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Apple Says "No" To Releasing New Dock Connector Specs
sl4shd0rk writes "According to sources, Apple hasn't offered any specs to developers for the new '9-pin Connector' to be used on the next version of the iPhone. Apple has also said it may use 'licensing agreements and threats of lawsuits' to prevent third-party adapters from hitting the market through at least 2012. There have been suggestions that this tactic is to allow Apple time to leverage competition and reap in revenues of $100 million for every 10 million Dock Connector Adapters it sells for $10. It remains unclear whether Apple will allow third-party developers to release competing alternatives after 2012."
You mean instead "leveraging their position to unfairly stifle competition," correct?
It's a shame that they do not have a universal connector. Something that would work on any damn phone, like a simple usb. But oh well... it's apple!
They haven't said or done anything, this is all just speculation. Slow news day on Slashdot.
Apple has never been a fan of cheap. Their products carry the undercurrent message "I can afford this", much like sports cars, suvs, rolexes and the like. They don't want everybody to provide cheap accessories to their products, because it diminishes the brand value.
Accessory manufacturers (particularly case manufacturers) burnt all their bridges with Apple long ago. Since around when the iphone 3gs came out, nobody has gotten any advance notice of new hardware because of all the leaks.
Even now, many of the apple rumors come from case manufacturers who are attempting to bribe employees at the manufacturer for information.
Right now Apple has only even hinted that there may be an iphone 5, and if they are going to deprecate a decade of accessories with a new connector they want to do it on their own terms. There is no way Applw have confirmed or denied the dock connector except perhaps in controlled leaks to the media. Nobody making alarm clock docks is gonna know a damn thing until the rest of us do on the 12th.
One big reason Apple doesn't use USB is that the dock connector does more than just USB.
The new connector itself is pure rumor. So they don't publish the specs on a rumored connector of a product they haven't even announced or given any clear indication it will exist at all ? Some days it really feel like all Apple Haters and Fanboys are like teenagers gossiping about their favorite star.
"One big reason Apple doesn't use USB is that the dock connector does more than just USB."
Does it, now? With airplay and whatnot, the need to transmit analog audio and video is rapidly disappearing, which is probably why the new plug has nine pins in stead of the previous billion. It's been months since I used my cable for anything besides charging, and I really can't see what I'd want from it that USB + wifi + bluetooth can't already offer.
Let's face it: it's a money-making ploy and nothing more.
It is of course entirely within their rights to use proprietary designs that way, but harassing people trying to adapt to it is not (or shouldn't be), and it is entirely within my rights to dispise and chastise them for it in any case.
sudo ergo sum
But nothing that you can't do with USB. Android phones have the ability to do audio and video through micro USB after all.
The only difference is they provide an analog pins for each audio channel, for svideo etc. Micro USB means you just send it as data and convert it in the adapter.
Excuse me while I say WTF???? People are fighting mad over an iPhone 5 that no one has admitted exists so far??? I might as well say the iPhone 6 will support Firewire 1600. Prove me wrong! Time people get a life!
Given the fact that nobody has a fucking clue of what's in the video, whether it's authentic or not, who shot it, I'd say it hints at somebody wanting you to believe something, not much more.
It doesn't say anything about a future Apple product or connector though.
My bet, if it is worth anything, is that if they change the connector, they will include in every iPhone box a converter allowing old accessories to work with the new iPhone. They'll drop the free converter next year on the iPhone 6 or whatever they decide to call it, giving effectively a year to accessories makers to adapt to the new connector.
If they don't do they they deprive every single buyer of the shitload of accessories actually on the market and in the homes of so many potential buyers. And this is a definitive advantages of iPhones over competing products.
Write boring code, not shiny code!
So when do you think apple will give it to 3rd parties? It's coming out next week, so they are seriously running out of time to get production up and running. Or do you just blindly defend apple any chance you get, truth staring you in the face or not?
I'm pretty sure it's only called that when Microsoft does it.
The problem is, and this coming from someone who is NOT a fan of Apple and the walled gardens, is that its well known there are a bazillion "iClones" made in China that frankly you'd be hard pressed to tell if you sat them side by side, or even booted up.
So until we see an actual Apple product from an Apple store in the Apple box with a new connector? We all really need to treat these rumors as just that, rumors.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Take a purely speculative story and give it a headline stating something likely to excite your readership as a simple fact. result page hits.
You're confusing the colloquial with the legal.
A vertical monopoly is one in which the retailer is also the wholesaler is also the producer is also... etc. Definitions vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction but just to give you an idea with two examples:
Norway had a liqour-monopoly some years ago. The EU forced them to split the institution into retail and an import, thereby making it legal for any other import company to sell alcohol to the liqour -retail- stores. This opened the market and it was, in all honesty, a long overdue process because the monopoly was there for moral and historical reasons.
HP tried to sue everything under the sun for copying the software on their ink cartridges. The EU found it fishy that one supplier should be able to sell its printers AND force any others to not be able to sell ink. They told HP in so many words to either drop the lawsuits or pick whether they would sell printers OR ink. This (oversimplification) opened the market and benefited consumers.
This also illustrates the differences between civil and common law systems, I think, though this is a bit specious. Americans would read those two examples and come up with 500 ways to "game" each verdict and poke holes in it. Europeans would accept what the intent was and act accordingly. This is really one of the major differences between corporate culture in our two continents even if there is a gigantic overlap.
Since when is "not releasing specs of an unreleased product" considered leveraging their position to unfairly stifle competition? Please explain how this will stifle competition...or is Samsung also coincidentally also redoing their dock connector with an expected release date shortly after Apple's release date? If anything, Apple not releasing dock connector specs might slow down the release of products that support the iPhone/iPod (e.g. speakers, etc.) but that's Apple's business. Let's say they released the specs of their still unreleased product then they decided to change the specs to account for something they omitted...now what?
No. I'm tired of geeks Just not getting it, or getting it wrong every single time.
I remember the iPhone bashing in 2007, and how could anyone possibly buy an iPhone, it only has two buttons and a touch screen! But in 2012, that design is "obvious."
How can anyone take nerds seriously anymore?
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
So far it has been speculation that there is a new connector. Now there is speculation on why Apple won't release specs for a connector they haven't announced yet. Maybe the day they announce the connector, they will release specs. Or the connector manufacturers have been sworn to secrecy about it considering the leaked cases of past models.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.