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Apple De-Certifies Monster Cables After Lawsuit Against Beats

Posted by Soulskill on from the this-story-is-more-interesting-if-you-use-$140-cables-to-read-it dept.

An anonymous reader writes: Since 2005, Monster cables have been licensed under Apple's "Made For iDevice" program, which lets cable manufacturers put a logo on their product signifying they work with Apple products. Now, Apple has revoked that certification. In January of this year, Monster sued Beats, accusing its founders of fraud. Beats was acquired by Apple in 2014, and Monster is accusing Apple of bullying them by terminating the licensing deal. Monster's general counsel said the move would "significantly disrupt Monster's business and that the two companies had worked well for years, with Monster paying Apple more than $12 million in licensing fees since 2008."

6 of 288 comments (clear)

  1. Bad guys... by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Apple, Monster, Beats, an ex hedge fund manager turned headphone designer... This reads like a Marvel comic with only supervillains in it.

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    If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
  2. Monster Business School by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have always admired Monster's business model. Take something as dirt cheap as a cable, tack on a price at least 3000% above cost and not only make it a success but have customers who advocate the superiority of your product on faith alone. Because they spent so goddamn much.

    1. Re:Monster Business School by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Careful: if the connectors on your equipment aren't gold-plated, then it's those hard-to-replace connectors that will rust instead of the easily replaced cable.

      What you really want is a connector plated the same as the connector you're connecting it to. If it's tin-plated, use a tin-plated connector. If it's gold-plated, use gold. What I don't know of is any tin-plated cables which include a sacrificial zinc anode. In motoring (and presumably other places with metal bolted to metal) we use zinc anti-seize where dissimilar metals meet because it gets eaten up first, which is handy. I'm not sure if that applies to tin, though. Also in motoring, tin is what's used as an intermediate between steel or copper and aluminum.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    2. Re:Monster Business School by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And this is why radio hams, a self-selected group of the technically knowledgable that routinely deal with analog signals orders of magnitudes higher frequency than audio signals, are so fanatical about solid gold plated oxygen free copper directional cables. Not.

  3. Re:does marketing hype matter? by Daemonik · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It matters, in some cases, such as their sync cables. Apple's walled garden is so high most people buy Apple's peripherals just to be sure they'll work.

    I'm still shocked, to be honest, that Apple uses standard headphone jacks though.

  4. who are the quality PC makers? by Midnight+Thunder · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Just curious who the reasonably priced, quality PC makers are and how they compare to Apple? Also, consider after sales service.

    All those that come to mind are at the same price point and quality as Apple. Actually, I can only count one: Lenovo.

    I am not saying you are wrong (I am not saying you are right either), I am just saying I need something to put things into context.

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    Jumpstart the tartan drive.