As a consumer, the USB-C mandate is amazing and I wish it had been given as soon as USB-C became available.

Neat! I guess you’ll be advocating for whatever the next advancement in USB ports is becoming mandated as soon as it’s available, too?

Anything that reduces e-waste, yes.

Really, a brand new plug becomes available today, the EU mandates its usage and you think that reduces e-waste?

Yes. What makes you think that it has no effect on, or even increases, e-waste?

Sure, why not?

We won't need backwards incompatible advancements in this space for awhile, you seem grumpy that the EU is doing good for consumers rather than mega corporations.

I find it hard to believe that a good use of the EU’s time is regulating USB-C.

Yes! Changing plug standard every 10 years and some cables that work with everything beats alternatives.

Fuck, imagine if every devices you ever owned for last 30 years needed total of 3 different cables to connect, it would be fucking amazing.

> Fuck, imagine if every devices you ever owned for last 30 years needed total of 3 different cables to connect, it would be fucking amazing.

It basically does. USB-A, USB-C, Lightning, Micro-USB.

That...doesn't cover anywhere close to everything back to 1993, which would be 30 years.

Only back to ~2010 which is exactly when the EU introduced the mandate.

Lightning was introduced in 2012 lmao. Apple used other proprietary connectors before

Stop bullshitting. 4 wouldn't even cover connectors for apple stuff

Personally I’m uncomfortable that a centralised government is “choosing the winner” rather than having the standards duke it out on the open market.

In this case, USB-C is pretty much expected to win and be the dominant standard - even Apple was already moving towards it way before the mandate - but it’s the principle of it.

In what other area will the EU elect itself to “choose the winner” next? The whole thing sets a bad precedence and opens up the possibility of corruption - which the EU isn’t immune to.

This kind of regulation is one of the most basic functions of government, without which trade between states and countries becomes much more difficult. Of all the things a government can do, requiring certain standards on things like connector types seems the most reasonable.

Does the government really knows what the market wants in a standard?

Some people will benefit from their standard being chosen as the winner. This is just corruption waiting to happen.

It’s fine I guess if the standards are functionally identical or the market has already clearly chosen what it wants by mass adopting said standard - USB-C has not reached that state yet - and the government is just “making it official” - ideally in addition to the standard being unlikely to change for a very very long time.

How would you feel if the US government mandated Windows for all desktops and servers and Android for all mobile devices? It improves interoperability …

Or perhaps mandate all programs be written in C++ … again interoperability.

It's true that governments can overreach, and frequently do. What I'm saying those is that when it comes to enforcing standards, the basic ability of a government to do so is fine as it's commonly used for immensely beneficial reasons (as in, industries often want the government to regulate a standard and to sign international agreements regulating certain standards because it often makes it way easier to sell and transfer between regions). The standard should be evaluated on its own merits as opposed to a generic opposition to the government setting standards at all, which I see as deeply flawed.

What concerns me is the government’s ability to evaluate said merits and their responsiveness to market changes that would require a change in the standard. We have plenty of example where governments got it very wrong - see the USSR.

In this case it’s easy. But the next standard, should the the choice no longer be so clear cut between competing standards with their pros and cons. It would also be interesting to see how the EU determines when we should switch to a successor. Why should a bunch of old people in Brussels who in all likelihood can barely operate a smartphone be the ones deciding these matters?

There is also the issue of corruption - which is still fresh in my mind; see Qatar and the EU parliament. As such I rather nigh dictatorial power not be unnecessarily placed in the hands of governments.

Right… so we won’t have any regulation on wall socket design or voltages then, I guess. It’ll be great!

Government also "chose the winner" with power sockets in the walls, mains voltage, width of roads, railway gauge and even the units you're allowed to put the milk carton in.

Those bastards, standardizing interoperability and making sure market is open for new competition!

See you in five years. Good luck with the government intervention.