Sunday, December 13, 2015

New iPhone May Ditch The Headphone Jack

There are rumors that Apple is planning to ditch the headphone jack on the next model of the iPhone, and people are freaking out. I can see why this is a big deal to some people. It seems like changing the headphone jack will just make buying headphones more difficult, considering jacks on portable devices are standardized. They all have the 3.5mm jack. (If you don’t know what this jack looks like, look at your phone for an example. Unless you have the new iPhone that didn’t come out yet, you’re looking at a 3.5mm jack.) If the new iPhone has some kind of weird different headphone jack, this is just another kind of cord to have to worry about having. What’s the big deal, Apple?

Yeah, this does seem kind of pointless, but I don’t know how we didn’t see this coming. Apple does this with EVERYTHING. Let’s talk about chargers. If you want to charge your iPhone, you have to get the special lightning cable. You can’t just use the Micro USB charger that every other smart phone charges with. Same thing goes for the MacBook chargers. They have their own special chargers that no other laptops use. This is kind of Apple’s thing. They always make their products incompatible with most other tech products. It seems like this would negatively affect buyer’s opinions.

Yes, many people probably are turned off, but I feel like a lot of Apple users actually like this incompatibility. Most people I know who have apple products have Apple everything. They seem to like that they have this reliable, stylish tech brand that they trust, so whenever they set out to buy a new tech gadget, instead of worrying about where to get it, they always turn to Apple. Instead of being just a tech company, Apple is almost branding an entire subculture. There are many buyers who have this “I’ll buy anything from Apple” mindset, and they are giving the company an insane amount of power. Apple can release pretty much whatever they want, at whatever price they want and people will buy it. I mean, it has to work and have a really sleek design, but as long as it matches those criteria, it will be a success. So maybe this new headphone jack idea does make sense.

Think about it, is having a different headphone jack really that inconvenient? To start, the majority of people who listen to music on their iPhones don’t have any special headphones. Most people probably just use the earbuds that come with the phone. This new iPhone will undoubtedly come with the new style headphones, so this entirely eliminates the problem for most people. But is this a problem for those true audiophiles out there who know a thing or two about sound? No. If they were going to drop a bunch of money on headphones anyway, why not drop the money on the headphones with the new jack?

Whether we like it or not, part of Apple’s success as a company is due to the incompatible nature of its products. So Apple fans, don’t expect anything to stay the same for too long. Apple will always be mixing it up.

Source: http://money.cnn.com/2015/11/30/technology/iphone-7-headphone-jack/index.html

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