Frankly, I don’t see much of a problem with this.
They’ll sell the “Apple” charging cable for $40 or something fucking insane, but as long as you can buy and use a normal USB-C cable that does exactly the same thing, go for it.
Of course being Apple, they will probably void the warranty or add an identifier to their cables so that nothing else works. In that case, I hope the EU bankrupts them completely.
But what about … new users entering the Apple ecosystem?
What ecosystem do they think people are coming from where they didn’t already have a USB C cable or wireless charger?
Most phones shipped with USB a to USB c, that is not supported by many new devices. You need a USB c to USB C. If I pay over $800 dollars for something, I really shouldn’t be wondering if I can properly get it to charge.
Also, at what speed is it going to charge? If it charges slower with your old charger that you got from your last phone… Then you should supply the one that provides the speed I paid $800 dollars for.
This was why even Microsoft ships a new Xbox with a Controller, even though you can use your old controller with it.
Edit: That said, there has to be cut offs somewhere about features not being supplied, it’s not cut and dry
This is for the cheaper AirPods and the iPhone. Unlikely that they will not ship a cable with a phone. The article is just clickbait to make it seem like it’s for all the devices.
How about current IPhone users who have nothing but lightning cables and decide to upgrade to the new USB-C model?
Anyone buying a new iPhone still gets a USB C cable. This only applies to Airpods.
Oh no. Buy one then and be done with it. Oops.
First phone.
Then just buy a cable.
This is about Airpods. The phone still includes the cable.
Many people don’t know usb-c cable is universal, and apple only advertises chargeing iphone with macbook and ipad charger.
I imagine most of these people use an iPhone, and they will certainly waste their money on an Apple cable.
Plus many of these tech-illiterate people are likely on a lighting iPhone with a barrel jack Windows, they won’t even know they need a new charging cable until they realize their old lighting cables don’t work.
And USB-C cables aren’t universal, I imagine a bunch of the cables you have can’t handle the higher voltage charging Macbooks have. But if your cable is capable of a higher standard, it’ll work fine with anything below it (e.g. I use my Macbook Pro charger to charge my Android phone, keyboard, and mouse all the time).
apple moment
Now it’s just a fuck you at this point
I dunno, I have so many USB c chargers and cables around that I bin them every time a device comes with another cable.
Agreed, but Apple removes things from the box, and the price stays the same…
And being good for environment goes it the window when they are packaged, shipped separately instead now
I don’t know, mine keep breaking every few years around the device. I think it’s because I sometimes grab the phone without realizing I was charging it
I honestly still hardly have any (spare) USB-C cables, and while I’d never pay for one I always do find the official Apple ones quite reliable.
Everyone I know has at least 10 USB-C cables lying around, what’s the point of shipping more e-waste?
Apple: As long as we can gaslight you into thinking we’re classy, we can do whatever the fuck we want
Yet more proof that Apple has ceased to be an innovator that adds features to phones and now takes things away and leaves it to fans to make up justifications for it.
Removing things is also innovation
Or do you still miss the VGA connector? A floppy disk drive? DVD drive in a laptop?
Those were replaced with better tech that did the exact same thing. VGA - DVI - HDMI - Display Port.
I don’t know about you, but I still have one DVD hooked up. Because I have the option to. Not because the motherboard maker took away all the SATA ports and told me I had to buy a special proprietary dongle or plug to fit the replacement.
I still use most of these regularly, because I don’t waste money on anti-green Apple products.
Is using a 30 year old VGA monitor “green”?
They’re still innovating, especially when it comes to shareholder profits
Ok, let’s be real here. A charger can last a decade even if the charging speed slows…a cord will not outlast a phone. If it does, there’s a serious issue
I see you’ve been using apple cables. Other cables will absolutely last ten years or more.
For me this would mostly be a non-issue. I’ve got enough extra USB-C cables that I don’t even unwrap the ones Apple has been shipping. Not to mention that I’m pretty used to charging my AirPods via MagSafe these days anyway.
If I send you an address can you ship some extras, mine seem to die or you get ones that are only 4inches long with something. Throw in that now many devices only have USB C on both ends so your last phone that sold with a USB A to USB C cord, that no longer plugs into new devices, I am always at a shortage.
The 4 inch ones are awesome! I have a whole collection of different 4 inch cables for when I travel, and for when I take my laptop to the cafe. They’re also great for microcontrollers, like the mouse jiggler I made from a pico 2040.
I’m glad someone has found their use, hanging devices off outlets never seems safe to me, or the device just falls as you eventually stretch out the charging ports.
Wish I had a collection of various colored chargers now. You may have inspired me to figure out a way to color code charging devices now.
I just keep it simple. When I travel, I bring my power bank and a tiny cable to charge my phone. When I get to my destination, I recharge my power bank with a longer cable. At each place around my house where I’d want to charge something (desk, bed, etc), I keep a charger nearby, either already plugged in or neatly stored near the outlet.
I never need to worry about where a cable is, because I always have one handy, and it’s just the right size.
If I knew you locally, I’d be open to giving it away. But with the cost of shipping even light usb cables, I think buying a UGREEN cable from Amazon might cost about the same.
Good, I don’t need any more. Remove them from all boxes.
fear not you can buy an apple magic connector for just $60
runs at usb2 speed probably.
They are a huge tech company. They sound have a checkbox in the checkout flow that lets you add a free cable if you need one.
It’s fine if they reduce the price accordingly.
If it’s still the same price after they take the cable out, it was never about reducing waste to begin with.
Knowing Apple, that wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest, which is why I never have and never will own any of their products.
Adjusted for inflation, last years 15 was $827.
The base 16 is $800 and a separate USB C cable from Apple is about $20 for 1m and $30 for 2m.
So, if you buy a phone and cable, you’re spending about as much as you did last year, adjusting for inflation.
I don’t know why I just wasted all that time calculating that. I need to get a life.
The removed the cable from the box of the AirPods 4, not iPhone.
But here’s the question: does it cost Apple $20 to make a cable? I seriously doubt it. It probably costs them closer to 20 cents per cable. So in reality, they now make approximately $20 more from every sale than they did before.
Sure, not everyone is buying a cable with every phone. But cables get lost, they wear out, they get stolen by your kids to charge their iPhones because they broke theirs, they get chewed up by pets, etc.
And you can bet your ass that, just like any other high-margin item, the people in the Apple store are gonna be incentivized like hell to get every customer to buy a cable with their phone whether they really need it or not:
Do you have a charging cable?
Is it an Apple cable?
Are you sure you have one that’s USB-C and supports USB Power Delivery?
And it’s not worn out?
You say your dog chewed on it a little but it’s mostly intact and still works?
Well, I’d recommend getting a new one anyway.
Yeah you can get your own if you want but it’s best if you get an Apple cable.
OK great, that comes out to $820 total. And do you want to insure your phone for $5 a month?
How do they make $20 more if the price is reduced by $27 from last year and the cable taken out? At most they make the $3 more if people buy the 2m cable. For the 1m cable they make less than last year.
The phone plus cable last year adjusted to inflation is $827 and this year it’s $820. The cost of the cable for Apple is not in play here.
The point is kind of moot because the phone definitely comes with the cable: https://www.apple.com/iphone-16/specs/
The article is actually about the new AirPods. I was going entirely off the information in the comment I was replying to.
The thing is, the iPhone 14, 15 and 16 all have the same launch price: $799 US
Adjusted for inflation, the 14 and 15 may have cost more, but Apple is almost certainly making that money back somewhere else. Like, say, making people pay for accessories that used to be included?
And at the end of the day, the prices consumers pay for end products don’t follow the exact same curve as the prices megacorporations pay for materials and labor. We’ve seen plenty of evidence that the current inflation is almost entirely driven by companies price gouging consumers. So it’s not really reasonable to assume that Apple’s costs have gone up 1:1 with consumer prices anyway.
We’ve seen plenty of evidence that the current inflation is almost entirely driven by companies price gouging consumers.
And actually, the fact that the price hasn’t increased is pretty obvious evidence of this.
Do you think, for one second, Apple would accept any appreciable hit to its profit margin if their costs had inflated 1:1 with consumer prices? Especially when they have a perfect excuse to blame a price increase on?
The phone may cost them a little more to make than last year, but I doubt it’s that much.
There’s tons of elasticity built into the pricing already so that carriers can offer discounts.
well…by selling both the cable and wall adapter as separate items it doubles the packaging by necessity so it was still never about reducing waste
which is why I never have and never will own any of their products.
✊👍
I’m not going to defend Apple’s profit maximization strategy here, but I disagree. Most people won’t end up buying a cable and adaptare because they already have one, and in contrast to those pieces made of plastic and metal, the packaging is mostly made of paper. I’m pretty confident that the reduction in plastic and metal makes up for the extra packaging that’s produced for the minority that does buy a cable and/or adapter.
Seriously, since Apple stopped including a wall brick I have not had a single-port power adapter in my household. All I have now are a few power adapters with multiple USB A and C outputs so I can charge whatever is needed.
I agreed when they removed the brick. Everyone was saying it was horrible and it wasn’t actually about reducing waste but, nobody needs a new brick. If you reeeaaally need one, it’s really not going to break the bank to buy one, and it does massively reduce waste to not include one with every single new phone. I don’t see why people support wasting all these resources that 95% of the time is just going to be e-waste.
I don’t care if they keep the extra couple cents they saved on not giving the cable. I fucking hate getting extra e-junk with my electronics. I hate getting new cables just like I fucking hated getting shitty headsets with pre-smart phones. Nobody used them regardless. For all I care all battery-powered electronics, including laptops, could very well come without chargers and standardised cables, just with large warning on the box (like the one on cigarette packs). That was the fucking point of this EU regulation, to reduce e-junk
My Nintendo 3ds came without a charger nor cable, and it blew my mind at that time 😆 but to be fair, the 3ds does not exactly have a standard port, even if it is designed to charge using 5v 500mA.
I ended up buying a third party 3ds to USB-A cable…
The worst to me is everyone now including a shitty bag to put the product in. Like it MAYBE makes sense to include a case for travel headphones or something but no I do not need you to include something for me to put the external SSD drive in.
I’m all for it IF the cable is provided for free on demand to 0,001% of customers who happen to not have one. I have a separate drawer for all my extra usb C and micro usb cables which come with random electronics which I feel bad just throwing in the trash but I know I’ll never need.
If they were free on demand for people who asked with their purchase:
None of the people who need them would get them.
Most of the ones that did get handed out would still be to people who never used them.
Why is that?
Because there’s very little overlap between people who need them and people who know that it’s an option.
The people claiming them would primarily be people like me who do know how it works, know that I probably won’t use it, but am going to take it anyways, because it’s free and because it is within the realm of possibility that I need another cable as a temporary replacement until I get another one.
Simple solution: if a device you sell comes without charging cable, it has to be written in large letters on the box that you have the right to claim one for free (like cigarette health warning) and the seller has to inform the customer before checkout
Then everyone will claim one and you’ll increase waste.
The whole reason they’re removing the cable is because of pressure from governments not to waste materials including it.
xD no? Why would everyone claim one? I for example would be fucking glad not to receive e-junk with all my purchases
Because it’s free. I guarantee you 90% of people will take free shit if offered free shit.
Including it for free completely undermines the whole reason for removing the cable.
But cables wear out.
Agreed. The life of a phone includes multiple cables (unless someone here knows some trick I don’t), so including OEM hardware that’s tested and recommended for the device is great and I wish it were still standard. Phone manufacturers not including parts that they still sell separately seems to have little to do with environmentalism/conservation and much to do with profits.
On the contrary, I’ve had a USB cable last multiple phones before. I think the trick is to avoid using it when it’s plugged in as much as possible. Another common pitfall is that microfiber (pocket lint) can build up in the charging port over months and years, resulting in a poor connection. You can usually remove this by turning the phone off and using the tip of a wooden toothpick to gently scrape out the lint.
I definitely think they should include a cable in the box though.
Agree with this and the other commenter, the cable that came with my last phone stayed in the box and hasn’t been unfurled. I also agree this is almost certainly more about profit than environmentalism, but unused cables are e-waste, and I like to use a longer cable so the short ones that come with the phone have limited use case for people like me.
Cables are not eWaste. They are just copper and some plastic. Except, if you have a 5 amp cable including a eMarker, but this is only needed for laptops and crazy china phones that charge with more than 65 watt
No? I use the same usb cable and QC3 charger I got with my 2016 Xiaomi
I’ve used the same cables for years with no problem. You don’t yank them out of ports using the strand, you don’t stress the connectors by winding tightly or making them bend at sharp angles and just treat them with care.
I’ve used an IKEA lightning cable for years and treated it really badly and it’s still in perfect condition. The official lightning cable from Apple had to be replaced every two years (it’s my employer’s phone and we upgrade every two years, stupid waste) because it was always destroyed and I had to give it back in perfect condition.
The quality is also a factor.
It very much comes down to how you use them. Within my household, I don’t think I’ve ever had an Apple cable go bad. However I’ve had third party bad from purchase, and my teens go through cables every 6-12 months.
What kind of abuse do your cables go through?
- do you pull from the hard plastic or the cable?
- are they on the floor being stepped on or with chairs rolling over them?
- when carrying are they just stuffed in your backpack or neatly rolled up in a plastic pocket or in a baggie?
- when tangled, do you just pull harder or do you untangle?
