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Comment by skohan | Hacker News Reader

I am similarly of two minds. As an engineer, I can imagine how legal mandates for technology choices could stifle innovation and make the future of technology worse.

But at the same time, I think there may be a place for mandating interface compatibility.

To give some old-school examples, how differently might industrialization have gone if rail systems weren't mandated to operate under some shared standards? Or where would we be if every country had a handful of competing power grids with different voltages and outlet types?

So I am not sure the cable which plugs into our phones is the correct target for standardization, but in spirit I think it's worthwhile to consider how the public good of interoperability should be weighed against a handful of corporations' interest in building technological moats around themselves and their users.

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> To give some old-school examples, how differently might industrialization have gone if rail systems weren't mandated to operate under some shared standards?

I'm not sure that analogy holds particularly well. The UK did build rail systems without shared standards, and only standardised on gauge in 1846, which was very late in the industrial revolution: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Gauge_War - Standards for other things like signalling also came late, and broad gauge was still in use until 1892. (Notably though, this did happen just at the turn of Railway Mania, so affected a lot of the new lines.)

Effectively, the UK let (mainly by omission, not intentionally) the solutions compete and then selected the most broadly used solution to standardise on.

(I'd love to see any scholarly research on this though; I haven't seen a huge degree of it. Obviously things are different outside of the UK, but given it's where (uncoincidentally) both the industrial revolution and railways were born, that's the clear case to look at.)

> Effectively, the UK let (mainly by omission, not intentionally) the solutions compete and then selected the most broadly used solution to standardise on.

We're down to two connectors here, one of which is only used by a single vendor; do you think that hasn't already happened?

I’m not questioning that at all! I’m only responding to the question posed by the parent about railway standardisation in the context of industrialisation.

What happened is the worse more common standard was converged upon, so instead of the west coast main line having a comfortable, stable 7’ gauge, we ended up with the less comfortable standard gauge that requires longer trains to seat the same number of people.

I think that’s what weirds me out. In cases like rail, it’s necessary for interoperability and prevents anti competitive practices. There’s a clear state interest there.

But swapping a plug doesn’t buy us that. This is evidenced by the fact that no company is forced to use lightning to compete.

Almost everything uses USB-A at the outlet and choose your other end. We’re starting to see USB-C at the outlet, but same thing.

I also don’t see the e-waste argument. I haven’t had a cable outlive a device. My kids go through them every other month. No plug fixes that, it’s almost always where the cable joins the plug. (Except micro-USB, we shall never speak of that again).

My other biggest practical problem is that, despite appearances, USB-C != USB-C, and the off-the-shelf cables are awful, especially for normal humans.

In my dream world, I’d love to see clearly labeled device and cord capabilities, and USB-C all the things, and a reigned in USB-C spec.

I just think that government is a bad place to do it, and don’t see a necessary state interest case for their intervention.

> I also don’t see the e-waste argument. I haven’t had a cable outlive a device.

My old Nokia Micro-B cables outlived their bundled devices by a factor of… 3x or so? And I only took those out of use because I don't have a lot of stuff that still uses Micro-B.

Actually, I don't think I've ever managed to break a USB cable yet. What on earth are you doing to the things?!

Apple cables were notoriously shitty for many years, because they didn't build strain relief into them, until a couple generations ago, and they would fray with time.

I imagine this is what GP experienced, based on my experience with it on iphones and apple laptops.

Come to think of it, I don’t break them. It’s when I let my kids borrow/take them. Except micro, those connectors just wear out in a year or two.

My kids keep their tablets plugged in while using a lot of the time. I think it’s the stress on the joint from having the cable taut or yanking it around or something.

I did change to making them pay for replacements. That definitely slowed the rate :).

I can “reassure” you: this is unambiguously a bad idea.

First, market forces already standardized on two main standards.

Second, the interop problem is a $10 cable between wall-wart and device.

So the problem solved is a small one. I think this idea got its momentum from years ago when practically every model of phone had a different charger and wall wart.

Meanwhile, think about what you lose.

Is USB-C really the end-game of charging connectors? It has existing issues with labeling and capabilities confusion. What about mag-safe-style connectors? Does a phone necessarily need a charging connector at all and might there not be advantages to not having one?

As an aside, ewaste will increase in the short term, of course, as people will have to throw out their lighting stuff and buy USB-C stuff. (Don’t worry, it’s not a lot — small problem, remember.)

But you're assuming this USB-C decision is eternal right? Couldn't the problems you raised be solved by having a standards organization which could monitor and update the status quo over time based on the technologies available?

Which already exists -- without EU regulatory processes to encumber them.

> First, market forces already standardized on two main standards.

So, one standard too many. Especially when one of those standards is held hostage by one corporation.

> Is USB-C really the end-game of charging connectors?

It's close enough, we can already see that improvements have been incredibly incremental already. Hell, it would have been fine to stick to micro-B or even mini-B.

> What about mag-safe-style connectors?

You already have people building those as third-party dongles. Clearly it doesn't have to be part of the spec.

> Does a phone necessarily need a charging connector at all

Yes. Wireless charging is inherently far less efficient than wired charging.

> and might there not be advantages to not having one?

No. To steal a quote from yourself: this is unambiguously a bad idea.

> First, market forces already standardized on two main standards.

EU sat down the manufacturers and told them that if they don't come to an agreement the EU will make the choice for them. Most of them came to an agreement. So you are right, market forces did make manufacturers to standardize on two main standards. That force is named EU.

> Is USB-C really the end-game of charging connectors?

No, and EU has no illusions that it is.

> Does a phone necessarily need a charging connector at all and might there not be advantages to not having one?

No, and the EU doesn't think that it does.

> As an aside, ewaste will increase in the short term, of course, as people will have to throw out their lighting stuff and buy USB-C stuff. (Don’t worry, it’s not a lot — small problem, remember.)

This is just stupid fearmongering. People won't have to throw their lightning stuff.

I don't think EU regulation works the way you think it does.

> This is just stupid fearmongering.

I guess if you can't make a good point, you can always hurl insults.

What do you think people who upgrade their iPhones in 2024 will do with their lightning cables which no longer connect to anything they have?

> What do you think people who upgrade their iPhones in 2024 will do with their lightning cables which no longer connect to anything they have?

sell

The EU market for cables with lightning connectors will be contracting for some reason at that time.

New iphones come with a cable.

Even if they throw them out, it's better to pull off the bandaid than to go on creating more and more redundant cables and e-waste for the next 30 years

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