I don't really buy the "but think of the environment!" angle. Feels like green washing. This is going to hurt their profits, because they were artificially gatekeeping their tech. As far as I understand, lightning isn't any better than USB 3 or C connectors, in any regard.

I'm all for innovation but this seems like it'll have a positive effect for consumers.

The one benefit is that lighting is a simple male-female connector with the more likely to break male part on the cable.

USB-C is not. It, like a lot of other connectors, have a thin floating male part inside a cavity in the phone.

the springy working metal parts are in the cable end

IMO Lightning is significantly better than USB-C purely for feel. It's slightly smaller and clicks in very well. The only real issues with it are that its 1. proprietary, and 2. only supports USB 2.0 speeds. The fact that to use it you must buy a license is real unfortunate because I really like the form factor.

What are people transferring from their phone? I see people mention the speeds but I can’t remember the last time I used the cable for data.

I record 1-2hr training videos at work with my phone and then transfer them to my laptop for editing/publishing. The transfer to laptop takes a non-trivial chunk of the overall time.

"Significantly better" is a bit strong where you're talking about a really small size difference and a personal preference for how clicky a port should be.

Apple fans always pull that excuse out "It feels better, it sounds better, it's stronger!" and don't even think about how much e-waste and stress Lightning ports have caused over the years