Criminal lawsuit over iPhone battery slowdowns filed in France, where planned obsolescence...

1356

Comments

  • Reply 41 of 108
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    Maxter said:
    Planned obsolescence should be illegal everywhere!
    So, Apple makes an iPhone and says they'll support OS upgrades for 4 additional cycles/years as an internal determination. Would you find not supporting devices with 5+ year old HW as being illegal despite that clearly being a reasonable plan to stop supporting obsolete devices?

    How about Apple literally engineering way to make their devices last longer for users instead of devices shutting down completely?
    edited December 2017 watto_cobra
  • Reply 42 of 108
    Maxter said:
    Planned obsolescence should be illegal everywhere!
    How would you enforce it, if you wanna make it illegal?
    Besides, isn't it the case that deceptive business practices are illegal?
    You don’t have to make it illegal, just make their intentions transparent. Aka make them note it on their packaging.
    Planned Onsolescence: 3 Years

    And this should apply to all manufacturers
  • Reply 43 of 108
    I advise everyone's stupid family member's who are whining about this to go to Android.
    Try to explain to them why Apple did this. I explained to my family members and they understood.

    The Android folks will come back to iOS after a few months, thanks to the random slowdowns ,and bad battery life.
    bshankwatto_cobra
  • Reply 44 of 108
    r2d2r2d2 Posts: 95member
    steven n. said:
    Honestly, this was just the opposite (though communication was piss poor). It was easy to do a battery upgrade and get full speed back. For those that didn’t want to do that, it kept phones, and batteries, in use longer.

    Apple’s communication on this, however, was atrocious. 
    The problem is most people did not know to replace their battery. Many felt the only recourse was to spend on the phone upgrade.

    muthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 45 of 108
    This is such a crock of do-do.  What Apple did in engineering the iPhones to scale back processor performance as the battery ages has nothing to do with planned obsolescence.  Batteries in or powering any device or product (like a car) have a limited lifespan - perhaps French officials should be suing every battery manufacturer for making batteries that don't last forever, performing as new regardless of age and use?  So Apple should now remove this software and let people with old iPhones complain about their batteries dying - it's far easier for Apple to deal with battery life issues, because there is no such thing as a forever battery and everyone knows and accepts that.
    bshank
  • Reply 46 of 108
    I have seen the shutdown issue on a friend's iPhone 6, and it's really problematic--the phone, on a practical basis, would essentially be unusable were it not for this fix. 
    On the other side, my phone ran flawlessly and had multi-day better life before the iOS 11 update. My battery tests out fine and I have no warnings in my control panel. Yet, everything take so much longer now the phone is unusable. IMO, if I were allowed to upgrade back to iOS 10.3 I’m sure my performance would return to a usable state. 
  • Reply 47 of 108
    lukeilukei Posts: 379member
    After I got an iPhone 7, my iPhone 6 just sat for about 6 months.
    I plugged it, hoping to wipe it and either sell it or use it like an iPod Touch.
    However. it couldn't even charge enough to boot up. It stopped charging altogether.

    When I took it to the Apple Store, they said I should just throw it away, the repair would be too expensive.
    They didn't even have a definitive answer as to what was wrong with it.

    Gotta love it. 


    One to be filed under ‘never happened’
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 48 of 108
    r2d2r2d2 Posts: 95member

    alandail said:
    So Apple fixes an issue where degraded batteries cause unexpected shutdowns and everyone is upset with them for fixing it?

    As the article says, there is no slowdown with fully functioning batteries.

    Instead of suing Apple, customers should be thanking them for fixing the random shutdown issue.

    Show me where in the last year Apple fully and publicly explained this to people and I’ll agree with you.
    muthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 49 of 108
    The answer at this point is simple. For one, the software should prompt the user that the battery has degraded to a point where the battery can no longer run the "certain processes" at full speed. Second, it should then auto turn on the functionality to slow down the processes, as current, but have the option to toggle this setting off or on. Users should be given the option in the dialog box above to turn off slowing down the processes. If they choose to turn it off then, or later, then the user should be given another prompt that turning off this feature can cause the phone to shutdown/restart due to the degraded battery. Then confirm you want to continue. Apple then has on record that people specifically chose to turn this feature off. Third, there should be some kind of icon depicting that the battery is in a degraded state. Maybe changing the icon for the battery or making it a different color etc, so its front and center for the user that their device's battery has reached a critical point.
    ZooMigo78Banditlarrya
  • Reply 50 of 108
    Maxter said:
    Planned obsolescence should be illegal everywhere!
    Perhaps when the company tries to hide it. If a company offers a disclaimer about it, it should be left up to the consumer to make that choice. I fear that blanket, unconditioned opinions like this are slowly but steadily taking away our choice and agency.
  • Reply 51 of 108
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    ZooMigo said:
    I have seen the shutdown issue on a friend's iPhone 6, and it's really problematic--the phone, on a practical basis, would essentially be unusable were it not for this fix. 
    On the other side, my phone ran flawlessly and had multi-day better life before the iOS 11 update. My battery tests out fine and I have no warnings in my control panel. Yet, everything take so much longer now the phone is unusable. IMO, if I were allowed to upgrade back to iOS 10.3 I’m sure my performance would return to a usable state. 
    If your battery is working perfectly despite its age and number of charge cycles then it wouldn't have that issue. What you'e talking about is a new version of iOS having more features, not to mention newer code for these features. Don't conflate these clearly defined differences.

    Even on the newest iPhones we saw the Calculator app, for example, input presses slower than what is acceptable until an update was performed. We've even seen a recently benchmarked test that shows that 25 year old Macs perform faster than the latest ones in certain cases because of how SW evolves despite the massive increase in hardware performance.

    If you need a simple example to wrap your head around this concept, think of the earliest web browsers. Think about how fast they are now, and how fast they would be if JS didn't exist, if high-res images weren't included, and it was only some very basic text and basic HTML formatting.
    edited December 2017 watto_cobra
  • Reply 52 of 108
    bshankbshank Posts: 255member
    78Bandit said:
    bshank said:
    lewchenko said:
    I think this could be a turning point for Apple in terms of them losing "trust and integrity" with the general population.

    At a family Christmas visit, where most people have iPhones, this was surpisingly a hot topic - with non techy people.

    And the consensus was that apple played a devious card by not telling them their phone battery was compromised, and thus slowing down the phone. People were angry that they probably upgraded from their 6 recently due it being slow as a snail when they could have just got a new battery. Even worse that you can go to an Apple store and they will test the battery and say its fine even though iOS is slowing down your CPU due to the battery. Thats unforgivable. My family agreed.

    That lack of transparency is gonna cost Apple dearly. I heard family members considering Android (and Ive never heard any of them say this before). Perhaps Apple doesnt understand the level of anger here.

    Apple needs to get some comms out there ASAP or face even more backlash. Its also not transparent that you cant even see easily how many cycles your battery has had. Why hide this info in a private API (it used to be public but they changed it... wonder why!)

    It may well have been a solid technical fix but the way they went about it just reeks.

    At this point, Ive also held off updating my iPhone 7 to 11.2. Not sure I will either. At this point, they have lost my trust. And to be honest, over the years that was worth a lot in $ terms to them. So I hope they find a way to regain it.
    Apple did inform people in the release notes of iOS 10.2.1. You know, those notes meant to be read that people who have no idea what is in their tech never read? Anyway, I hope your family members do change to Android. Good luck to them on their path of self-inflicted problems
    Reposing this from the Korea thread.

    Here's the statement from the release notes:  "It also improves power management during peak workloads to avoid unexpected shutdowns on iPhone."

    How in the world would any reasonable user infer the software is looking for a battery that cannot supply proper voltage and then cutting processing power by up to 60% out of that statement?  That statement could just as easily mean that the software cuts back on background app activity, slightly dims the display, reduces wi-fi & Bluetooth transmit power, or any number of other possibilities during peak workloads to ensure the full processing power of the phone is available to the active application.  Nowhere does it mention throttling or battery issues.  It could just as easily have been unexpected shutdowns due to excessive processor temperatures during high workloads.

    Apple gave a very vague statement that revealed nothing about the underlying identified issue even to users who read the release notes.  It would have been much different if they would have stated they were throttling CPU power in response to inadequate battery output.  That would have put the owners on notice it was a hardware problem that could be eligible for a warranty repair or replacement.
    Regardless it’s not nothing as Apple is being accused of, and what Apple did is solve an issue of shutdowns people bring to the store often. I’d say this was a direct response to the shutdowns. Litigators and complainants would get a lot more mileage trying to prove Apple knew of a “defect” in iPhone 6 gen and did not do anything about it. If that’s true (and I do not believe it is) then Apple would have a problem. I do feel the 1GB of RAM and 16GB base model was short sighted and is the reason older devices are having so many issues. Not a defect, just a decision that was not future looking enough to the processing demands we have in 2017. No conspiracy. Just engineering decisions that did not work out and Apple is trying to solve. People are pissed ask phones not to shut down. Then their phones don’t shut down and they are still pissed. People can’t make up their minds what they want.
    edited December 2017
  • Reply 53 of 108
    bshank said:
    Which conspiracy is a it? Planned obsolescence? Or slowing down old phones to help them last longer? Both conspiracy theories cannot both be true at the same time.
    Indeed. It's troubling to see greedy individuals and scum sucking attorneys going after companies like this. It's nothing more than a get rich quick scheme. What's more troubling here is that the French government may get behind this. At any rate, they'll have a hard time proving this in court, unless there's a French conspiracy to convict Apple... 

    Apple should make the old/bad battery slow downs an optional setting and see how people like that. They also will need to include disclaimers in future OS versions along the lines of "improved user interfaces with enhanced user experience inevitably lead to increased memory and processor needs that may manifest as slight decreases in performance, particularly on outdated hardware." Or they'll just stop issuing updates to old hardware. Then they'll get sued for that. You can't win with greedy, selfish people.
    bshank
  • Reply 54 of 108
    foggyhillfoggyhill Posts: 4,767member
    dbendixen said:
    Maxter said:
    Planned obsolescence should be illegal everywhere!
    Perhaps when the company tries to hide it. If a company offers a disclaimer about it, it should be left up to the consumer to make that choice. I fear that blanket, unconditioned opinions like this are slowly but steadily taking away our choice and agency.
    Make choice about what, yoûre phone is already crashed if they don’t do anything. 

    Wrf agency your talking about. At most they could put a more visible battery wear indicator. Remtmber that these are the same people who bought the iPhone because it was more compact.


  • Reply 55 of 108
    Unintended consequences of good intentions. Claims another victim. 
    jony0
  • Reply 56 of 108
    foggyhillfoggyhill Posts: 4,767member
    r2d2 said:

    alandail said:
    So Apple fixes an issue where degraded batteries cause unexpected shutdowns and everyone is upset with them for fixing it?

    As the article says, there is no slowdown with fully functioning batteries.

    Instead of suing Apple, customers should be thanking them for fixing the random shutdown issue.

    Show me where in the last year Apple fully and publicly explained this to people and I’ll agree with you.
    Explaining them that fracking batteries get used up, should they have to. In entitled world, seemingly must be a explained that magic feoesn’t exist and then people will complain anyway cause that’s how people are these days. 

    apple le by babying their users seemingly have made them more prone to this type of things.
    bshank
  • Reply 57 of 108
    Anyone who thinks this isn’t a serious PR issue for Apple is delusional. My guess is there will be changes with iOS 12, perhaps notifications that more prominently warn uses when there is a potential issue with the battery that could affect performance.
    muthuk_vanalingamr2d2jony0
  • Reply 58 of 108
    bshank said:
    Which conspiracy is a it? Planned obsolescence? Or slowing down old phones to help them last longer? Both conspiracy theories cannot both be true at the same time.
    But people didn’t know their phones were being slowed down to extend their lifespan. What about those who bought a new phone not knowing that at $79 battery replacement would solve the issue of their slower phone? It’s not like Apple is out there advertising to replace the battery if your software is sluggish.
    r2d2
  • Reply 59 of 108
    lewchenko said:
    I think this could be a turning point for Apple in terms of them losing "trust and integrity" with the general population.

    At a family Christmas visit, where most people have iPhones, this was surpisingly a hot topic - with non techy people.

    And the consensus was that apple played a devious card by not telling them their phone battery was compromised, and thus slowing down the phone. People were angry that they probably upgraded from their 6 recently due it being slow as a snail when they could have just got a new battery. Even worse that you can go to an Apple store and they will test the battery and say its fine even though iOS is slowing down your CPU due to the battery. Thats unforgivable. My family agreed.

    That lack of transparency is gonna cost Apple dearly. I heard family members considering Android (and Ive never heard any of them say this before). Perhaps Apple doesnt understand the level of anger here.

    Apple needs to get some comms out there ASAP or face even more backlash. Its also not transparent that you cant even see easily how many cycles your battery has had. Why hide this info in a private API (it used to be public but they changed it... wonder why!)

    It may well have been a solid technical fix but the way they went about it just reeks.

    At this point, Ive also held off updating my iPhone 7 to 11.2. Not sure I will either. At this point, they have lost my trust. And to be honest, over the years that was worth a lot in $ terms to them. So I hope they find a way to regain it.
    One question I have is do we know for certain these were perfectly fine batteries that just had normal degredation over time or is it possible more batteries were bad and should have been recalled? If it’s the former why isn’t this a story with all phone manufacturers?
    r2d2muthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 60 of 108
    78Bandit said:
    bshank said:
    lewchenko said:
    I think this could be a turning point for Apple in terms of them losing "trust and integrity" with the general population.

    At a family Christmas visit, where most people have iPhones, this was surpisingly a hot topic - with non techy people.

    And the consensus was that apple played a devious card by not telling them their phone battery was compromised, and thus slowing down the phone. People were angry that they probably upgraded from their 6 recently due it being slow as a snail when they could have just got a new battery. Even worse that you can go to an Apple store and they will test the battery and say its fine even though iOS is slowing down your CPU due to the battery. Thats unforgivable. My family agreed.

    That lack of transparency is gonna cost Apple dearly. I heard family members considering Android (and Ive never heard any of them say this before). Perhaps Apple doesnt understand the level of anger here.

    Apple needs to get some comms out there ASAP or face even more backlash. Its also not transparent that you cant even see easily how many cycles your battery has had. Why hide this info in a private API (it used to be public but they changed it... wonder why!)

    It may well have been a solid technical fix but the way they went about it just reeks.

    At this point, Ive also held off updating my iPhone 7 to 11.2. Not sure I will either. At this point, they have lost my trust. And to be honest, over the years that was worth a lot in $ terms to them. So I hope they find a way to regain it.
    Apple did inform people in the release notes of iOS 10.2.1. You know, those notes meant to be read that people who have no idea what is in their tech never read? Anyway, I hope your family members do change to Android. Good luck to them on their path of self-inflicted problems
    Reposing this from the Korea thread.

    Here's the statement from the release notes:  "It also improves power management during peak workloads to avoid unexpected shutdowns on iPhone."

    How in the world would any reasonable user infer the software is looking for a battery that cannot supply proper voltage and then cutting processing power by up to 60% out of that statement?  That statement could just as easily mean that the software cuts back on background app activity, slightly dims the display, reduces wi-fi & Bluetooth transmit power, or any number of other possibilities during peak workloads to ensure the full processing power of the phone is available to the active application.  Nowhere does it mention throttling or battery issues.  It could just as easily have been unexpected shutdowns due to excessive processor temperatures during high workloads.

    Apple gave a very vague statement that revealed nothing about the underlying identified issue even to users who read the release notes.  It would have been much different if they would have stated they were throttling CPU power in response to inadequate battery output.  That would have put the owners on notice it was a hardware problem that could be eligible for a warranty repair or replacement.
    This. And who the heck (besides tech nerds) read the release notes to software updates? The idea that it’s the users fault for not reading 10.2.1 release notes and understanding the vague statement is ridiculous. Rene Ritchie at iMore apologized for their site not covering this more or better explaining it but it’s not the job of him or John Gruber or any other Apple centric site to explain this. That belongs to Phil Schiller and the Apple press office.
    muthuk_vanalingamjony0
Sign In or Register to comment.