Apple is trying to pacify headphone jack loyalists with this $9 dongle
So it’s official. Apple is officially attempting the murder of the venerable headphone jack. The shot has been fired. And it doesn’t look good for the stereo mini-plug, despite its decades of loyal service.
This might be a bad idea, but it doesn’t matter, really, because the Cupertino-based company seems to enjoy the singular ability to strong-arm its customers into accepting everything from proprietary charging cables to its closed ecosystems that reject customization.
In fact, the company has often claimed to know its customers better than they know themselves, and barring an unlikely mutiny by the traditional sheep-like flocks of Apple customers, the plug will not be commuted from death row. Apple is a juggernaut in its field, and if it wants to affect a customer-hostile change, it will do so. And you’ll like it!
Naturally, Apple has an answer for people like me who are offended at this capricious anti-consumer, anti-green, anti-audiophile change: an adapter of all things! As writer Leah Finnegan’s dad mused on iMessage, via Twitter, “We were supposed to have flying cars by now. Instead we get a phone from Apple with no headphone jack.”
The adapter, or dongle, will be bundled with the new iPhone 7, as will the traditional Apple headphone, the EarPods, since the hot new AirPods are too expensive to include gratis at $159 given the standard $649 price point, and since the 5-hour battery-life may not get you through that plane ride to Europe. But you should get used to paying this price, since you will likely lose at least one. Apple’s company Beats is, of course, offering plenty of other headphone options as well.
This means that the dongle will, at least for now, not be a scarlet letter separating the wirelessly enlightened from the luddites who shame themselves by listening to their iPhone 7 via traditional methods.
By the way, if you lose that dongle, it’ll cost you $9 to replace it.
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