Sure, but Germany has a lot of clout in the EU, and this might be a good point for –just a random pick– a new chancellor to show his/her concern for the people. I'm almost sure the new German chancellor could get that done in EU record time.
While I'd be happy for this plan to go through, I don't think most of the people will be happy with the side effects. Especially because of the spare parts requirements, I guess manufacturers will
1) Withdraw from EU market. 2) Reduce number of models on offer. 3) Raise prices.
Should it be legal to make cars for poor people without airbags and seatbelts?
And are we really gonna argue that this idea would be for the benefit of the poor people?
2. That would actually be good, the amount of models aims at confusing customers. But also: Why would that happen? Many models can (and do) share the same spare parts.
3. Prices are already as high as they can be. They do not get lowered because production gets less expensive, they get lowered because of competition. This might have an effect on prices if the competition was very high and profit span very thin - which might be the case for the cheapest budget phones. For something like an iPhone? To my knowledge they are already utterly overpriced, as is tradition (https://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2017/11/08/apple-iph...), then it will have no effect there.
I expect the poorest to benefit the most from extended longevity, since more affluent people "need" the better camera or a more fashionable design the most.
I know quite a few people with >3 year old smartphones, but mostly with custom roms, since stock firmware isn't usable anymore.
2. "longevity" means nothing when most people keep dropping their phone. Even used phones that appear perfect can start bootlooping months after buying because of damage caused by the first owner and the eBay seller won't accept returns by than, even if you could prove it was not caused by you.
Someone who is really clumsy or in a situation where they are much more likely than average to drop their phone should purchase phone insurance.
And for uninsured people who happen to break their phone, it would still be cheaper to repair it than to get a new one. Repaired phones still benefit from longer support lifecycles, and the proposed legislation would ensure that spare parts are affordable and available.
The latter may be a problem but you could still buy an older (mid-cycle) model instead of the latest one and still get updates for years.
Does everyone on hackernews get paid £100k a year and spend over £1,000 on a phone?
You wouldn’t buy a car either without planning for repair costs.
There is also no good reason for the cost of security fixes to vastly increase the cost for manufacturers if they slow down the release cycle for hardware and software. This isn't 2010 after all. The pace of meaningful improvements is considerably slower.
They have a far higher trade in or resale value than any other brand.
It actually causes a bigger second hand market of phones if they have a longer life. Plenty of users still want the latest or there abouts. While others will happily go for the nearly new.
The result of this law would be that cheap phones will get more expensive for no benefit at all and expensive phones will cost the same.
Not even going into the problems with second-hand phones and that poor people de-factor have zero legal rights as they don't have the money to take sellers to court.
Many used phone sellers/marketplaces offer extended warranties on second-hand phones, which risk-averse buyers should purchase.
This thread is about EU law.
In EU you don't have to take sellers to court, you just have to nag customer protection authorities until they do.
It might take some time: Google still hasn't gotten a massive fine for abusing its position in search and ads to kill competing browsers despite my reports but I will not be surprised when it happpens.
PS: come on guys and gals and do write to your local competition authorities. The sooner we can get this sorted the better.
(1) Battery stops holding a charge
(2) The device gets damaged
(3) Cameras get a lot better
The Nexus 6 automatically throttled performance based on battery left, but at some point the battery wore out to the point that less than 1/2 an hour of use got you below that threshold. After that the phone was very laggy and frustrating to use. No way anyone would want 5 years of that experience, updates or not.
As for cost, I don't see why it would have to go up all that much. Apps are already upgradable on phones and much of the OS is hardware independent. So the only real pressure point is with the kernel and other hardware dependent code.
I see this as a big plus. Not a fan of Apple but they did get this one right (at least in the past).
1) Withdraw from EU market - I guess most people dont realise EU as a market itself is 2nd just behind US.
2) Reduce number of models on offer - Parts aren't that different across models.
3) Most likely answer - Although it doesn't cost that much at all. You can still get a 7 years old iPhone 6 repaired, it is just costly, as it did 7 years ago. The incentive pushes you to buy a new Phone.
Come on. Every time the EU tries to implement a consumer protection a whole contingent of people comes here to say that this will cause companies to leave the EU. China is so much worse in terms of constrictive laws and regulations and you can plainly see that companies don't care. They adapt and sell, that's how they work.