Am I the only one who thinks this is completely insane, just based on principle? How have we reached a point where we think it is OK for the government to tell me that I can't buy a phone without a specific charger. This isn't a safety issue, and there isn't any massive infrastructure requirement, let people make their own decisions.

If I want to make a crazy phone that is 2mm thin and needs some special charger, I shouldn't be banned by the government from doing so. And if I have some charging port that I think is better than USB-C, I shouldn't have to lobby the government to get it implemented.

Right now new phones either have lightning, or USB-C. Seems pretty reasonable to me. USB-C is not faultless - imagine if we had been stuck with micro-USB instead.

How about the government leaves us alone and lets us make our own decisions. I think that would be nice. Just make people pay for their externalities.

Hopefully in practice, all this means is that Apple will include a lightning to USB-C converter in the box.