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Comment by zaptheimpaler | Hacker News Reader

As annoying as some of this stuff is, i've found Android/Windows/Linux to be as broken in this regard. The last time I tried transferring photos/videos from my Android to a PC, it transferred at ~5-10MBps over a USB 3 connection because of limitations with MTP. So these phones can record in 4K@60FPS, have 256/512GB of storage but 5-10MBps transfer speeds.. and there is no easy way to get around this limit..

Any sort of syncing between PCs/mobile devices is universally neglected in favour of the cloud now. Why invest in syncing when they could charge you for cloud storage instead?

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> Why invest in syncing when they could charge you for cloud storage instead?

Bingo. I started seeing this everywhere I looked and it made me furious. Everything, in small ways, seems to sabotage the user trying to control their things. Eventually, and at scale, they win. It's fatiguing to constantly be fighting these toys.

> and there is no easy way to get around this limit..

I mean, Apple could just add a better physical connection to the iPhone. Either the USB3-speed Lightning port they used twice on a few iPads, USB3.x over USB-C, or even the brilliant Thunderbolt standard they helped make nearly a decade ago. But... the iPhone's physical transfer speeds are still stuck in 2001. It's genuinely an unbelievably amount of negligence for a company that directly profits off of cloud customers.

USB3/USBC is coming in the next set of devices (thanks EU), so at least the speed issue will be resolved.

Using the USB-C connector doesn't guarantee high speed connectivity. Technically that connector can fall all the way back to USB 1 speeds. Hopefully we'll see higher speeds, but Apple never put their higher speed Lightning ports on the phone, so who knows.

The EU did nothing. When Apple moved away from the 30 pin connector to the lightning connector they promised they'd keep it for a minimum of 10 years since so many people were howling about the change. That was 2014. Guess what? It looks like Apple will be adopting USB-C in 2024, thus fulfilling their 10 year promise. Meanwhile, since 2014, Apple has been adopting USB-C across their entire product line - except the iPhone which they had promised they wouldn't do.

So, let's end the farcical statement that the EU stood up to Big, Bad, Apple. The EU did nothing.

The EU is telling Apple that the iPhone may no longer use connectors that they license themselves. Apple can do whatever they want in 2024, but if they want to sell phones in Europe then the iPhone will ship with a more agreed-upon connection standard.

If Apple still wants to use a superior in-house technology, they can implement Thunderbolt on iPhone.

You missed my point entirely - the EU capitulated to Apple. They mandated what Apple was going to do anyway. Great job!

Apple never said they were switching the iPhone to USB-C, unless I missed something. Do you have a source for that?

Here is an ars article to back up the claim that they will switch to usb-c. Some devices like ipads use usb-c already. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/10/apple-confirms-it-wi...

That ars article was published after the regulatory ball was rolling. The fact that iPads and Macbooks have already switched to USB-C is part of the mounting frustration surrounding Lightning - plus the fact that Lightning was redundant and licensed by Apple.

We need regulators to do this so Apple doesn't change their mind and make "Lightning 2". Even if Apple did have a full USB-C switch on their roadmap, every company in FAANG needs a healthy fear of regulators. Europe cracking down on the App Store and Apple's silly proprietary cables are the start of this, and a fantastic first turnout so far.

In 2014 Apple said they would use the Lightning adapter for at least 10 years. Meanwhile they've adopted USB-C across their product line. Apple famously never announces future product plans but I think it's pretty easy to read the tea leaves with regards to what they were going to do.

Well, now there are no tea leaves to read. If Apple doesn't want to be transparent or work with their community, these are the kinds of laws we'll be forced to pass. They have to be responsible with their power, as the single largest private company in the world. We have to hold them accountable.

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