create a mountain of electronics waste,” they are indeed talking about the current state waste, but they’re referring to innovation being hurt in the future. USB-C is not a ‘forever’ port. Eventually something better WILL come along and, unless this is rescinded, this limits the adoption of anything new and better. Apple doesn’t hate USB-C, they disapprove a mandate that restricts Apple’s ability to deliver better solutions worldwide.

I have no doubt that in 2026, they’ll be talking about how they forced Apple to use USB on their laptops due to their mandate.

Thank you!! While I guess we should all be thankful that they didn’t do this a few years ago and lock us into micro-USB, the USB port itself has already changed so many times in recent history that it should be obvious to anyone that technology evolves, and we shouldn’t have to go back and dig up the old “640KB should be enough for anybody” urban myth to illustrate the shortsightedness of this!

 

[zarmanto]

We do know, for sure, that Apple didn’t decide, in 2022, to release a USB-C smartphone in 2023, these decisions are made years ahead of time (especially considering that USB3 support is built into the A17 Pro chip). ...

I do understand your premise, but I'm not sure your conclusion is as obvious as you assume. The unstated associative link that you're making is that the support for high speed USB-C connectivity in the A17 Pro necessitates that the handset itself have a USB port on it in order to take advantage of those speeds. I don't think it does, necessarily: just as there were already Lightning to USB-A and Lightning to USB-C cables, there could have also been newer Lightning to high-speed USB-C cables, if not for the legislation requiring a USB port on the handset.

Likewise, the necessary redesign effort for just the port itself would be a much smaller hurdle than that for the chip... so 3 to 4 years seems a bit pessimistic to me. In fact, the notion that a single engineering student was able to retrofit an iPhone X with a USB-C port demonstrates that it was imminently doable within the existing constraints of Lightning based iPhones; if Apple hadn't been able to make it happen, that would likely have been some pretty messy egg on their face.

... when Apple says “the proposal would hurt innovation and create a mountain of electronics waste,” they are indeed talking about the current state waste, but they’re referring to innovation being hurt in the future. USB-C is not a ‘forever’ port. ...

I concur; there will likely be some very heated technical discussions about this in the future.