sunman42

gatorguy said:

I don't know that it's as much "political pressure" as it's simply infeasible given YMTC being added to the list of Chinese companies not permitted to sell into the US market. Apple is so wealthy and powerful anymore that I doubt they care too much about what any government says they want them to do. They'll beat 'em back with money, lawyers, political friends, and lobbying and do what Apple corporate wants to do for the most part.

Sorry, but this is counterfactual, at least as regards China and the EU. Apple blocks apps from the App Store in China to which the Chinese government objects, and is widely rumored now to be replacing the Lightning interface with a USB-C one in next year’s iPhones to comply with the daft EU legislation to that effect. Similarly, Apple worked with the Indian government to start production of iPhones in that country, when India’s laws insisted on that for foreign manufacturers. In fact, you could say that Apple has bent over backward to comply with the laws of every country in which they sell their products.

I've said it elsewhere on this and other sites, but it bears repeating: reducing electronic waste is a laudable goal, and I have no argument with legislatures anywhere trying on mandate such a reduction — as long as they go about it in a sensible, way. The members of the European Parliament are politicians, a class that includes few engineers. So you'd think they'd recognize that they should legislate goals (and set standard, and benchmarks to be reached, with dates), and leave the engineering to.... engineers. I got used to something similar working for a four-letter acronym US agency that puts extremely high-tech apparatus on the top of large stacks of high explosives in order to send those apparatuses elsewhere in the solar system. As a scientist, I learned pretty early on that the engineers knew a lot better than I ever would how to accomplish that, assuming my fellow scientists and I gave them the requirements (e.g. spatial resolution, cleanliness, thermal constraints, pointing accuracy, &c., &c.). Th engineers would perform a "flow-down" of requirements in order to see the stated mission goals. There might be trade-offs to fit within mission budget and schedule, but it was an iterative process with all stakeholders involved. And no one on the science side was dumb enough to say, "You must use this kind of connector." The engineers would have laughed at us if we'd tried.

The net result of this legislation will be that the European Parliament will be able to say, "No mobile phones have been sold here for <n> years with anything but USB ports for charging," but they'll never be able to say (not credibly, anyway), "This is how much waste we've prevented through this policy" — simply because innovation will keep rolling on. And will their legislation prevent Apple and other manufacturers from also including Qi/MagSafe charing as well as USB-C? That would really be colossally stupid.

Madbum said:

The EU is a Un -elected group of bureaucrats

but they act like communists  

Um.... while thus policy was certainly recommended by unelected bureaucrats in Brussels, it was enacted into law by the European Parliament, so just as elected as, say, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Then again, people in the EU enjoy the Eurovision contest, so there's no accounting for tastes.

mvmaastricht said:

I can’t suppress the feeling that EU law makers just do not understand this matter: they consistently talk about chargers which is a good thing. But forcing device connections to use USB C is effectively just about the cables.

In the case of Apple, all chargers are already USB C, so what’s the problem this law is solving?? To force al cables to USB C? That’s stupid and hardly contributes to reducing ewaste.

It’s worse than that. The EU is attempting to engineer a technical solution to multiple problems at once, the foremost in the opinion of their legislators being e-waste. If that is the objective, why not legislate that goal, and allow the manufacturers, who are demonstrably better than politicians at innovative engineering solutions, do whatever it takes to implement that laudable goal?

From this side of the Atlantic, at least, the whole business smacks of legislators who want to prove they can stand up to big corporations, rather than wait ting to achieve an environmental goal.

lkrupp said:

StrangeDays said:

Ah yes, an entirely practical "beat it with a hammer test to simulate...something" test. Rolleyes. Not clicking 

Well, unfortunately, you may not click on it but thousands will and that’s how these YouTubers make money. They paid $800 for the Ultra and will likely make three times that in views and ad revenues. That’s how far social media has sunk as well as stupid people are.

Given the sorry history of the US and several other countries over the last six years, in part due to the spread of disinformation via social media, I'd argue social media and people's gullibility havesunk a lot farther than "If it bleeds, it leads" hucksterism.