Apple must pay a man $1,000 for not including a power adapter with new iPhone | Hacker News Reader

Apple must pay a man $1,000 for not including a power adapter with new iPhone

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This is only ever so slightly related, but I just have to write this somewhere because it happened yesterday. An iPhone X is what, 4 years old? I took one that died completely to the apple store yesterday. They said that it's out of warranty and the "logic board was dead" so there was nothing they could do. But I could pay $560 for a new one! I dissappointedly gave them the phone to recycle. Then on the walk out of the mall I saw one of the "we fix phones" kiosks and thought I'd give it a shot. I was thankfully able to get the "paperweight" phone back from the Apple Store. And, I'm not kidding here, this single employee at the kiosk had the phone split open and booting in under two minutes. The genius bar staff just resorts to "bad logic board" when they don't want to spend even a minute diagnosing the problem. Or maybe they don't have the skills, IDK. I was happy that this solo kiosk rep was a repair wizard.

I don't think genius employees are trained or permitted by Apple rules to open up a phone and start tinkering around. They are very much there to provide basic t1 tech support, and if anything is broken in hardware to send it back to the mothership for repair/replace.

Correct. Genius Bar folks are not hardware-repair folks.

Isn't that the problem though?

That someone in a mall kiosk is more skilled and authorized to fix a phone than an entire Apple store full of Apple geniuses?

Edit: Apple Authorized Service Providers (AASP) have mall kiosks, for those doubting authorization.

Skilled perhaps. Authorized? No. At least not by Apple.

Ah, when talking about authorized:

Several repairs on iPhones and other Apple hardware are exactly that: not authorized by Apple, unless done by Apple itself.

That guy in the mall kiosk makes money by fixing phones. Apple makes money by selling new phones, and geniuses are paid to follow a script.

> That guy in the mall kiosk makes money by fixing phones. Apple makes money by selling new phones, and geniuses are paid to follow a script.

Telling customers that the phone cannot be repaired is deceptive though when it actually can be repaired. That's where I would expect regulators to step in.

The honest answer would have been: "We are not competent to repair your phone. Maybe someone else can repair it."

> The honest answer would have been: "We are not competent to repair your phone. Maybe someone else can repair it."

They may or may not be competent to repair the phone, but Apple probably doesn't permit them to. So it might be more accurate to say that they aren't allowed to repair the phone, but what they _can_ do is sell you a new one.

As shown so well in Doc Hollywood anything can be repaired with enough expertise and effort. A store employee saying something cannot be repaired is not going to be viewed by anyone, including a regulator, as meaning anything other than by the store employees either by capability or policy.

Harry Tuttle, cellphone repairman, at your service.

> Apple Authorized Service Providers (AASP) have mall kiosks

AASPs are prohibited from doing component level repair, they are only allowed to sent the phone to apple for anything more than major component (screen battery camera) swap.

The story would look exactly the same, motherboard problem = $560.

Seems like a scam that they are portraying these people as "genius" level repair services in order to trick customers into (unknowingly) giving apple their repairable devices.

Yes but aren't people who think they are geniuses the actual idiots? I guess we should protect idiots but can we?

I don't think it's idiotic at all to think that employees of an apple store would be more qualified to fix an iphone than someone in a phone repair kiosk at a mall.

I've had several friends and family use those "we fix phones" places to fix their iPhone. They're often their own form of a scam - you pay $100 and they "fix" your phone for 30-90 days. I've seen it happen many times.

How exactly do they do this?

They usually use batteries that are not the best. But the good kiosks will offer at least a one year warranty on the new battery.

In general one falling for a scam doesn’t make one an idiot. Though on the other hand it might also be a slick Nigerian prince kinda of filter to push even more stuff onto whoever falls for this genius trick.

Offering a non-zero level of trust to a corporation shouldn't be considered idiotic.

What's really idiotic is defending a corporation's deceptive business practices by saying anyone who gets tricked is an idiot who deserved to get tricked.

But I mean offering non-zero level of trust to a corporation shouldn't be considered idiotic, but offering a non-zero level of trust to apple a bit is, because like how many times to they have to fuck people before people understand? Like in EU the warranty is 2 years without ifs or but, and Apple has been fined for advertising them offering just one year, and still they're still advertising that they offer 1 year to sell more AppleCare+ of 2 years, apple is fucking cancer a shady shitty incorrect cheaty shitshole, what trust do you want to put in them?

Ideally I agree with you but I think as of now if you get an Apple product you need to understand that you are going to be scammed so buying anything Apple is idiotic

I’ve been buying Apple kit for 15 years now, on my fourth Mac and we’ve had over a dozen iPhones and handful of iPads on the family.

The reason I trust Apple is the products we’ve bought have lasted years and years, been highly reliable, had solid software support and upgrades for many years and been easy for me to repair (I’ve replaced the batteries on 4 phones using third party kits). Plus three times now when I’ve had problems with a device, even outside warranty, I’ve had free repairs or replacements for various reasons.

Data point of one of course from your perspective, but from my perspective this is handfuls of data points that tell me I made a good choice.

Yes I know plenty of others have had bad experiences, but I’ve had bad experiences with plenty of manufacturers. Overall through Apple has sky high customer satisfaction ratings for reasons.

I think when a company get fined for its dodgy warranty policy, a person coming around saying that it’s all good it’s either lucky or not super partes, not sure what to say, ok you got good experience with Apple, on the other hand it’s shit and get fined so I guess good for you

You have to choose between the options available. I’ve used kit from a wide variety of other manufacturers, with mixed results. None of them were ideal. I’m not expecting Apple to be perfect, they’re just a good option compared to the others in my experience.

I'm with you here... but marketing by corporations really works. People really believe that the genius bar people are skilled people with all the technical know-how and training to solve every problem.

People don't know that in reality, Apple looks for candidates who can make customers feel that way... while being able to follow basic protocol. Look at the key qualifications required to apply to be a Genius [1]:

> Strong people skills and a knack for problem solving.

> Ability to maintain composure and customer focus while troubleshooting and solving technical issues.

> Ability to adhere to a schedule of customer appointments.

[1] https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/114438151/us-genius

Calling it 'genius' is just puffery

It's actually Apple's reaction to a unionization effort.. I forget which one but I think it was in 2014.

At that time, Genius Bar employees were a relatively skilled workforce, and couldn't be immediately replaced because they needed months of training to be function, and years of experience to be really successful. That meant they had actual negotiation power with the store, and with corporate.

Ever since then Apple has been pushing to make the Genius position lower skilled and easier to replace. Genius discretion and knowledge has been replaced with flow charts on iPads, and a reduction in the amount of genius-bar serviceable parts in the devices.

Good marketing is indistinguishable from a scam, except in a court of law.

But you’re right in spirit.

Just like Best Buy Geek squad are not all actual computer geeks, I think the companies could argue this is just puffery. If I were a genius would I be working at a retail store counter?

More likely you’d be at the kiosk, judging by this story

Welcome to Apple style of marketing. Want to buy a Magic Mouse?

They are trying to keep their "Apple Care" insurance relevant by making their phones non-repairable by third parties. Geniuses aren't support, they are sales.

Apple replaced the trackpad on a 2017 non-retina MacBook Air for me in-store last month. It was $130. $51 parts and $79 labor ("HARDWARE REPAIR-LEVEL 1"). They are definitely capable of on-site hardware repairs. Further, if the repair doesn't fix the problem, it's no charge.

My only annoyance with Apple this time was that this MBA was like one month past its Applecare expiration and Apple wouldn't provide any sort of "customer good will" exception. My sob story about how much money I've spent with Apple going back decades was met only with: "sorry, policy."

I don't know why OP had such a different experience. Seems like a misdiagnosis if the kiosk person was able to repair it so quickly.

Trackpads are usually pretty easy to replace, hardest part is taking the laptop apart, unplugging the tiny cable without damaging anything and reversing the procedure. I've watched quite a few Apple repair videos, most of them with burned out chips, diodes or capacitors that require re-soldering, a skill I assure you the vast majority of "genius" bar employees don't possess nor do the stores even have the necessary tools on hand.

I was refuting "if anything is broken in hardware to send it back to the mothership for repair/replace" which is not true. They are capable of replacing components. In OP's case, they obviously misdiagnosed that the entire logic board needed replacement.

OP never said what the kiosk employee needed to do to get the phone operational, but given that it took less than two minutes, they likely didn't re-solder anything either.

And the kiosk rep's name? Louis Rossmann

Nah, that’s Paul. Louis is busy promoting Right to Repair.

Ha ha, just finished reading "Laserwriter II" [1] by Tamara Shopsin last night and it reminds me of this. It was a fun little book if only for the trip down memory lane before Apple stores and Genius Bars when ma and pa shops would repair Macs. Book was fun (not amazing) — easy to read in one day.

[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/56269270-laserwriter-ii

They're not genii, they're sales assistants now.

"Genius" should be taken as "sales genius", not as "technology genius".

> Then on the walk out of the mall I saw one of the "we fix phones" kiosks and thought I'd give it a shot

Please tell us where that kiosk was. You could help a lot of people.

There are millions of them, usually one or more in each mall. The quality can vary depending on how well they've been trained; the more traffic they have the more likely they are to be pretty good.

If you have a broken screen Apple's flat fee for that is honestly very good; but if it is anything more you might as well try the kiosks.

What's the flat fee? I have a gen 1 iPad Pro 12.9" with a broken screen and all the quotes I could get for screen replacement were about the same as buying another one used (which is how I got this one, with an intact screen at the time), and maybe even upgrading a generation in the process.

[EDIT] I ask because I didn't find specific info on screen replacement on their site, just a general "service" fee that's about equal to what I paid for this thing originally, just after the gen3 came out.

“Screen replacement” isn’t a screen replacement, they literally give you another refurb at a discount. Source: broke my 12.9’’.

Yeah, they give you a refurb and send your old phone in to fix, which becomes a refurb for someone else down the line (supposedly).

The iPhone flat fees are here: https://support.apple.com/iphone/repair/service/screen-repla...

The iPads are likely not included and yeah, the costs are insane.

It was at the entrance to stonestown mall in SF. Looks like it's called iRepair, and reviews are completely polarized so maybe I should see how long it works before singing their praises, as another commentor recommended: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31112815

In Boston, my go-to repair guy is a guy named Dr. Phil (or at least that's what he calls his store).

https://qp7243.wixsite.com/drphilrepaircenter

On the bright side, Apple's poor customer support has opened a niche in the market for local entrepreneurs.

Cars are the same. Stay away from the stealership! Resist their grease-less uniforms and bright signs!

My brother-in-law is a Ford mechanic. When he has problems diagnosing something he has access to Ford's engineers. He can hook the car's computer up to Ford's network and the Ford engineers can run their "digital twin" in real time and see exactly what's going on. They diagnose the problem and my brother-in-law fixes it.

Here's the thing - my brother-in-law has been a mechanic for 40 years. He was raised on the race track building race cars. His side hustle as a kid was to repair lawnmowers people threw away as "junk" and sell them. I say all this to point out the man knows his way around a car - yet in this day and age he finds he needs access to the engineers.

You may want to think about that when thinking of the service department as the "stealership." That moniker is old and hasn't applied for the past 20 years.

With that in mind, I've also heard some manufacturers have a problem solving flow chart when the vehicles come in.

You plug it in, it gives you a diag plan, and you follow it. To venture away from this you need to ask permission.

I can see why this would be beneficial most of the time. Nine times out of ten it probably saves time, money, effort, reworks, etc. It's that one in ten time where I feel this would fall short.

> You plug it in, it gives you a diag plan, and you follow it. To venture away from this you need to ask permission.

That was my German car stealership experience. Car suddenly sounds rough and reports cylinder 1 misfire. I swap around sparkies and coil packs, but still cyl 1 misfire.

I write that up, go to dealership because this is beyond me and I figure they have fancier tools than my $20 reader. But for $250 they obviously didn’t read my note and advised replacing sparkies and coil packs even though I’ve 100% excluded those as the cause. And obviously if they had the tools to test a spark plug or coil back, they didn’t use them either.

Their flowcharts not only lobotomize their techs, but have taken the place of basic troubleshooting techniques.

Next indy read my notes and immediately does a compression test showing cyl 1 holds no pressure. Even sent pictures.

Correct diagnosis was failed exhaust valve spring. $2k later and I’m back in order. I shudder to think the stealership could even tear down and rebuild their engine that way.

Having worked in the auto industry, dealers are independent businesses with varying levels of quality. My fathers newish F150 was having many electrical problems and a Ford dealership could not fix it (really they claimed nothing was wrong because maybe they caused the issue in another repair), so he eventually had to take it somewhere else and they swapped the body ecu. Dealerships are no silver bullet to fixing everything, it depends on the quality of the people who work there.

I agree with your overall point that Apple ought to be better about repairing old iPhones, but I would also caution you to wait a bit to see how reliable your iPhone X will actually be after that mall kiosk repair. I had an iPhone X screen replaced by a mall kiosk and it was awful. The screen kinda worked, but had lots of problems flickering and the touch screen seemed very unresponsive. The screen quality itself was also terrible. It wasn't OLED and had terrible color range and contrast.

All that is to say that while they did repair the phone enough to make it just barely usable, for less money than an Apple repair or a new phone purchase, but that's about it. If I had that same experience from Apple it would be totally unacceptable. I hope your iPhone X continues to work well for many more years, but I would be surprised!

Would be nice if the repair shop or you would have the right to buy the original screen from Apple or from Apple sources and not have to be forced to use second hand parts or black market parts because Apple does not allow you to repair your stuff yourself or at a competent shop.

Yes, but repair shops should also be upfront that their parts are often (albeit maybe due to no fault of their own) noticeably inferior to original parts.

Sure, like with cars you can decide what parts you want, do you want the expensive side mirror or a cheaper good enough one, you as owner decide and the mechanic or yourself replace the broken one.

There is an Apple program being rolled out to let you do your own repairs

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2021/11/apple-announces-self-...

https://9to5mac.com/2022/04/08/what-happened-to-apples-new-s...

Its a scam. Replacement screens cost as much as fully working second hand device.

In Norway the law mandated "warranty" is 5 years for products like these. So if you didn't do anything uncommon to break it, it's Apple's problem to make you whole. If they make unservicable phones, that's just a cost they have to eat themselves, and thus provide you with a new one.

considering how small a % Norway is to apple they probably don't care about eating the cost

> that's just a cost they have to eat themselves

Companies never eat any costs like this. Warranties, including the original one, are insurance policies by another name. You pay a premium for the insurance. For the original warranty, that premium is part of the price of the phone. I guarantee Apple knows how much the premium is. What does an iPhone sell for brand new in Norway? Half again as much as in the US?

Of course, but it makes the average repair cost upfront. If two phones sell for $1000 in the US, but one has a 10% failure rate and the other 0%, you can't know that buying one of them will on average suddenly cost you a lot more in the future. In Norway the one with a high failure rate would instead be priced around $1100.

So manufacturers are incentivized to make more lasting products, which is also good for the environment.

What ended up being the actual problem with it?

Servicing outdated hardware is completely against the Apple idea of providing an excellent customer experience, which requires helping you select from the current product offering that meets today’s performance experience goals

I remember taking my macbook 2012 in which was acting up due to the HD connector becoming fried.

The only thing the "geniuses" managed to do was to screw up the HD so it couldn't load.

I ended up figuring out the issue, ordered a new cable and fixed the booting issue they introduced on the HD.

The laptop still works today - after a couple burnt HD cables I added some extra insulation (tape) and it seems to be running well. Recently took apart and added some new CPU adhesive as the laptop started smelling like body odour (apparently it's a thing with old macbooks).

I did recently upgrade to the new M1 Macbook Pro, but very happy to have been able to keep my 2012 around and still have it running well today.

This is the nice thing about having a large number of mostly identical devices deployed out there. Any problem is google-able and even with a vague description of symptoms, a plausible diagnosis and treatment can usually be predicted quickly.

It’s also why I like my mom’s old Toyota and hate my bicycle.

Aren't 90% of all bicycles just some Shimano components? Or at least most work the same way and documented in Big Blue Book by Park Tools.

Basically. Repairing bicycles is very easy and very standardized, except that some manufacturers just won't tell you what standard a part follows.

At least shimano stamps a part number on most of its parts. I mostly repair 70s-80s bikes and often encounter an “I’ve never seen this before”, or a situation where parts have the same branding on them, but clearly went through multiple (undocumented) iterations.

There ends up being a lot of “close enough” substitutions. E.g. cones on axles.

There are hundreds of Louis Rossmann videos on YouTube that are variations of exactly this. Apple quotes hundreds/thousands for a fix, he opens up the device and unbends a pin in 30 seconds.

I bought a Mac Pro in 2006 and became addicted to World of Warcraft. There was some weird bug with the GPU (Radeon x1900 XT), where it would eventually burn out. The Mac would boot, but no image on my ACD. So I schlepped the whole Mac Pro to the Apple store 50 miles away. They couldn't figure out why the GPU didn't work, so they replaced it under warranty.

Two months later, the GPU burned out again (Did I say I played a lot of WoW? Like 18 hours a day?). Schlepp this heavy beast to the store, they swap out the GPU again.

Three months later, GPU burns out again, I take it in, and they start giving me side-eye. The Mac was still under warranty, but they were sus about the whole situation. They still replaced the GPU, but kind of gave me the vibe that I was on some no-fly list.

Eventually gave up on WoW and the Mac lasted almost another decade as my primary desktop before I turned it into a Plex server in the basement.

> The genius bar staff just resorts to "bad logic board" when they don't want to spend even a minute diagnosing the problem. Or maybe they don't have the skills, IDK. I was happy that this solo kiosk rep was a repair wizard.

probably neither of those reasons... just more money for Apple this way

My phone had a cracked screen 4 years ago. I got it repaired and still use it today.

> The judge said Apple had "obliged the consumer to purchase a second product of its exclusive manufacture,"

This take is baffling to me. While I don't necessarily agree with Apple's decision to take the charger out and change to USB-C at the same time, this is an awful take. First of all there's a million and 1 USB-C chargers from many different manufactures. Second, USB-A to C adapters exist. Third, there are 3rd party manufacturers of USB-A to Lightning cables.

I'm confused how anyone could believe Apple is the exclusive manufacturer of anything required for an IPhone but the phone.

I bought an iPhone 13 pro max and I can only use the cable on my computer because I don’t have a usb c wall wart. I use the existing usb a lighting cables everywhere.

I hate that wall warts no longer ship with phones.

Why not just buy a wall wart for yourself then?

Why didn't it come with the phone?

Because almost all people have more wall warts and cables than phones.

Would it make you happier if there was a boxed version without a wall wart, and a boxed version with a wall wart for $20 more?

Or you could just buy a $20 wall wart and cable...

How about dropping the price $20 if it's not included...

Apple removed something that was and has been standard for over a decade and kept the price tag. If they're really doing it fOr ThE enVirONmeNt, shouldn't they also drop the price accordingly?

...no? How does paying $1000 or $980 affect the environment?

And they didn't "keep the price tag", because they're selling a completely different product than they were a decade ago. And regardless, they're allowed to set the price as whatever they want, for whatever reason.

I feel like complaints about this is just a psych study in loss aversion.

How does paying $1020 as opposed to $1000 affect the environment?

If you bought any other product and couldn't use it without buying additional accessories, you'd be pretty peeved. Should Sony remove the power cable from the PS5 since your PS4 power cable works and charge you an extra $20 for it?

How many people have a multiple unused PS4 power cables laying around their house? Is it like 90+% of PS5 buyers?

How do you know that they didn't drop the price?

"Because almost all people have more wall warts and cables than phones." Do you have a source to verify this claim? Anecdotally, I know 3 people that switched from old Androids to iPhones who could not charge their phones. You're on a tech forum, so I assume you keep up with the tech news. But, at least in my circle, most people don't. They buy phones and expect them to ship with the required accessories to operate them.

Do Android phones not charge with USB cables these days? Those chargers should be compatible with the USB cable that ships with an iPhone.

They should try reading the website then. Go try to purchase an iphone 13 and it clearly tells you "what's in the box" during the order flow, and then directly beneath it it says:

> As part of our efforts to reach our environmental goals, iPhone 13 and iPhone 13 mini do not include a power adapter or EarPods. Included in the box is a USB‑C to Lightning Cable that supports fast charging and is compatible with USB‑C power adapters and computer ports.

> We encourage you to re‑use your current power adapters and headphones that are compatible with these iPhone models. But if you need any new Apple power adapters or headphones, they are available for purchase.

And in the box is a USB-C to lightning adapter, so if they have a USB-C charger they can just use that. I'm guessing you said "old Androids" to imply that they are so old they're using micro usb, right?

I should start a company where I buy the phone and the wall charger from apple and put them both in a box and then sell it at a 10% markup to the people that get frustrated that nobody will sell them these two things in the same box.

I'm going through old stuff in preparation for a move and you wouldn't believe how many USB-A wall warts I've got shoved in the bottoms of boxes and drawers. IMO they should have kept it included for ~3 years of the USB-C transition because now people get a USB-C cable but only have old USB-A chargers, but long term I think it's the right move to stop including chargers with every new device.

You can go on Amazon and get a multi-port USB-C + 3x USB-A charger with 60W power delivery support for $22 [1]. I've been using a pair of these for years (one under my desk, one behind my nightstand) and they're really nice for charging multiple devices than the individual wall warts. Phone, laptop/tablet, headphones, watch, power banks. I like it a lot better than a power strip with four separate wall warts plugged in next to each other.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Charger-Nekteck-Desktop-Charging-Stat...

(One of my chargers is Nekteck branded, the other is Monoprice, but at least externally appears to be identical)

How many are ending up in landfills because people aren't using them?

Why waste money? Why does the iPad still ship with a wall wart?

The USB-C wall wart is pretty awesome, though. It charges the phone surprisingly fast if you're used to older tech. It's worth the upgrade. (You don't have to buy an Apple one, just one that supports USB-PD.)

https://www.usb.org/usb-charger-pd

Conversely, I did not like the old system where I would buy a new phone and get a new wall wart which I would proceed to toss into a drawer (since the old wart still works fine)

I'm ambivalent at this point. My primary chargers now are multi-port Anker USB-C chargers. I have a drawer of old USB charger blocks that I keep in case I need another one in a pinch, or if someone else wants an extra.

> I'm confused how anyone could believe Apple is the exclusive manufacturer of anything required for an IPhone but the phone.

I wonder if it could be all the years of using proprietary connectors for everything? Can't feel any sympathy if they finally switch to USBC (only after being forced to by legislation) and people not realizing...

Outside of mac magsafe chargers, I can't think of an Apple device without a <connector>-to-USB-x cable in the box.

Has there ever been an iPhone that did not use a USB charging cable?

I don't know anything at all about the Brazilian courts system, but if it's possible, I rather expect Apple to appeal this and win if the basis of the decision is really tied-sales.

"there's a million and 1 USB-C chargers from many different manufactures"

How many of these are compliant with specs? How would you know? If you fry your $1000 iPhone due to choosing incorrectly, will Apple refund you?

See joshvm’s reply here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31112241

MFi doesn't cover USB-C chargers: https://mfi.apple.com/en/faqs.html

If MFi did cover chargers, the iPhone warranty conditions would then be forcing you to buy a charger that is made by either Apple, or a company that's paying fees to Apple.

I love how in one hand HackerNews is gushing over how the EU might perhaps be planning to mandate USB-C ports in iPhones for the 50th time, and on the other hand HackerNews wants to live in a world where Apple users have to be compensated for only being able to use Apple chargers for their standard USB-C ports.

This story is not about standards or chargers, it can be shortened to

Hurr durr Apple bad LOL amirite!

Imagine you are young, and you've went out to buy your first phone only to find out that you can't actually use it without buying a second thing.

I'm going to guess that apple's products warn about the danger in using non-apple products - risks of damage and all that. Not wanting to ruin your new, expensive phone, you play it safe and just buy the matching charger, even though you feel like you should have been able to use the phone with everything that was in the box. For some years, Apple has warned about the dangers of third party accessories possibly ruining your stuff, after all. And I'm guessing the apple store employees aren't exactly going to recommend you buy other brand's stuff.

> I'm going to guess that apple's products warn about the danger in using non-apple products - risks of damage and all that.

Not that anyone checks this (and the UX isn't great because you can't see category listings directly), but Apple has a searchable database to see if your charger or whatever is approved:

https://mfi.apple.com/account/accessory-search

MFi doesn't apply to USB or USB-C chargers. See the first section of the FAQ: https://mfi.apple.com/en/faqs.html

Yeah it doesn't seem to be comprehensive. There are certainly USB-C chargers in the database, but maybe only the ones that are also sold with lightning cables?

> but maybe only the ones that are also sold with lightning cables

Correct.

I actually had almost that same experience back in the 90's when I bought my first gaming console with my own money. I bought a PS1, and Final Fantasy 8 with all the money I had save up for months to get, only to find out when I got home that I needed a non-included memory card to actually save my game. My disappointment was immeasurable.

Now technically, you're not required to save the game, and this don't need a memory card in the strictest sense, but the reality is, the console was near useless to me without it.

What was the longest you ever left it on for to “save” progress?

I remember a bit of a ruined Christmas when I got some toy that required batteries, with no batteries in the house and the next two days being public holidays.

I had the exact same experience as a young owner of a cool new remote controlled car. However, I think this example proves the point that Apple isn't the first or only company to exclude "required" components.

My RC car didn't have batteries and they were most certainly required. Should the RC company include batteries? Does it come down to "expendable" items, like batteries, are exempt from this rule?

Not sure about toys, but all electronic devices with remote control I ever bought had the batteries for the remote included. Same for all wall-mountable items, they always include some cheapo wall plugs and screws which most people throw away immediately (I usually keep them, although I never use them). Not including a charger does reduce the amount of electronic waste, but of course, if you buy an expensive phone (and even entry-level iPhones are expensive for the average Brazilian income) and the package doesn't even include everything you need to get started, I imagine you might feel cheated...

Do you have a discernible point? Young (and old) people have access to the internet to get informed on things like this.

I'm not sure what your point is here.

Sure, the internet exists. Sure, you'll find non-apple accessories.

What you'll also find are horror stories about cheaply made bits and information from Apple stating that you need to use approved accessories lest you void your warranty and/or ruin your device. Even though you'll find positive stuff, you'll be left with "ruin my device or use an apple product".

I've been an Android user since my first smart phone, but when AT&T dropped support for my last phone I decided to just give it a shot and get the new iPhone SE. I have a 12 year old MacBook that I got after an old job retired it but I never really bought into the Mac environment, so I thought maybe this could sell me. So I get the package, I open it up, ooh ahh, pull out the phone, pull out the USB-C cable, uh oh, and then lift up the cardboard liner annnnd nothing. The phone was charged, my girlfriend had cables and I could get a power supply overnighted, but I really sat there for a minute just thinking "man, fuck this." Not a good start.

Perhaps it reflects my upbringing, but my general assumption is any product requires some unadvertised secondary purchase to function unless I can prove otherwise. Those items usually have much higher profit margins and thus businesses are motivated to use this 'model' where the original product is not fully functional without a secondary purchase.

> Perhaps it reflects my upbringing, but my general assumption is any product requires some unadvertised secondary purchase to function unless I can prove otherwise.

Perhaps it is your upbringing indeed. My own upbringing, however, suggests that all things should work out-of-the-box but perhaps with "minimal functionality". For example, your computer should work great out-of-the-box but you can install additional hardware and/or software to do more.

Apple is not going to honor your warranty if you use a bad third party charging cable and it damages your device, so yes you are restricted to their exclusive one.

Baffles me too. By the same logic, Apple should not be able to sell phone cases without including a free phone in them.

This is a great outcome. Apple should be penalized for trying to squeeze every buck. If they want to save the environment they should have kept the price the same and knocked off 30 dollars if you didn't want the charger.

The fact that they even try to make this about the environment is absurd and what is more idiotic is the general populace believe it.

I mostly agree… but isn’t it possible that they kept the overall cost fixed and spent the extra $30 from the charger making slightly better phones?

I think it’s good they stopped including the charger since i already have at least 10 apple branded ones myself but I have no faith they didn’t also get better margins for this “generosity”.

> knocked off 30 dollars if you didn't want the charger

A charger cost them less than $1. Checkout AliExpress to get an idea of the real price of things. Of course because they sell so many iPhones, that still represents in the order of 100 million dollars saved per year for Apple.

Have you seen a comparative teardown of an Apple charger vs a $1 Aliexpress charger? They're completely different internally because the cheap ones skip all the required isolation and noise filtering, and usually deliver only half of their rated current.

You are free to buy a different phone. No lack of competition in this industry.

If they really wanted to, they could offer two versions: one which includes a charger, and another which does not and donates $5 to an environmental charity.

They don't even have to offer two versions, they can just "give the charger for free", or "donate $X to an environmental charity".

>If they want to save the environment they should have kept the price the same and knocked off 30 dollars if you didn't want the charger.

This is what they are already doing. You can buy the phone plus the charger or just the phone for 30$ less.

It's an interesting take, I wonder if the argument hinges on USB-C not having market penetration everywhere. For example I (Canada not Brazil) have mostly USB-A wall chargers, with only one USB-C charger that came with my phone. If Apple had chose to give a USB-C to USB-A cable while not providing a wall charger, would the case still stand?

The thing that gets me here is the "exclusive manufacturer". I don't see how that can ever be the case. You aren't required to use Apple's brick or cable (though they have to be certified).

Apple even presented that stance in court, but they seem to have rejected it because of the USB C plug rather than the older style.

They also didn't buy that it reduced waste since they sell it separately.

Personally, it would reduce waste for me. I have a ton of those plugs and cables in many combinations.

But I could see how some people might not have it yet.

Perhaps Apple should have offered it for free for a couple years if you ask for it, rather than include it by default, and maybe they would have been better off here.

Edit: I'm wondering if I misread it. Is it a proprietary plug on the charger end of the cord? If so, that makes a little more sense, though there are generics for it for a while now anyhow.

> They also didn't buy that it reduced waste since they sell it separately.

But that's a bizarre take from the judge as well. Obviously the claim isn't that no charger is needed. It's that you need way fewer chargers than devices, so shipping a charger with every device is indeed just waste.

> Is it a proprietary plug on the charger end of the cord? If so, that makes a little more sense, though there are generics for it for a while now anyhow

Iphones come with a Lightning (proprietary) to USB-C (standard) cable but no USB-C (or any other) brick. So there shouldn't be anything proprietary needed to plug it in.

I will help you reduce waste, send me all of your extra plugs and cables and I will pay the shipping.

There are definitely ways out of this for Apple. Obviously they can go back to including the brick in certain jurisdictions like this. The other good solution, as you say, is to ask the customer if they need one, and offer them something else, like a 10% off coupon, if they reject the charger. Otherwise everyone will simply say "yes" even if they don't need it.

I know a lot of people would take one, even if they don't actually want it, just because it's free. But I know there are things like that in the past that I haven't opted into because I realized I really didn't need another one sitting around, or even just didn't need a first one.

Oculus' free rubber insert for example. I have a third party one that I like and didn't need the one Oculus offered, so I didn't take them up on it.

It'll partially reduce their cost right now and get people used to the idea that it won't be there in the future, instead of this shock where it's just not there, but expected.

It has to do with a law about 'tied sales' where you can't sell something that requires people to buy a second thing in order to for the first thing to work.

Tied sales are about requiring you to buy another of your products only, no? Like if I buy a remote control without batteries included, that's not a tied sale. Is it a tied sale because to get the full fast speed charging it has to be Apple or Apple-licensed in some way because they don't fully support PD?

EDIT: > But the judge rejected the argument, saying the cable didn't work with wall adapters lacking a USB-C port, with which the Apple charger was designed.

I really don't follow this reasoning. It sounds more like Apple is having some political trouble in Brazil and this is the evolution of it.

> I really don't follow this reasoning. It sounds more like Apple is having some political trouble in Brazil and this is the evolution of it.

Hadn't thought about that but I think that's the real take here. Since I can't make sense of any other reason they gave.

Is one allowed to sell a bicycle in brazil without also selling a pump for the tires?

Only if the nozzles are industry-standard. If you sell a bike with pentalobe-shaped nozzles and only you make such pumps, you must include the pump with the sale.

> Only if the nozzles are industry-standard. If you sell a bike with pentalobe-shaped nozzles and only you make such pumps, you must include the pump with the sale

But this is more akin to shipping with an adaptor to the standard nozzle but not the pump. And you can buy 3rd party pumps and adaptors with whatever ends you want.

Are you just making this up?

How do companies like Milwaukee get away with selling bare tools in Brasil?

https://www.milwaukeebrasil.com/rebitador-m18-fuel-onekey-26...

Apparently they do, I suspect Apple didn't put the required "ugly sticker" on the box.

Can you sell a gaming console without the screen?

I like that apple is trying to reduce waste by not including copper and plastic that is superfluous for a high percentage of phone buyers.

Can Apple not simply offer a two iphone SKUs, "with charger"; "without charger"?

Or simply hand the buyer of a new iphone a free charger if they ask for one, but we all know it's not about the environment.

> we all know it's not about the environment.

Kinda like all the complaints are not really about the charger ;-)

I think the vast majority of buyers would ask for a free charger because:

1) one more can't hurt, what if you lose one of the others?

2) it's free, so why not?

3) it's free and then I can SELL it!

4) ... maybe more?

The judge seems irrational. Both arguments mentioned here are flatly wrong.

It is demonstrably false that Apple not including the adapter ”obliged the consumer to purchase a second product of its exclusive manufacture”. The number of people using the product without an Apple manufactured power adapter could populate entire cities. Alternatives are easily accessible and come in many forms you might have preferences about.

Furthermore many have existing power adapters from Apple and others so buying a duplicate contributes next to nothing for many despite having an environmental and financial cost.

The argument that Apple also manufactures adapters so this is not environmentally beneficial to exclude is staggering in how little sense it makes. Decoupling the two allows you to purchase only what you need when you need it avoiding duplicates and waste. Can people possibly be so dense as to seriously argue otherwise?

If the packaging is not clear about what is and isn’t included and suggests something needed to use the device is included when it isn’t, that’s a different story and something I can understand taking issue with (from a false marketing standpoint), but the arguments as stated here are pure garbage.

I don’t need a new power adapter with every device any more than I need to also have to buy a screw driver as a part of the package every time I buy screws. Forcing the coupling of purchases effectively increases the minimal cost for consumers, decreases consumer choice, and produces waste.

I suspect this has nothing to do with the arguments and everything to do with ”sticking it” to a big corporation that is disliked for entirely unrelated reasons.

If we can’t even take away chargers from luxury phones we have no chance of making meaningful sacrifices to stop climate change lol.

I just recently replaced my 2016 iPhone SE with a 13 Mini. While I'm ok not getting another charger, I am not ok with getting a usb-c to lightning cable as I don't have any chargers in my house that have a usb-c port. Fortunately I have plenty of usb-a chargers and lightning cables in the house to fit the bill.

I'm also very tired of apple dragging their feet on putting a usb-c port on the iPhone.

Nintendo 3DS XL didn't come with a power adapter either.. so what? As long as it's advertised as such and customers warned during purchase.

I for one is happy with this ruling and hope it comes h to more countries. I am tired of company making anti consumer decisions hiding behind some shitty logic and lies.

Removing 3.5mm jack, crappy cables and removing free power adapter are all anti consumer and have nothing to do with the lies told about them.

And for MacBooks: you can't buy extra power adapter and MagSafe cable as a combo. You need to buy power brick and then cable separately. And of course they sell cable itself for $50!

While generally I'm against unnecessary regulations, I think we need laws for providing repair manuals and parts for cars and devices, and then for controlling prices for parts and proprietary accessories.

While MagSafe cable is a benign example, this gets ridiculous for medical devices. People use them for life, but necessary parts, batteries, etc are completely overprices.

This sounds like a terrible idea. If things are that overpriced, start a company that makes 50% less profit per unit and take the market.

I'll bet that in US you can't really start a company which will make replacement parts for proprietary medical devices without license from the original company.

Pay $400 every time you need to replace proprietary sound processor rechargeable battery, and I'll listen to your arguments then.

I'm talking about making medical devices, not replacement parts for other people's medical devices.

I had an issue with my iPhone X not charging completely after running it completely empty last week. First the bedside wireless charger seemed to be messing up. Next I tried just charging with a cable and that seemed to work one night but then the phone wouldn’t keep trying.

I decided to go buy a new cable and charger because I needed to have my phone, so I went to Walmart. They had some very cheap chargers and the apple options. I splurged on the 20W USB C charger. That charger doesn’t come with the cable in the box because the cable still comes with the phone. Since all my other cables aren’t usb C to lightning, I had to buy a new one. The only one at Walmart was from Belkin. All in all it was $40 for everything. This makes the Brazilian case in yet another way. They’re selling the charger without the cable you need to use it.

On the bright side my phone did charge to 100% overnight and everything seems to be back to normal.

The big issue I have over the whole "chargergate" is that Apple announced it as "being green", which, sure, it is.

But the real reason they did this was to maintain their huge margins - cutting the cost of the charger AND they could therefore make the packaging smaller, leading to lower shipping charges from their overseas sweatshops.

ffs apple just use usb-c. Just like NFC, it doesn't need to take a decade to figure this crap out.

They do already, just on the wrong end.

The cable is included, so there is USB-C on the end of the stuff that comes in the box.

Indeed. It only takes 5 minutes to figure out that staying with Lightning serves Apple's existing customer base better than an arbitrary stupid change to USB-C, which offers basically no advantages to iPhone users and a lot of disadvantages.

It would offer me the advantage of the phone not detecting a "non-genuine" lightning cable and refusing to charge. This used to be possible disable through jailbreaking, but the closest I've come lately (with admittedly little effort) is to get a phone at 10% to sit at 10% overnight, neither charging nor discharging. Ostensibly, a dumb pipe (yes, the CC pull-ups form a state bit) would preclude them the ability to prevent charging.

Who has so many lightning accessories that would be so disadvantaged?

On the other hand switching to USB-C, like the entire rest of the planet would open up a TON of more devices that would now be compatible with Apple. It means you could actually charge your Apple phone when not at home, because most people have USB-C these days, but lighting only those who have Apple devices.

Um, obviously a lot of people. Lightning is ten years old. People have ten years' worth of docks and cables and specialized accessories.

Another thing most mindless USB-C promoters aren't aware of is, the Lightning port is significantly smaller than a USB-C port. Moving to USB-C would mean that the most vulnerable part of the metal iPhone frame, which is the area surrounding the charging port, would be significantly thinner.

This is in addition to the connector itself also being more fragile.

There's just not a good enough reason to change ports. If there were, Apple would have changed it already, like they did for the iPad eventually.

Why should I continue to read what you have to say when you start off with false claims like "Lightning port is significantly smaller than a USB-C port".

I think the right thing would be to include an adapter by default, but have an option to get a small discount if you don't want an adapter.

I'm pretty sure environmental concern wasn't the main driving force behind Apple's decision to not include an adapter :)

Does it matter if environmental concern was the true reason? I’m fairly certain it does make a significant difference. And, FWIW, Apple has always been interested in making money. The environmental concern is rather new, and coincides with this decision. It may not have been the only reason, but may well have been the change that flipped the decision.

> have an option to get a small discount

Then people would complain that the discount was only $1.

My Apple TV didn’t come with an HDMI cable. It’s required to work. The difference I guess is Apple don’t make the cable?

I wonder if this would work in small claim court in the USA? Just make a form letter lol.

The problem with suing apple in the US is that they can lose and give you compensation but then they can also disable your iCloud account and now all you have is a paperweight .

Isn’t there someone suing Apple over this in California? Apple turned off their Apple ID for whatever reason and the person lost access to thousands and thousands of dollars of purchases?

Batteries not included.

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