“Apple’s decision to remove the headphone jack from the iPhone 7 has generated its share of controversy to be sure,” Mark Rogowsky writes for Forbes. “But it’s also an illustration of a singular vision at the company (1) Find a pain point (2) Design a fix to eliminate the pain, and (3) Turn a profit doing it.”
“While Phil Schiller called the decision to remove the jack courageous, the reality is that it was pragmatic. Making the Home button offer a virtual press instead of a physical one was a necessary stop on the road to making the button disappear into the screen itself someday and the Taptic Engine makes that possible,” Rogowsky writes. “Apple needs every cubic millimeter of iPhone internals it can find, it knows users waste plenty of time fiddling with headphones, it can use its design and technical skill to fix both.”
“That the removal of the headphone jack is an inconvenience to some (albeit not much of one as a $9 adapter allows the use of existing headphones and one is included free with iPhone 7) is consistent with Apple’s history,” Rogowsky writes. “It pushes forward even in the face of criticism that it’s behaving in a user unfriendly manner.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The “outcry” over Apple removal of the antiquated 3.5mm headphone jack from iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus is shocking in its near total absence. The included adapter and the immense promise of the AirPods seem to have assuaged the expected backlash.
SEE ALSO:
Survey: 12% of U.S. consumers say they’ll buy Apple AirPods; extra $3 billion in revenue – September 29, 2016
Bill Atkinson: Why Apple’s AirPods are the best place for Siri – September 28, 2016
Apple’s response to Amazon Echo: AirPods – September 20, 2016
Apple’s AirPods make Google Glass look even more ridiculous (if that’s even possible) – September 19, 2016
Why Silicon Valley is all wrong about Apple’s AirPods – September 17, 2016
Apple CEO Tim Cook: AirPods won’t fall out of your ears (with video) – September 14, 2016
What AirPods can tell us about Apple’s future – September 12, 2016
Hands-on with Apple’s new AirPods: Stayed in my ears, sounded awesome – September 10, 2016
Apple and a truly wireless future: AirPods are just the start – September 10, 2016
Whoever makes the first AirPods strap is going to get rich – September 8, 2016
Funny no one said a thing when the Droid Moto Z came out with no headphone jack? Not a whisper but when Apple does it is is a problem Urgh!
Perhaps not many people care about the Droid Moto Z
Or perhaps some people here just aren’t being intellectually honest with themselves.
Nintendo removed the audio jack for mobile gaming devices in the past too — while sales initially didn’t suffer, users hated it, sales tapered off, and the next model implemented the headphone jack again.
Stop pretending that there are no alternatives to the iPhone 7. Once the initial rush is over, we shall see how many burnt Samsung customers come over, and if they choose the iPhone 6S, which up until a month ago was considered the best phone ever by the usual Apple fanboys. It’s still good enough for most people, and it doesn’t force dongles onto users that are just not into dongles.
You’re a dongle.
And, yes, there are no alternatives to the iPhone 7/Plus.
Completely agree!
Good point, but you have to remember, on Android, it’s not absolute and unilateral.
The Airpods will be awesome. The feel of the home button on the 7 really sucks though. Maybe I’ll get used to it, but some tactile buttons are necessary for people not to go crazy. I don’t want machines in the future that only respond to voice or whatever other detached UI they push.
I didn’t like it for maybe the first few minutes of using it but have actually grown to like it better.
I find it amusing that someone one-starred your perfectly acceptable comment. There is a lot of immaturity on this site.
Well, it looks like the mature folks rallied to improve your rating!
“I don’t want machines in the future that only respond to voice…”
A lot of moms would disagree.
I haven’t heard or read a single complaint. I can’t see how its a big deal except for connecting to power at the same time. If I used my phone in the car that might bother me on long trips but i use an old ipod classic connected to the car stereo.
Apple is almost certainly counting on people using their legacy iPhones and iPods with headphone jack to tide them over during this time of forced transition. That might work for some people, others just aren’t going to embrace the iPhone 7 yet.
Wouldn’t it have been nice for Apple to still have a large capacity iPod to offer users who want convenient portable hi fi from their own music collections that is compatible with the rest of the audio equipment on the planet?
Isn’t 14,000 songs enough?
We wont hear complaints until people start losing one Airpod.
You are wrong there because everyone will have the second Airpod for backup!!
Maybe they will have an app called find my EarPods ??
Replacing lost Airpods will be another $1-billion product category for Apple.
I need to get a few of those adaptors for my non-Bluetooth cars. But ultimately Bluetooth adaptors.
People hate change unless that change means winning the lottery. Resistance to change is childish because it requires the child, who wants to play, to become an adult who analyses and implements.
The big change is not being able to listen with wired headphones while charging. That is going to be an inconvenience. We will see if the inconvenience is so big that Belkin makes loads of money selling a charger with headphones plug on it, with mini-jack or lightening adapters in the box. That might cost $29.