Apple Starts Blocking Unauthorized Lightning Cables With iOS 7 663
beltsbear writes "Your formerly working clone Lightning cable could stop working with the latest iOS update. Previously the beta version allowed these cables to charge with a warning message but the final release actually stops many cables from working. Apples Lightning connector system is locked with authentication chips that can verify if a cable is authorized by Apple. Many users with clone cables are now without the ability to charge their iPhones."
In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple: Not Even Once
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
This, right here, is why I will never carry an Apple phone. Not only to they eschew standards, now they are deliberately working to eliminate interoperability with non-Apple products. Fuck them very much.
Re: In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Ill never own one either, but keep in mind those chargers are shit and break. Its not that hard off the beaten trail to assume they are trying to protect their brand by eliminating the levels of suck.
Re: In other news (Score:4, Insightful)
Apples cables are shit and break as well. My wife went through 3 of them in 6 months. She finally got fed up and bought 5 knock offs from some Hong Kong vendor for the price of 1 official cable. She's not the only one.
http://store.apple.com/us/reviews/MD818ZM/A/lightning-to-usb-cable [apple.com]
Re: In other news (Score:5, Informative)
Just by charging them. She has two cables in the house, one connected to her laptop, and one connected to a wall charger in the bedroom. Both pretty much stay in the charging device full time, the only change is when the iphone is plugged in and unplugged. Nothing any more stressful happens to the cables other than your standard plug and unplug like you'd do with a USB cable.
The 30 pin cables were great, the new cables are crap.
Re: In other news (Score:4, Interesting)
Of course if they priced their stuff at reasonable levels, perhaps people wouldn't be buying the cheapo stuff...that is another way they could prevent people from dying. They didn't choose that route though...
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
But you have to admit, putting smarts in an otherwise dumb as a hammer cable instead of the devices it connects
is an ingenious money grab.
Astoundingly, brazenly, mercenary, but, when you have logic-blinded fanbois as customers
who will buy anything you hand them just to look cool, what kind of behavior do you expect?
What's next, a box you have to register? A warning booklet that you need an unlock code for?
Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Its called; broken by design.
And, all the fanbois think Microsoft is the definition of evil.
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Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Better yet, imagine where the "PC" would be today if IBM had tried something like this.
Imagine if you you were in the early 80s, bought an IBM PC, and the only devices you could add were from IBM?
People bought IBM PCs and clones because there was so much choice and competition. Instead of having separate serial/fdd/parallel/whatever cards from IBM you could throw in some cheap Tiwanese card that did all of that in one. IBM wouldn't support it, and you might wind up blowing up your motherboard and printer, but that is a risk you could CHOOSE to take.
The fact was, a lot of other vendors back then tried to create lock-in like that - upgrades only available from said vendor. And with really only one exception (Apple), where are they now? Long gone and forgotten to history, that is where!
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Better yet, imagine where the "PC" would be today if Apple had tried something like this.
Imagine if you you were in the early 80s, bought an Apple][ PC, and the only devices you could add were from Apple
People bought Apple PCs and clones because there was so much choice and competition.
FTFY The IBM PC design was a a choice made by IBM after seeing the huge success of the Apple ][ PC. At the time IBM was perfectly capable to build a custom microporcessor. They had the technology to build the IBM 5100 in 1975. A better and faster system in 1981 using an IBM CPU was feasible.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
IBM did try this with the PS/2 range which used the proprietary Micro-channel slots instead of ISA. This was a spectacular flop.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Greed? You call it greed? How can you? I am very happy that Apple has these approved conductors. Using an unapproved conductor might result in some random positively charged electron flowing through my device. What kind of havoc might result from THAT? Oh, Please, Apple - put those chips into your conductive cables! Filter out those positive electrons!! Yea, though I walk through the valley of positiveness, Apple will protect me with negativeness!!
Alright, so the inanity and the sarcasm are over done - I apologize.
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There's a flip side. I brought in an iPhone 5, almost out of warranty, with a broken sleep button, to the Genius Bar on my way to work. The guy said "yep," 5 minutes later I walked away with a fully functioning replacement, no questions asked; got to my office, and it was like having a brand new phone.
Then I was at an AT&T store. I saw a I guy with a Windows Phone; same thing---button issues, still under warranty. He got told to ship his phone somewhere. He needed his phone so he couldn't ship it off. S
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Yes, yes I do.
So does just about everyone else.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Think different.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Funny)
Do you really think they wouldn't still be trying to lock out third-party products if no-one had been electrocuted?
if no one had been electrocuted, that would mean the guy at Apple whose job it is to make sure the iPhone electrocutes users of knockoff chargers must have been asleep at the wheel
Re:In other news (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, I'm not surprised that there are knockoffs for the Apple chargers. And this thing with 'unauthorized' cables, I was laughing my head off the first time I heard it and I predicted that exactly this situation would occur.
They want ~$29 USD for their chargers and an "ordinary" charger with USB connector is ~$5 USD. Paying more than $20 extra just because it says Apple on it is just plain stupid and there are people out there that will try to cash in on it (besides Apple I mean).
My guess is that we will hear some whining from Apple-product owners now and it's essentially their own fault for 2 reasons:
1. They bought an Apple product.
2. They bought a third party peripheral for their Apple product.
There is no denying that Apple make good products but I would never buy one because of their walled garden and antics like this.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.righto.com/2012/10/a-dozen-usb-chargers-in-lab-apple-is.html [righto.com]
That guy tore a part a bunch of USB chargers and rated them based on the materials inside. The 'cheap' ones are indeed VERY cheap and dangerous.
This counterfeit charger has so much noise in the output that I had to double the scale on the left to get it to fit. Note the very large spikes in the output (yellow). ... This counterfeit charger shows extremely poor regulation, as shown by the very wide yellow line. It's hard to fit a voltage-current curve to this picture. The amount of power supplied by this charger seems almost random.
Re:In other news (Score:4, Insightful)
a cable doesn't have to worry about any of that. It is the USB socket device that must worry about those things.
The cable should just be bundled wires with a connector. It doesn't have to step down anything.
Re:In other news (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple doesn't need to cover their asses. It's already covered by the user who used a device capable of transmitting lethal voltages down a cable not designed for it. This is just a convenient way for apple to lock out third party devices. Apple already did everything they could be designing a device which doesn't have a single lethal voltage anywhere inside.
And no you don't need to use quality materials. You need to use good engineering. The materials can still be cheap and be perfectly safe. The most expensive components don't help you if you get your isolation or control scheme right. Or my favourite ignoring any requirement for heat sinking.
Re:In other news (Score:4, Insightful)
What's stupid is paying $900 for a phone and then bitching about $30 for a charger.
It's like the idiot I saw in Mississauga, ON driving an umpteen thousand dollar car. He couldn't get up a shallow hill because he didn't buy snow tires. All that money, and not a dime on the important part of the purchase.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Better make sure you get those expensive Denon HDMI cables for your 72" TV; why spend all that money on a TV and then scrimp on a $5 digital cable when you can pamper your TV with a quality cable.
Youre right that theres "being cheap", but the other side of the coin is "being foolish with money". Seeing as most small device manufacturers (routers, printers, switches, cable boxes, etc) manage to make wall-warts to go with their $20 gadgets without breaking the bank or electrocuting their customers, it stretches credulity to suppose that Apple cant make a charger for under $30 for a ~10W device.
No, the reason theyre charging $30 for a charger for a $900 device is because they know you already spent $900 and a 200% profit margin on a charger probably isnt going to stop you from buying the device.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
Old ipod Shuffle cable... (Score:3)
Somehow the plug which goes into the audio plug on the Shuffle to charge it, broke... so i looked at replacement chargers... $60 from Apple (yes the player with charger was $75)
heres a picture of the charger if anyone isnt sure what i meant http://i.imgur.com/n8QEUwJ.jpg [imgur.com]
Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
Uhh why not just use an established standard like say ooohh micro USB??
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This has nothing to do with the chargers. It has to do with the cables. It's not about safety, it's about control.
If they could, they wouldn't let anybody else sell you a screen protector or a stylus without it having "Apple" on it.
I used to love this company. Their stock helped me put my kid through college. But now they are way up there on the list of companies that suck ass. And their stock price is reflecting that, which is a good thing.
Re:In other news (Score:4, Interesting)
"It's not about safety, it's about control."
Unless I am mistaken, exactly this kind of "corporate lock-in", for safety or any other reason, has consistently been ruled by the courts to be "anti-competitive practice" and is outlawed.
I *LIKE* Apple products. But I do not like the lock-in, or Apple's attitude about it. I would be happy to see a class-action lawsuit over this.
Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
Finally a reader that realized that the electrocution from the charger has nothing do with the cables. The charger and the cable are separate things.
People the cable is a separate thing from the charger. If you used one of the dodgy chargers with a genuine apple cable you are still as likely to be electrocuted.
Other readers please stop spreading the FUD that it's about safety. It's not.
And guess what Lightning is not an international standard. It is a variation on a standard. And Apple can do anything they want with it. It's called a proprietary connector. There is nothing at all illegal about what Apple is doing. It's entirely self defeating.
Is it greedy? Yes
Does it have anything to do with safety? No
Is Apple doing the right thing for it's customers? No
Re:In other news (Score:5, Insightful)
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The case is probably connected to the ground pin. This is pretty common practice.
Same thing would happen with a PC connected with a power cable that has live and ground swapped.
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Re:In other news (Score:5, Informative)
That is an example of getting electrocuted by the bad charger, not by the cable. The official cable plugged into that same bad charger will still result in electrocution.
Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:5, Insightful)
The idea of a physical cable is that it is simple, robust and as long as the connectors fit, it should (given sane engineering) do what is expected. It is fascinating how they violate that simple and powerful idea in a complex way, just to make a few bucks more. It is also utterly repulsive to any principled engineer.
Re:Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't worry - even though the only benefits of Apple's Lightning connector over Micro USB are being able to insert it upside down and a hardware-enforced requirement to pay Apple a cut on any Lightning cables, there were plenty of fanbois in the media ready to portray it as some super-futureproof, all digital miracle. (In fact it's shown exactly the same futureproof, all-digital ability to support new interfaces without hardware changes as bog standard USB. Even the Lightning video out is a hack that compresses the video to the point it could be send over USB, and in fact probably is.)
Re:Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed. Their greed seems to have eradicate all instances of the KISS-principle in their people. If you do not follow KISS, you cannot be taken seriously as an engineer.
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That actually doesn't count as a "benefit" - Quite the opposite, it means that incorrectly attaching a device most people consider passive has to potential to destroy your much more expensive phone/tablet if its orientation sensing ability fails (unless it has the exact same pinout on both sides, in which case, can we say "wasteful"?)
OTOH, I have yet to successfully plug a USB cable in upside-down, no
Re:Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:5, Funny)
I have yet to successfully plug a USB cable in upside-down, no matter how hard I try to force it.
I have yet to successfully plug in a USB cable right-side-up the first time, even though it's supposed to be 50-50.
>Try to plug in
>Nope
>Turn over
>Nope
>Turn over again
>Goes in.
It's the work of Satan, I tells ya.
--
BMO
Re:Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:4, Interesting)
As if only Apple could build electrically sound chargers. No, the problem is that in China, no quality level is too low to push it onto the market and people will still buy it even if it is safety-critical equipment.
And what have defective-by-design USB PSUs to do with the cable? Does the "genuine" cable prevent the USB side from being plugged into a defective charger? All the stories seem to indicate that it does not, so your claim would be entirely bogus.
Re:Wow, they managed to break the idea of a cable! (Score:4, Informative)
Regarding low quality goods being produced in china, the majority of these goods come into existence this way:
1. Company calls up a Chinese manufacturer to get a price quote for a doodad they designed.
2. Chinese manufacturer replies with a quote.
3. Company asks if they can make it cheaper.
4. Chinese manufacturer says yes
5. Company asks how cheap
6. Chinese manufacturer quotes a bottom price
7. Company says great, you got a deal.
8. Market is flooded with cheap and crappy doodads.
There is often a disconnect between western companies and Chinese manufacturers regarding how they negotiate and do business which leads to the above situation. Then there is those who really just want to manufacture really cheap doodads to make a quick buck.
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Something that curiously never comes up in the world of USB cables outside of Apple devices- you know, those cables that are in use for every other device in the known world these days. USB cables and chargers made in the cheapest Chinese workshops still seem to manage to work without electrocuting anything.
This means that either:
1) The Lightning extension to the USB standard is somehow inherently dangerous.
2) People who manufacture Apple peripherals are less competent than all of the other peripheral manuf
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This Just In ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Dear Apple (Score:5, Informative)
Thanks for reminding me of another reason why I don't buy your products
Confused as usual. (Score:5, Informative)
TFA talks about Apple''s desire not to have it's customers electrocute themselves with dodgy, cheap chargers.
TFA (and TFS) talk about the evils of unlicensed cables.
I can get where Apple might come down on the dodgy chargers. At least some had clearances that allowed mains voltages to jump to the charging cable and thence to the unfortunate Apple Fritter. I don't see where the cable itself is involved. I'm thinking that if you put mains voltage on the Official Lightning Cable (TM) it's going to happily conduct the electricity to whatever it's connected to. Or do official cables have a ground fault interrupt circuit in them?
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Re:Confused as usual. (Score:5, Informative)
> There is also the fact that a micro-USB charging port is
> mandatory in the EU on mobile phones, just so that people
> do not have to buy the expensive ones from the phone vendor.
and so that they don't have to buy a new charger when they get a new phone; and so that they don't need multiple different and separate chargers (home,work,car,etc) for each device (phone, tablet,etc); and, most importantly, so that they don't have to throw away the old chargers. a big part of the reason for the law was to reduce electronic waste.
most phone/tablet/gadget manufacturers responded by making mini-usb or micro-usb charging ports standard in every country. not apple. they met the requirement in europe with an adaptor while keeping their high-priced proprietary (and disposable) charger everywhere else.
it's also clear that apple's designs deliberately encourage waste and disposal rather than re-use and repair. iphones and ipads are cheaper / more convenient to replace than repair if the screen or glass is cracked.
more obviously, their all-in-one imacs with a beautiful high-resolution 27" or 30" screen built-in are intended to be disposed of rather than upgraded. the screen is probably the single most expensive component in the unit, and the one that has the most potential longevity (i.e. it's less likely to need replacing/upgrading as technology improves). but you can't upgrade the CPU in the imac. you're supposed to discard the entire thing in a year or two and buy a new one. a huge amount of unneccessary waste.
Re:Confused as usual. (Score:4, Informative)
Of course not. They don't want you to know that they will exclude your computer from future OS upgrades in roughly 3 years.
~former Apple repair tech, specialized in OSX installations (did you know certain G3 and G4 iBooks/PowerBooks would only accept 10.2.3 or 10.2.8 and NOTHING ELSE? Bet you the school districts that had these laptops wouldn't have bought them if they knew that!)
Massive FUD Project? (Score:3)
I'm not sure whom I dislike more, Apple for having the unmitigated audacity to try the Lightning Pin4/Pin8 con job, or Monster Cables, a company that undoubtedly wishes they had thought it up first. I sure hope some independent lab tests will be done soon that show no harm from third party controllers. It would be a real treat to watch consumer legal actions if we knew for certain that the special Apple cables have no technically unique purpose other than to cause consumers to buy them out of FUD.
Official cable doesn't stop dangerous chargers (Score:3)
Two ways to be shocked by a Lightning cable (Score:5, Funny)
2) Financially shocked when you learn what Apple charges for a genuine cable
Minor Sympathy. (Score:5, Insightful)
It was extremely frustrating to deal with, but when we tried to lock down some of the more critical (and high call volume) pieces like hard drives they would then run to forums to complain about our money grab by locking out cheap replacement drives and charging high prices for replacement ones.. even though that high price came from (a) manufacturer custom settings/firmware and (b) a supply guarantee from the manufacturer that we would continue to receive the exact validated model well past it's consumer equivalent would be end of lifed.
So while as a consumer I agree it is annoying, as someone who has been on the other side I can sympathize with wanting to stop people from buying cheap unvalidated 3rd party crap.
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Re:Minor Sympathy. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Minor Sympathy. (Score:5, Insightful)
On the other hand, every other smartphone seems to be working just fine with a $2 standard microUSB cable.
"Authorized cable" (Score:5, Insightful)
Even the term "authorized cable" is enough to make me cringe. It's a FUCKING CABLE. It's the very simplest of electronic devices (if you can even call it a "device"). It has connectors, connected by stranded wires. That's all there is to it. And yet even the humble CABLE can't escape Apple's walled garden. What's next? "Unauthorized" headphones?
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What's next? "Unauthorized" headphones?
Apple Earpods don't work as hands-free cell phone headsets on my Galaxy S3 or Note 2, or my dad's LG something-or-other...so unfortunately I think that base is already covered.
God f-ing DAMMIT Slashdot, really? (Score:3, Informative)
Damn it, Slashdot, I come here for anti-FUD, not FUD. This is just about the worst confused, untrue FUD article I've ever seen posted here.
Apple are unequivocally NOT "blocking" the use of unauthorized third-party Lightning cables. The summary/title is absolutely 100% bullshit. The article says, and I quote: "Apple will probably shut the door on the usage of [unauthorized third-party Lightning cables] in a future update." (Emphasis mine.) Which is of course a completely baseless supposition by the article author in order to get outrage-clicks. The article also clearly includes a screenshot of the actual informative warning message that pops up, which simply says, "This cable or accessory is not certified and may not work reliably with this iPhone." With a single button that says "Dismiss".
The article also throws third-party USB chargers into the mix which has absolutely nothing to do with the cables, just adding to the confusion. Apple has no way of blocking the use of any kind of USB charger, so it doesn't even belong in this discussion. After the death and coma incidents in China they instituted a trade-in program to garner public good will, where you can buy an Apple charger at half price if you bring in a third-party USB charger, but that is neither here nor there with regard to the Lightning cables.
Look, I will be quite happy to come here and spew hatred and vitriol at Apple along with the rest of you anytime Apple ever actually does something as monumentally stupid as trying to block unauthorized Lightning cables from charging your iPhones. But until then is it really too much to ask that we only spew hatred and vitriol about things that are actually true? This is like spewing hatred at Microsoft because somebody posted a summary claiming Microsoft has kept Elvis imprisoned in their basement in Redmond for the last 40 years, while linking to an article that claims nothing of the sort. *insert WTF face here*
Really, Slashdot? Is this audience really that easy to manipulate into getting outraged by total factless bullshit that isn't even supported by the only link in the summary? Are the editors really not capable of reading a couple of short paragraphs before posting obvious bullshit summaries? (Yeah, I know, must be new around here.)
Slashdot, today, I am disappoint. >:-|
Re:God f-ing DAMMIT Slashdot, really? (Score:5, Informative)
It is you that has the reading/comprehension problem. From the first paragraph of the article:
See that: "is blocking"?. Not probably.
Where you quote "probably", you have taken that sentence out of context. Let's put it back in:
"the latter" clearly refers to "some unauthorized cables with cracked chips".
You take the warning "may not work reliably" and extrapolate this to mean: "will probably work". According to this page [iphonehacks.com] you cannot actually dismiss the dialog and get the cable to work. Users actually report that cables that used to work with beta releases of IOS7 do not work with the the production release of IOS7. Of course it is possible that with millions of cables in use, some just happened to fail between IOS7 beta and IOS production releases, nevertheless, your claims are not supported by any reports.
So, get off the Apple fanboi train and learn to read.
Re:God f-ing DAMMIT Slashdot, really? (Score:5, Interesting)
You're adding emphasis wrong. And you completely misquoted the article!
First of all, the first sentence of the article says unambiguously:
Your quote comes from a couple lines down:
OK, inappropriate use of the phrase "the latter" but in context it's pretty clear. TFA says that Apple is currently blocking "unauthorized" cables, but despite this some unauthorized cables with "cracked chips" may still be working. Of course, since iOS 7 is blocking unauthorized cables it stands to reason that Apply will try to disable unauthorized cables that use "cracked chips".
Whether they will be able to do so is kinda irrelevant to the main thrust here which is that Apple used an operating system upgrade to lock out third party cable makers. Wont someone think of the poor airline stewardesses!
IMHO, this news is just piling on considering the fact that your iPhone uses a custom adapter that is incompatible with all other phones, costs 5 times as much as it should, and will be forced into obsolescence after a few generations.
I love /. comments (Score:4, Insightful)
Best comment of the day (Score:3)
I have to ask the same thing - is there something seriously wrong and dangerous about Apple products??
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
...unless their cable broke (cables do wear our on occasion)
In which case Apple is just making a money grab by forcing people to buy their overpriced cables.
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Except it is the charger not the cable that can be traded. Moron.
Re:Load of crock (Score:4, Interesting)
He's not necessarily a moron. He's just a fanboi. To so many deluded people Apple is akin to religion, and like the Church is to a fanatic can do no wrong.
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
Many Apple users now have to use the official legal lightning cables included with their IPhone
Well, you don't say.
Luckily, I happen to have a bunch of legal charging cables for my Android phone scattered around the house. They kind of accumulate from miscellaneous gadgets.
Not having to keep track of a single magic cable is one less complication in my life.
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Informative)
"cheap doesn't always equal better!!!"
I guess that's why Apple makes their products in China...........
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
So artificial lockouts are a-ok, and it's the customer's fault for not bowing to the proper altar? Quit apologizing for apple. They don't need your help. Since when do people need 'authorization' to use their products how they see fit? Where is the authorization for apple to modify/reduce functionality post-sale?
Before you scream 'license agreement', the real issue is one of ethics. Well, if it's not ethical for the customer to use 'unauthorized' cables, then it's definitely unethical for apple to modify functionality post sale. This is a big problem that's getting worse as embedded computers spread to more and more devices.
Re:Load of crock (Score:4, Interesting)
Since when do people need 'authorization' to use their products how they see fit?
Since DVDs with CSS encryption and region locking forced you to play your purchased disc on a particular set of devices sold in a particular part of the world - perhaps sooner. Things have been going downhill from there.
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
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That's a delusional point of view... Apple is forcing users to buy cables at an artificially increased price. This is price fixing/gouging at its finest. There isn't/wasn't anything wrong with the cables the users we using. The manufacturers just didn't pay an apple tax which creates a more expensive product that functions absolutely no better than the cheaper "unauthorized" alternative.
This is anti-competitive and anti-consumer. It's another reason on the pile for while I quit buying apple products, and wi
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
This is one of those problem the free market is meant to solve by itself - people are meant to stop buying iphones in response. Me, I'm perfectly happy with my Samsung Galaxy.
Re:Load of crock (Score:4, Informative)
This is one of those problem the free market is meant to solve by itself - people are meant to stop buying iphones in response. Me, I'm perfectly happy with my Samsung Galaxy.
The problem is: people already bought their iphones.
The software update will "brick their device", by making it incapable of being charged, by the power adapter that worked fine before.
This is likely to result in a class action suit against Apple; potentially with a demand to repair/replace hardware that was rendered inoperable.
(E.g. Replace customers' iPhones with new ones, that will work with all their charging cables, or pay the cost of replacement for all the 3rd party charging cables consumers had purchased, PLUS the price difference for any new cables the customer would have purchased from a 3rd party)
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And sadly most of the time the only people who profit from class-action suits are the lawyers involved...
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The free market is meant to solve every problem, but in fact solves a small subset of problems.
Just like any religion.
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The free market assumes all sorts of property and contract law which considerably limits everyone's power to freely make choices.
Re:Load of crock (Score:4, Insightful)
The reason the Free Market never works is that it requires rational actors with enlightened self interests. The average consumer (and most companies) do not meet that definition, so we can't, by definition, ever have a Free Market.
Re: Load of crock (Score:3)
What free market? If there was a free market you wouldn't need a license to make a competitive cable.
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Insightful)
This is one of those problem the free market is meant to solve by itself - people are meant to stop buying iphones in response. Me, I'm perfectly happy with my Samsung Galaxy.
Is free market supposed to solve the problem of antibiotic development? Note; its a lot better for the pharmacy companies to develop new medications for chronic conditions, very very profitable. Antibiotics are very unprofitable for them. Because of this there haven't been major developments in antibiotics since the '80s.
Since antibiotics have saved countless lives, our modern world is barely imaginable without them, failure to continue developing them is one of the biggest failures of the free market and potentially devastating for the development of the human race.
free market fails.
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So again I must point you th
Re:Load of crock (Score:5, Funny)
Re: Walled garden got a roof (Score:5, Informative)
We won't care
Re:Walled garden got a roof (Score:5, Insightful)
Well I wonder how apple users will relate to this walled garden business now.
With post-hoc rationalization (and antipathy towards those who point it out).
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Re:To be fair (Score:5, Insightful)
Because the phone manufacturers who use standard usb connectors are having so much trouble...
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Because the phone manufacturers who use standard usb connectors are having so much trouble...
Not just phones! My sports watch, camera, Bluetooth headset all charge with USB cables. The same cables attached to any number of different chargers. So what stands out as being a PITA ? All of the Apple devices. I have an adapter for my proprietary Apple 30 pin to Lightning adapter, bought for $3 on eBay. Apple equivalent? $29 [apple.com]. My $3 device worked fine until I upgraded to iOS7... Apple is turning into Countrywide Finance under Cook.
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...bullllllshit.
the cable isn't the thing the cable is attached to which is the dangerous bit.
the cables break, too. especially if you have to carry the one cable you have with you to everywhere.
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Re:FUD article (Score:4, Informative)