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Comment by ubercow13 | Hacker News Reader

The government already mandates the electricity interconnect one step back at the wall socket. This is just extending that to modern devices.

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Just to be clear, power sockets are not standardized in the EU. Italy has different ones (Type L), France as well (Type E), and the UK too (but they are no longer ... you know) ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mains_electricity_by_country

To be fair, the CEE 7/7 plug will work almost everywhere in the EU, not counting the UK of course.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AC_power_plugs_and_sockets#CEE...

If you use a screwdriver or similar to open the socket covers (shove the screwdriver into the earth socket) then you can indeed use a CEE 7/7 in a UK socket.

I used to do this with my keys every time I traveled to the UK and forgot my adapters.

Well, they are standardized - it's just that the standard (sadly) accepts a substantial number of different plug designs... Some countries did have to adapt when the standard was defined or if they joined after the standard was set. Compared to what we had before, it was a substantial simplification of the landscape, even if it doesn't go all the way to mandate a single plug design.

Italian sockets can be easily vandalised into a type C socket in a pinch. I know, I've done it once in a fit of anger.

> Italy has different ones (Type L)

Non-ancient sockets in Italy are _bipasso_, meaning they accept both the 16 and 10 A variants of the Type L, and the 10A variant is compatible with the Europlug, making it really a non issue. In households you'll also likely find Type-L compatible Schuko (usually) sockets for higher power devices, or even combo sockets that can work as two _bipasso_ or one Schuko.

So in the end standardization ended up working anyway and no one is struggling because of this (also standards about wire gauges made extension cords safe to use)

> and the UK too (but they are no longer ... you know) ...

We have the same sockets in Ireland, so the EU still has the same number of different standards.

But still each govt standardizes them to some extent right?

/me cries in Danish ;_;

I guess it depends on how far you want it to go. If electric sockets aren't standard then that creates bottlenecks in infrastructure interchangeability.

To me, I don't see why government has any business in USB. Bluetooth maybe since it takes up the air. But USB? It's bad enough that wall sockets haven't improved. Will we be stuck with USB-C long after its natural EOL?

> It's bad enough that wall sockets haven't improved

There's not much need for that, to be honest, at least not for Continental Europe where the Schuko plug system is dominant. It's reasonably secure against children and offers enough capacity for all household loads, and industrial applications have all converged on the bulky IEC-60309/CEE-17 plugs.

Sometimes, a product is simply "good enough" and does not require further improvements (or alternatively, a better solution exists, but the cost for retrofitting is prohibitively large).

smartphones are critical to living life in most developed countries. it's the same level of utility as electricity at this point. I don't see anything wrong with requiring a standard port.

Legislation is not eternal. When USB-C outlives its usefulness, it can be legislated away in favour of a different standard. Or they could let a standards/industrial body make the binding decision.

> When USB-C outlives its usefulness, it can be legislated away in favour of a different standard.

When USB-C outlives its usefulness there won't be any ready-made standard for the legislation to switch to. Or at least if there is such a standard it won't come from the EU, or any other jurisdiction with similar regulations. Why would anyone develop a new standard for mobile devices when the law says they have to use USB-C? There are more profitable ways to spend the limited R&D budget than designing new ports which you might not ever be allowed to use.

The payoff is huge. Assuming that your connector will be allowed to charge royalties, you can make the money on the fact that literally every phone will be using it once you lobby to update the standard.

Besides that, whichever organization is behind USB is the obvious candidate. A new standard that's backwards compatible with the old one (because that's what consumers are likely after) except for the connector is best made by the org that developed the previous version of it.

Sure, the payoff is huge if you can charge royalties, but so is the risk. You don't want to be the one that spends tons of money to develop a new standard only to have someone else's design chosen. You're also limited in how much real-world testing you can do since you can't market devices with the new connector to the public until the law is changed. And if the government is going to mandate that everyone use a certain kind of port then it ought to be made available royalty-free, which removes the prospect of a huge payoff.

"It's bad enough that wall sockets haven't improved"

In what way, spesifically? What can you improve in a metal connector carrying current?

I'd like to see positive clamping (perhaps by means of a mechanical camming action) rather than relying on the springiness of metal contacts, which inevitably degrades over time due to metal fatigue.

Government doesn't regulate the other side of that interconnect. There are dozens of different DC power connectors that go into a two or three prong wall outlet.

And at least in the US I believe the regulations are local building codes

Honestly, what you're describing about the US is one of the worst aspects of the US. It's mostly a remnant of the fact that we started out as a bunch of territories. But it hasn't really been that way for a long time. Alaska and Hawaii don't really count as they are basically just so different from the mainland US.

For example we have this thing called the NEC. It's a private document owned by a private organization. It's named the National Electrical Code. It applies absolutely nowhere. Every single jurisdiction either uses an outdated copy or so heavily amends it that it prevents anything ever resembling standardized electrical construction. Every single electrician must be a total master of his own local "National Electrical Code".

Local government is still govenment. OSHA also mandates some electrical safety testing stuff through UL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UL_(safety_organization)

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