apple controversy Brazil bans charger-less iPhones and fines Apple

[KaitouX]

6 minutes ago, igormp said:

They weren't fined, just notified, and only started including the charger for some niche models (Z fold and flip), the S22 lineup still doesn't come with a charger and you need to request those from their website after purchasing a phone (I had to do that with mine).

Procon Fortaleza fined both Apple and Samsung early this year, not sure if they contested it or not. I thought that when you bought directly from the manufacturer they just gave you together with the phone(in this case a Samsung shop), while buying from third-party shops means you have to request it with from the manufacturer.

[igormp]

3 minutes ago, KaitouX said:

Procon Fortaleza fined both Apple and Samsung early this year, not sure if they contested it or not. I thought that when you bought directly from the manufacturer they just gave you together with the phone(in this case a Samsung shop), while buying from third-party shops means you have to request it with from the manufacturer.

Didn't know about that, the one I saw was this one: https://g1.globo.com/tecnologia/noticia/2021/10/27/apple-e-samsung-sao-notificadas-pelo-governo-novamente-apos-venda-de-celulares-sem-carregadores.ghtml

 

And yes, even if you buy a S22 straight from samsung or through a 3rd party it won't come with the charger and you'll need to request it from their website.

[rikitikitavi]

15 hours ago, WereCat said:

Not necessarily

 

Yeah, usbC is a stupid chaos.

 

However, it seems like the phones aren't that picky, and therefore will charge. So my guess is that anyone buying an iPhone is safe.

 

I have 4 usbC chargers: 2xApple, Pixel2 and Ikea - all of them seem to work fine to charge all phones, kindles, gamepads and bt kb

[xAcid9]

Good. I hope more government do the same. 

[M1K33EE]

https://www.boredpanda.com/brazil-bans-apple-iphone-sales-without-charger/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic

 

 

Discuss

 

Here’s Steve Lehto’s discussion…

 

 

[igormp]

There's already a topic on that:

 

[Skiiwee29]

@M1K33EE I have merged your threads into the already existing thread surround this topic. 

[Forbidden Wafer]

On 9/11/2022 at 9:42 PM, igormp said:

I miss when phones used to come with cases, headphones and chargers, the phone I bought this year just came with the phone itself and a USB-C to C cable.

Bought a Moto G30 for my mom last year, and it is fantastic. Came with a case, screen protector, 20W charger, cable and headphones. It does have a P2 port. 4x cheaper than the cheapest iPhone.

 

Too bad it doesn't have a camera button, or I would have gotten one for me. 

[Dracarris]

20 minutes ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

Bought a Moto G30 for my mom last year, and it is fantastic. Came with a case, screen protector, 20W charger, cable and headphones.

For most people that's a whole pile of avoidable waste.

• USB cable is a no brainer
• Screen protector, okay if it's a decent one and not really significant in terms of waste.
• If I actually want a case, I'd please like to chose my own according to my liking.
• Headphones? Oh gtfo, those that used to come with phones were so utterly horrible. I have like 4 pairs or so of them in my basement. E-Waste right out of the gate.
• Charger at this point in time unnecessary for probably >95% of buyers, but that's a whole separate topic.

23 minutes ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

4x cheaper than the cheapest iPhone.

So this phone costs around 110 USD?

[Forbidden Wafer]

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

For most people that's a whole pile of avoidable waste.

• USB cable is a no brainer
• Screen protector, okay if it's a decent one and not really significant in terms of waste.
• If I actually want a case, I'd please like to chose my own according to my liking.
• Headphones? Oh gtfo, those that used to come with phones were so utterly horrible. I have like 4 pairs or so of them in my basement. E-Waste right out of the gate.
• Charger at this point in time unnecessary for probably >95% of buyers, but that's a whole separate topic. 

Well, other than the headphones, which she doesn't use and will probably be given, everything else seems like tailor made for her. 

 

Case is transparent to show the phone, which is beautiful. Adds some grip to her slippy hands. Protector is decent. She is the kind that manages to break cables and chargers somehow, so ends up using everything. 

 

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

So this phone costs around 110 USD?

About 300 USD. Don't forget we have crazy taxes over here.

[Donut417]

I found it quite dumb that they would stop providing a charger and turn around and change the port on the charger to USB C, All to get back at the EU, for trying to force them to switch. Which now they are going to have to do any way. 

 

EU: Apple we want you to move to type C. 

Apple: NO

EU: Talks about making it a mandate. 

Apple: OK, USB C to Lightning cable, USB C port on Charger. 

EU: 

Thats not what we meant. 

Apple: ............ OOPS. Oh BTW we are no longer going to include the charger with the phone, Because people already have chargers. 

 

Consumers: BUT...... all the chargers have USB A ports........ 

[Forbidden Wafer]

1 minute ago, Donut417 said:

Consumers: BUT...... all the chargers have USB A ports........ 

EXACTLY

[Dracarris]

15 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

Apple: ............ OOPS. Oh BTW we are no longer going to include the charger with the phone, Because people already have chargers. 

 

Consumers: BUT...... all the chargers have USB A ports........ 

Guess what: Consumers also already have USB-A to Lightning cables. And laptops with USB-C ports.

 

OOPS?

[Donut417]

34 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Guess what: Consumers also already have USB-A to Lightning cables. And laptops with USB-C ports.

 

OOPS?

Not all computers have type C. My mom's doesnt. Mine is in the back on the motherboard. Also lightning cables are known to "wear" out. Also what about cars? My car supports CarPlay and Android Auto, but only has type A ports. What if I didnt have another lightning cable? What if this was the persons first iPhone? For example my mom moved to a iPhone recently. She didnt have a lightning cable. I only have 2, one for my bedroom and one for my car. 

 

Also why the fuck include a cable if you cant use it with your current charger? Seems kinda a waste there as well. 

[Blademaster91]

42 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Guess what: Consumers also already have USB-A to Lightning cables. And laptops with USB-C ports.

 

OOPS?

It seems wasteful to include a USB-C cable if people are supposed to use their old USB-A cable. And as already mentioned not all laptops have a USB-C port, I find it kinda funny that about everything else Apple sells has a USB-C port, yet they refuse to put a standardized port on their phones.

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

For most people that's a whole pile of avoidable waste.

• USB cable is a no brainer
• Screen protector, okay if it's a decent one and not really significant in terms of waste.
• If I actually want a case, I'd please like to chose my own according to my liking.
• Headphones? Oh gtfo, those that used to come with phones were so utterly horrible. I have like 4 pairs or so of them in my basement. E-Waste right out of the gate.
• Charger at this point in time unnecessary for probably >95% of buyers, but that's a whole separate topic.

So this phone costs around 110 USD?

I think its interesting a $200 midrange phone comes with everything you need, yet expensive and overpriced phones don't provide anything in the box except a cable, which people might already have.

A screen protector, headphones, case and charger are all nice to have, and IMO every phone should include a case and screen protector as phones are just too fragile to not have at least a protective case. And spare headphones are nice to have, wired headphones are much less wasteful than BT headphones.

[igormp]

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

For most people that's a whole pile of avoidable waste.

• USB cable is a no brainer
• Screen protector, okay if it's a decent one and not really significant in terms of waste.
• If I actually want a case, I'd please like to chose my own according to my liking.
• Headphones? Oh gtfo, those that used to come with phones were so utterly horrible. I have like 4 pairs or so of them in my basement. E-Waste right out of the gate.
• Charger at this point in time unnecessary for probably >95% of buyers, but that's a whole separate topic.

So this phone costs around 110 USD?

It really shows that you're not aware at all of the majority of the population and instead believe everyone has the newest iPhones and MacBooks that they renew every year.

[starsmine]

30 minutes ago, igormp said:

It really shows that you're not aware at all of the majority of the population and instead believe everyone has the newest iPhones and MacBooks that they renew every year.

I update less then the average person. 
I ran an iphone 6s until january of this year

I ran a llano laptop until I found a decent refurbished zen 1 laptop. 
I still run a 2nd gen core desktop as my main PC. 
My car is a '98

No I agree with Dracarris. I am not arguing in the shoes of people who upgrade often, or even as often as normal people. When sub 5% of purchasers need to get either a new charger with type c, or a new cable with type a. Then thats is still 95% of unnecessary chargers being shipped.

I do see you with your bulldozer and piece meal upgrades over the year. Thats the kind of frugality I can get behind. 
 

[igormp]

1 hour ago, starsmine said:

I do see you with your bulldozer and piece meal upgrades over the year. Thats the kind of frugality I can get behind.

It saddens me to inform you that this is an older build which I had to move on due to the platform's ram limitation, and that I'm too lazy to update my sig. However, I'd still have kept it if I could manage to have 64gb+ of ram in it. 

 

1 hour ago, starsmine said:

When sub 5% of purchasers need to get either a new charger with type c, or a new cable with type a. Then thats is still 95% of unnecessary chargers being shipped.

I'm going to need some citations on that. Maybe where you live, but from what I see here those accessories are pretty useful to most buyers that'd otherwise need to spend more money on them. 

[yolosnail]

People be acting like you're only allowed to use one charger!

 

I for one have multiple phone chargers around the house because convenience, in fact every included phone charger since my Galaxy S4 is currently still in use! 

[Dracarris]

10 hours ago, Blademaster91 said:

I think its interesting a $200 midrange phone comes with everything you need, yet expensive and overpriced phones don't provide anything in the box except a cable, which people might already have.

So it's a 200$ phone and the statement "a quarter of the price of the cheapest iphone" was a straight-out lie by @Forbidden Wafer that is now just ignored? Cables tend to break indeed most often so to include those makes sense. "Everything you need"? You had a slight typo there, correct wording is "A lot of stuff that the majority of buyers doesn't need and is straight (E-)Waste". And the charger is still the worst offender here, it still has a rather complex mix of materials and rather complex to produce.

10 hours ago, igormp said:

It really shows that you're not aware at all of the majority of the population and instead believe everyone has the newest iPhones and MacBooks that they renew every year.

It really shows you have no clue that you don't need even close to the level of "new" that you postulate here. It's just plain wrong that you need to renew every year, PCs, laptops from 5+ years ago already have Type-C.

Cheap screen protectors and cases inflate packaging size and are straight plastic waste for the majority of users. Again, especially with more expensive phones, if I actually want to have those things, they for sure don't come in the quality that I want in the box.

Same for the headphones; cheapest I ever had were 50$ wired Sennheiser. Absolutely no phone has headphones of that quality bundled.

 

Shipping all these things with every phone creates a mountain of waste. Period.

8 hours ago, yolosnail said:

I for one have multiple phone chargers around the house because convenience, in fact every included phone charger since my Galaxy S4 is currently still in use!

Me too. Multiple at home, at work, in my backpack, wherever I can imagine. And still multiple wallplugs and lightning cables sitting unused in a drawer. And I bought 3 phones over the past 10years and my Airpods Pro, that's it. Far from a person that upgrades every year.

It's even worse with micro-USB cables (worst connector of all times), at this point I must have 10+ of them sitting unused as they come with every accessory that has a battery inside.

[igormp]

6 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

"a quarter of the price of the cheapest iphone" was a straight-out lie by @Forbidden Wafer that is now just ignored?

It is a quarter of the price of the cheapest iphone in brazil, which is the place this thread is about.

 

7 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

PCs, laptops from 5+ years ago already have Type-C.

Most laptops sold here don't even have usb-c, and about 50% of the phones released in the past 5 years also don't feature usb-c.

8 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Again, especially with more expensive phones, if I actually want to have those things, they for sure don't come in the quality that I want in the box.

Good for you, but you're not the rule, and if most people didn't want such things, they wouldn't have complained and then our ministry of justice wouldn't have imposed such ban upon apple, but guess what actually happened?

[Dracarris]

30 minutes ago, igormp said:

It is a quarter of the price of the cheapest iphone in brazil, which is the place this thread is about.

So? The iPhone SE exists in Brazil as well, and this thread long isn't about Brazil only anymore.

 

The SE with 64GB costs 4300 Real which is about 825 USD. So

13 hours ago, Forbidden Wafer said:

About 300 USD. Don't forget we have crazy taxes over here.

this whole 1/4 postulation was a straight out lie!

 

Managed to fight my way through the Brazilian Apple Store checkout process, apparently there is also some kind of cash discount available

 

[MageTank]

Allow me to help everyone move away from this "poor people can't afford iPhones" part of the argument, since its a terrible hill to die on.

 

While an individual may not be able to afford a new iPhone, their company might certainly be willing to buy them a work phone. Plenty of companies pay for the phones of their employees, especially if they are in a position where they are typically on-call, or travel for business and need access to a corporate VPN. Everyone in my company has their own personal cell phone, but you can bet your sweet bippy that I am not going to use my own personal device for work-related matters, especially if they want to install monitoring software on it for VPN access, lol.

 

This alone means this law (as silly as it may sound in this context) would be applicable in making sure someone that may not have owned an iPhone or a device with a compatible charger, can receive the equipment they need and have it function as intended, regardless of whether an individual is capable of affording said product.

 

I am not going to argue environmental impact (frankly I believe neither side is altruistic, Apple cares more about saving money and I am certain Brazil is feigning ignorance if they don't believe excess chargers are problematic to the environment), but I can certainly see the need to ensure products are sold in a manner that ensures they function without the need to potentially purchase additional equipment.

 

Offering two different SKU's (one with a charger, one without) and pricing them accordingly is in my opinion, the best compromise here. Alternatively, create a web portal with a means for a customer to type in their phone serial and request that a charger be shipped to them free of charge. Make it eligible for new phones only and if need be, require an invoice/receipt be uploaded before the request is honored.

[Obioban]

On 9/11/2022 at 8:42 PM, igormp said:

They didn't lower the price for the new phones without a charger tho, and I bet it also won't increase if they do start bundling the charger back, so it just worked as a way to increase their profit margins.

Apple targets a certainly margin. That can't be achieved by price adjustment or component cost adjustment. If a charger comes with the phone, it'll either increase the price of the phone or decrease features in the phone. It's not free, just because it's included.

 

I've had 8 iPhones now (starting with the first one, then upgrading every 2-3 years). I don't need 8 chargers. They don't go bad. I'd rather it wasn't a component on the BOM.

[Forbidden Wafer]

2 hours ago, Dracarris said:

So? The iPhone SE exists in Brazil as well, and this thread long isn't about Brazil only anymore.

Huh, they still sell that old thing. I looked at the iPhone 12.