We know the bans are temporary. The thing that isn’t temporary are the eu regs.
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Report: Apple to Stop Selling iPhone 14 and iPhone SE in EU This Month
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This is not a ban, this is standard. Standards are good and they benefit citizens. Believe me, I am just outside EU and I would love to live under those regulations and standards, here people die because of corruption, negligence and lack of standards.
This "vast majority" you're talking about ... sorry, I'm just not buying it
I think for a "vast majority" of customers it's way nicer to have everything in their lives using USB-C
Even the most ardent of Apple fans has plenty of non Apple tech in their life that uses USB and having the same connectors, cables, charges, etc ... all work interchangeably is a massive QOL improvement
Is the connector itself "better" and "as elegant" -- no way!
I love lightning -- I primarily use it still as I have loads of Lightning devices (iPad Mini 5, iPhone 13 Mini, tons of iPhone SEs, Airpods, on and on)
But my personal situation and preference isn't something that clouds my view on how nice it would be -- and will be -- when everything is on USB-C -- I've already started migrating my chargers to all USB-C and just using USB-C to Lightning cables for now .. but I do have other devices that are USB-C, so it's a mix for a while until I upgrade all of my Apple kit
As I said before, it’s nicer for me that the phone is USB-C. It’s nicer for a lot of their customers. But on the other hand we have people like my mother in law who has held off on upgrading for two years now because she doesn’t want new cables. She doesn’t have another device - just a desktop computer. And I promise you she is much closer to Apple’s “average user” than anyone reading this.
I find the idea that Apple dragged its feet for a couple of million in licensing fees ridiculous - I think the much more likely explanation is that Apple, who knows far more about how it’s devices are used than anyone posting on MacRumors, legitimately believed Lightening was better for most of its customers each time the decision was made to put Lightening in the phone (which, remember is a decision made years in advance). Maybe they were wrong with the timing, and USB-C became ubiquitous enough that they could have made the change earlier, but given Apple’s track record, and the fact that it’s their product, I’d defer to them.
But even if you all are right and it would have been better for Apple’s customers if they had switched earlier, the idea that the government is coming in and saying “thou shalt use USB-C, and no other connector” remains a ridiculous overreach that is going to lead to worse products the future. There will never be a phone that is thinner than a USB-C port, for example.
It’s this kind of thinking that leads to the EU’s inability to compete in the tech sector. You’d think that the fact that they tried to force Micro-USB on everyone would cause people to stop and think “huh, maybe we shouldn’t mandate this and let the market work.” We just saw this play out in the EV market in the US and the market produced a far better solution than the one the EU mandated years ago. And to all those who say “the EU will just update the regulation when a better connector comes along” - when Tesla tried to bring the new connector to the the EU, they were not told “oh, that is a much better solution, we’ll consider updating the standard” but, and I quote, “a committee decided the standard years ago.”
So tech nerds on MacRumors are so outraged Apple didn’t adopt USB-C in 2017 and are cheering on the government cutting off their noses to spite their faces.
What lets the US “lead” in the tech sector is the government’s complete unwillingness to stand up for their citizens. If they did we wouldn’t have an internet full or tracking companies, spyware and adware, cell companies logging every single location you visit and selling it, Bluetooth beacons, facial recogniztion. Taking everything that that we have ever posted and feeding into AI companies, without explicit permission, so they can make a profit.
The personal data market that has made our tech sector wealthy is because they are allowed to crap all over everyone without any concern.
I don’t buy that we have a good tech economy in the US. I think it’s garbage and Silicon Valley has a rat problem….and Apple isn’t not immune.
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Of course you are entitled to your opinion, but in my experience Apple really does seem to care about what’s best for its customers. Not saying they’re perfect, but so much better than everyone else. I’m not naive enough to think that profit doesn’t factor in to decisions at all, but I do think if the options are “stick with a worse solution and make slightly more money” or “switch to the better solution and make less” they’re going to go with the better solution.
Obviously if you think they are acting nefariously you’ll likely have a different take on why they stuck with Lightening (and other things like App Store regulations, anti-steering, etc). So maybe we just need to agree to disagree.
Anyways, I’ve said my piece here and probably am not changing any minds, so I’ll dip out unless quoted and I have something new to add.
Enjoyed the debate, everyone!
Don’t quite understand how we couldn’t order them in Northern Island, we obviously use the same UK Apple Store as the rest of the UK, don’t know how they would differentiate between Northern Island, Scotland, England Or Wales??
Apple plans to stop selling the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Plus, and third-generation iPhone SE in European Union countries later this month, to comply with a regulation that will soon require newly-sold smartphones with wired charging to be equipped with a USB-C port in those countries, according to French blog iGeneration. All three of these iPhone models are still equipped with a Lightning port for wired charging.
In a paywalled report today, the website said the iPhone models will no longer be sold through Apple's online store and retail stores in the European Union as of December 28, which is when the regulation goes into force. Apple may begin phasing out the iPhones even earlier in Switzerland, which has a close relationship with the European Union market. There, the report states that the devices will be removed from Apple's online store as of December 20.
Apple Authorized Resellers in the European Union will be able to continue selling these iPhones until their remaining inventory is depleted, the report added.
Apple plans to stop selling some other Lightning-based products in the European Union as well, including its extended Magic Keyboard without Touch ID, according to the report. That keyboard is still equipped with a Lightning port for charging.
There are 27 countries in the European Union, including Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, and Sweden. While the United Kingdom left the European Union in 2020, the report said Apple will stop selling the devices in Northern Ireland, which continues to follow many of the European Union's trade laws.
As far as the source of this information, the report said Apple shared these details with its relevant internal teams. Apple did not respond to our requests for comment, but we will update this story if the company confirms or denies the report.
According to a guide published by the European Union in 2022, the USB-C port regulation will apply to any individual iPhone that is placed on the market after the regulation goes into force, even if they are models that launched beforehand, like the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Plus, and the current iPhone SE. At a minimum, that means Apple would not be able to sell any iPhones with a Lightning port manufactured after December 28.
The relevant passage from the guide:While the European Union has suggested that the regulation does not prevent existing stock from being sold, which explains why Apple Authorized Resellers would be able to sell through their remaining inventory, it is not entirely clear to us how the regulation applies to any iPhones that Apple may have already stockpiled in factories. In any case, the report said that Apple's decision is to stop selling the devices soon.
Apple is expected to announce a fourth-generation iPhone SE with a USB-C port in March, so the device would quickly return to the European Union. Meanwhile, the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Plus likely would have been discontinued in September, so sales of those devices would be ending in the European Union around nine months early.
Article Link: Report: Apple to Stop Selling iPhone 14 and iPhone SE in EU This Month
Finally that archaic lightning port banished.
Normal people don't have game consoles and bluetooth speakers? Are all of these "normal" people you know Amish?
The vast majority of households have something other than just an iPhone, and if the number is to be believed 50% of the US have android devices, therefore usb-c. 80% of households have at least two cell phones.
Game consoles are in 53% of US homes, and I bet there is a lot of iPhone overlap.
You need to get out more. This isn’t 1993.
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Therein lies the problem, no? The EU's eagerness to regulate anything and everything under the sun meant that there was little by way of tech innovations on their shores, and it speaks volumes that the DMA applies almost exclusively to US tech companies who had the right business climate to develop and thrive, and export their brand power worldwide.
Seriously, just look at the tech and apps that you use. How many are linked to US tech companies in one way or another? iOS, android, windows, macOS, Facebook, X, WhatsApp, YouTube, Netflix, Office, amazon, google apps, probably the notable exception is Spotify (and I switched them out a long time ago).
They can try to regulate AI, but the reality is that nobody is obligated to follow their laws beyond their borders, and it's just as likely that companies simply choose to exclude the EU from any new iteration of AI than bend over backwards to accommodate them (and hobble their own progress).
But not iPhone, and god knows how many decades Apple want to cling on lightning for their money printer should the mandate never happen.
Uh huh. Designer still works for Apple senior managers and such. They can’t design a USB-C device until Tim and his cabinet tells them to. Apple wants endless profit from lightning and MFi fees.
Just because Apple already switches to USB-C on Macs and iPad doesn’t mean they will also switch to USB-C for iPhone in due course. Otherwise we’d have USB-C iPhone in iPhone 14 series rather than 15.
The iPhone 12, 13 and 14, in hindsight, were part of a 3-year cycle. So if Apple didn’t upgrade the iPhone 12 in 2020 to include usb-c, then their next opportunity would have been 2023 with the iPhone 15.
That this lines up with the EU’s imposed deadline is probably more coincidence than anything else, but again, I am fine with pro-EU folks wanting to frame this as their victory.
As you may remember, back in 2012 they promised that Lightning would be the iPhone's port for the next decade. It wound up being 11 years. Remember lots of people were upset in 2012 because they had to replace their accessories based on the 30-pin port. Apple reassured them that they could use their newly-purchased Lightning accessories for 10 years before they had to change again. They kept their promise. Moving to USB-C after 3 years, which you wanted them to do, would have angered a lot of customers who rightfully would have felt lied to.
Again, MFi income was reported as equivalent to “a rounding error” on Apple’s profits by multiple sources inside Apple. If you think Apple is intentionally making its most important product worse for the majority of its users to make “a rounding error” worth of additional profit you and I are looking at two very different companies.
There are a lot of Apple fans out there who think Apple can do no wrong and are thus upset at the EU. Those Apple fans wish Tim Cook could get away with continuing his corporate greed practice of keeping the Lightning port in order for Apple to make even more money through MFi licensing. Those Apple fans prefer Cook to give them less user-friendly products in order to give shareholders more money.
Anyone who agrees with what the above paragraph says about the Lightning port, might be interested in the following thread:
forums.macrumors.com
Anyone who agrees with what the above paragraph says about the Lightning port, might be interested in the following thread:
Will iPhone 14 be USB 2.0? Probably, since Cook is mediocre.
Apple computers have had USB 3.0 since mid-2012. That is 10 years ago. Despite that, Tim Cook, being the mediocre beancounter MBA suit that he is, has still not done anything to upgrade the connectivity on the latest iPhones. The latest iPhones use the same USB 2.0 connectivity that shipped with...
forums.macrumors.com
Even if you are correct that Apple was keeping Lightening entirely for MFi money, “rounding error” that it has been reported as (and spoiler alert, you’re not correct) - that should be Apple’s choice to make. If it’s a mistake then let Apple be punished by the market.
This government mandating a charging port does nothing other than cement that charging point for all eternity. The EU tried to do that for Micro USB. Should Apple have capitulated then? Or are you glad they didn’t? If you’re glad they didn’t, why are you so convinced there will never be a port better than USB-C?
Are you somehow mad or annoyed at the above universe of consumers? The ones who throw money at apple?
You mean a user started thread in the iPhone forum?Anyone who agrees with what the above paragraph says about the Lightning port, might be interested in the following thread:
Will iPhone 14 be USB 2.0? Probably, since Cook is mediocre.
Apple computers have had USB 3.0 since mid-2012. That is 10 years ago. Despite that, Tim Cook, being the mediocre beancounter MBA suit that he is, has still not done anything to upgrade the connectivity on the latest iPhones. The latest iPhones use the same USB 2.0 connectivity that shipped with...
You know your God Steve Jobs thought he could cure his cancer with dietary treatments and juice cleanses ( https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2011/10/24/steve-jobs-cancer-treatment-regrets/)
The EU didn't mandate data transfer speeds. You can have a USB-C port at USB-2 speeds.
I thought back then they only threatened to mandate if the phone manufacturers didn't stop their nonsense? Back then you still had a lot of phones shipping with proprietary connectors that were part of the plug so you couldn't just buy new cables etc, and often the connectors would change with each generation of phone, rendering all your previous chargers useless even for that brand. The vast majority then switched over to MicroUSB.
Kinda sad that one of the biggest updates to the iPhone in years was government mandated. Put's in perspective the choices Apple makes.
The EU mandated that European standards bodies agree to a common charger in 2010, but didn’t specify which type; the standards bodies then chose micro-USB themselves. That’s the reason phones went from dozens of proprietary charging cables as you mention, to just micro-USB. This was unequivocally a good thing for consumers, because it was a nightmare before that.
That regulation wasn’t quite so comprehensive as the new USB-C regulation though, and allowed Apple to continue using its own port as long as it made adapters available. At the time this was Apple’s 30-pin charger, but also later applied to Lightning.
Want proof that the EU won’t be stuck with USB-C forever? Because it’s not stuck with micro-USB forever, either. That argument was always asinine.