[eru]

> [...] the push for standardizing phone connectors ended up [...] making it a better place for everyone.

What's your evidence for that?

By default, we should assume that the engineers building phones and the consumers buying phones are the best placed to evaluate what connectors they want. And it would take considerable evidence to convince us that some unrelated third party bureaucrats know better.

Especially since even the best case benefits are so minuscule: it's already very easy to get charging cables that have multiple heads, for that people that own multiple phones with different connectors, but only want a single cable. (And everyone else can just buy one cable or the other.)

[mschuster91]

> What's your evidence for that?

Living in a world where I don't have a host of different power bricks in my travel bag any more, where one single Anker dual-port charger is enough to bring with me on vacation and get my stuff charged, and where when I lose my cable I can just walk into any random store and buy one for cheap.

> it's already very easy to get charging cables that have multiple heads, for that people that own multiple phones with different connectors

These multi-head cables almost all don't pass through the D+/D- pins of USB which means no way to get more than 500 mA charging current from them.

[eru]

> Living in a world where I don't have a host of different power bricks in my travel bag any more, [...]

Huh? I don't have to do that, either. I only have different cables, but the power brick is the same.

[mschuster91]

Yeah because by now it's all USB. I'm old enough to 'member the times where literally everyone had different plugs and voltages.

[eru]

Yes, but that standardisation on USB that we have already witnessed came about without any legal mandates, or did it? So it undermines the argument for them.

[mschuster91]

> Yes, but that standardisation on USB that we have already witnessed came about without any legal mandates, or did it?

The EU said "hey guys, make up your mind on a standard" to the industry at large, which led to the consolidation to Mini-USB and, later on, Micro-USB, and as Apple hadn't even moved an inch towards standardization and USB-C was validated enough to be supporting literally everything, the EU said "okay, Apple doesn't want to listen, so we bring down the hammer".

[eru]

And I'm suggesting that bringing down the hammer was unnecessary overreach.

[toyg]

Standardization was an option, but it took laws to actually force the inevitable refuseniks (like Apple) to the table.

[eru]

Huh? I could already charge Apple via USB before that forced standardisation, I just needed a different cable, but it worked via the same power brick.

And, again, I don't see much benefit in the forced conversion of the refuseniks. Their refusal only hurts _them_; I mostly have Android devices, and I don't care one what chargers other people want to use. And evidently, they had made up their mind. And who are we to second-guess their choices?

What's next? Forcing people for their own good to accept the Divine Authority of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?