Apple De-Certifies Monster Cables After Lawsuit Against Beats

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."

Comments

This was always going to happen

[Anonymous Coward]

It's inevitable and it's going to happen more. They are both from the dark side so who cares for any of these frauds. This type of thing will happen more often because of the IP Protection racket the government is running and also because these companies are going to increasingly run into each other due to this protection racket. The whole stack of cards is in it's last era.

Re:This was always going to happen

[NatasRevol]

realistic understanding of the Cult of Ayn Rand

If there ever was an oxymoron....

Re: This was always going to happen

[firewrought]

Actually, Ayn Rand's own admirers were calling themselves "The Collective" in her own lifetime. It may have been intended as a tongue-in-cheek thing, but the cultivation of dogma and ideology was (and is still) very real. http://crooksandliars.com/john...

Re:This was always going to happen

[Archangel Michael]

Typical Anti Ayn Rand rant.

The problem isn't Ayn Rand's viewpoint, it is that reality is skewed by Corporations creating laws to benefit themselves. Thus proving that Government should not be involved in economics, since the moment it is, it is corrupted by its own involvement.

In this case, government protection racket (dressed up as IP law) has created a case where nobody knows anything. I would suggest that Any Rand would say that the three (two now) companies should sue themselves into mutually assured destruction over IP rights that are tenuous at best, letting better, more agile companies to come in and save the customers.

As far as I can see, Apple, Beats and Monster are three of a kind over priced status symbols. let them market themselves that way. And all the Sheeple will come and pay way too much for crappy products. The smart people will pay less for better products.

This is going to be hilarious.

[Anonymous Coward]

Flim-flam cable maker suing overpriced hipster baiting electronics firm over tacky rich kid headphones.

Fetch me my popcorn

Re:This is going to be hilarious.

[techstar25]

You know what they say: All is fair in love and war and overpriced A/V accessories.

Bad guys...

[JaredOfEuropa]

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

Monster Business School

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Monster Business School

[Daemonik]

Back in the day of analog cables, there was some margin of truth in Monster's claims of cable quality and gold plating. Now that everything is digital though? A rusty coat hanger can carry a digital signal as well as their best cable, so yeah fark 'em.

Re: Monster Business School

[rfengr]

To extent; a rusty coat hanger can't carry a 10 GBPs serial link like a coaxial cable. It's digital, but signal integrity is still an issue.

Re:Monster Business School

[Phreakiture]

customers who advocate the superiority of your product on faith alone. Because they spent so goddamn much.

The guitarist in a band I've engineered for is stone deaf but thinks of himself as an audiophile. He can't hear the hum coming out of his guitar amp, but swears by these overpriced interconnect cables as well as the special acoustic pad that he puts said humming amp on. One night I pointed out one of the XLR cables to him and said, "You see that $10 cable there? Whatever you're listening to went through one of those." He didn't say another word to me all night.

Re:Monster Business School

[KozmoStevnNaut]

There are still plenty of analog connections around. Headphone jacks, RCA outputs and so on. None of them sound any better through Monster cables than through cheap dollar store cables, and they never did.

http://archimago.blogspot.ca/2...

Note that by far the largest difference was stereo crosstalk, and that has a lot more to do with cable geometry than with price or "quality". You can make any cable measure exceedingly low crosstalk by physically separating the wires, but no one can head crosstalk at -84dB anyway, so it's pointless.

Re: Monster Business School

[Anonymous Coward]

What you get is packet loss, which either results in buffering or artifacts. An example is 'snow' on faulty HDMI cables. So there's still a case for a good quality cable that's not going to be dropping data because it's sitting on the edge of what quality is acceptable.

Where some manufactures enter the realm of fantasy is when they start to say things like the colours will look better. They won't. If the all the data is getting through a $10 and $3000 cable will look alike.

Re:Monster Business School

[drinkypoo]

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.

Re:Monster Business School

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Re:Monster Business School

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I make sure to use dust-plated connectors.

Re:Monster Business School

[CastrTroy]

Yeah the big problem in bicycles is steel frames with aluminum seat posts or stems (where the handlebars attach to the frame). Those things are often assembled without any kind of anti seize or grease and are known to basically get "welded" together from corrosion. I've seen a few that were impossible to remove.

Re:Monster Business School

[Stuarticus]

I tend to buy fairly expensive guitar cables, the Planet Waves ones. Rather than being an audio quality issue (though they do sound better than the cheapest cables which can hum a bit in a noisy environment, those gain pedals boost noise!) I buy them for durability, the cheaper ones can fail after a few months while I've only had one planet waves one die in nearly 10 years of use and they replaced it for free, with no hassles. Reliability is worth the money.

Re:Monster Business School

[TheGratefulNet]

I'm not a fan of MC, but I will say this: while the MC's are overpriced at least the shielding is reasonable. hum can be a problem with poor shielding and the MC's that I used to use, years ago (car audio ones with foil wrap) were quite good for keeping hum low. dollar store cables have the thinnest shielding and usually poor molding so they break easy.

once you get to minimum quality standards, there's little diff other than being able to see numbers change in high priced test gear. but dollar store is really not what you want to compare anything to. even monster is better than that ;)

their prices are outrageous but the quality is acceptable. not worth the money but that's not the same as saying that they are made like dollar store cables. they definitely are not.

Re:Monster Business School

[mlts]

There is a point with audio that there is a split between "pro audio" (as in flat response monitor speakers), versus "audiophile audio" (speakers that have Bog knows what for response levels, but they look cool on their marble stands.)

While some cable making companies tout things that can't be quantified, there are items that can be, such as a proper gauge of wire, well soldered fittings that are properly shrink wrapped to prevent oxidation, good insulation, and other basics.

does marketing hype matter?

[nimbius]

does 'certified for iDevice' even matter anymore? I could see it being a concern for the average consumer about a decade ago but so many products, uncertified mind you, exist for the apple to channel audio from soundcard to headbone that the logo itself seems of little merit.

Monster and Beats cultivated a brand all their own. Sure, Dr. Dre doesnt have his doctorate in accoustic waveform theory, but neither does Monster when it comes to a $600 pair of mission control headphones on the average teenager. Its all about the image, and in this case that image is perpetuated by pop culture and not dictated by apple.

Re:does marketing hype matter?

[Daemonik]

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.

Re:does marketing hype matter?

[QuasiSteve]

These programs tend to go well beyond just a sticker, though. If you're not part of this program, you just won't be listed in the store, or carried in Apple's physical stores. If you're not 'certified' for Apple devices, your product won't be in the "Apple Accessories" aisle at other retailers. And if you're not part of the MFi project, then at least in theory Apple could simply block your accessory from working at the lightning interface level.

Re:does marketing hype matter?

[drinkypoo]

I only really worry about not using knock off cables/adapters when it's connected to 110 volt power or higher

That's misguided AF. Back in the olden days when HDDs were stupid I had an RLL disk literally burn (with black smoke and scorches, and probably flames too) a trace off its PCB when the spindle stuck (SEIZEGATE FTW)

Low voltages are perfectly capable of starting fires.

So, a good move then

[AikonMGB]

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."

So, this is a philanthropic move from Apple, then. Monster are bottom-feeders that prey on the naive, and the world would be a better place without them.

Re:So, a good move then

[Aqualung812]

Apple only charges around 2-3 times more for a cable than the competition.

Monster's level of bullshit is another sport entirely.

Buying genuine Apple stuff is like buying parts from the dealership for you car. More expensive, and may or may not be any better than what you can get elsewhere.

Buying anything Monster is like buying a bottle of $100 window cleaner that has specially aligned atoms that will reduce wind resistance and increase speed on your car.

Poor little monster

[Rigel47]

Getting pushed around? Not used to having to deal with someone that can bite back? Keep in mind this is the company that has a track record of attacking any and all start-up cable and connector makers.

This is a great read - a small-time cable maker basically telling monster suck it after they sent their default "infringement" claim. http://www.bluejeanscable.com/...

Does Monster make overpriced watch bands?

[tomhath]

Seems like it would be a natural market for them.

Re:Does Monster make overpriced watch bands?

[Dragonslicer]

If you don't use a Monster watch band, you won't get true time fidelity. Monster watch bands give you perfectly clear seconds, while all those cheap watch bands will only give you ugly, degraded seconds.

Re:Does Monster make overpriced watch bands?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sloppy seconds, you mean.

Monster accuses Beats of fraud?

[mark_reh]

The company whose entire business is based on selling overpriced cables to phools is accusing another company of fraud?

Bring out the stickers and crying hipsters.

[Pascoea]

So now the good folks at Monster will have to go put black stickers over the "Made for iDevice" logos on their packages, and the millions of hipsters will cry out in horror as their overpriced headphones will no longer work with their iPhones.

Re:Monster Cables are Great

[ColdWetDog]

fancy-pants ones have this great braid on them that makes them slide across one another easily

I was going to ask what exactly are you doing such that 'sliding across one another easily' is important but then I decided that was probably not a good idea.

who are the quality PC makers?

[Midnight Thunder]

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.