this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2024
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[complete transcription so that you do not need to visit X]

A crazy experience — I lost my earbuds in a remote town in Chile, so tried buying a new pair at the airport before flying out. But the new wired, iPhone, lightning-cable headphones didn't work. Strange.

So I went back and swapped them for another pair, from a different brand. But those headphones didn't work either. We tried a third brand, which also didn't work.

By now the gift shop people and their manager and all the people in line behind me are super annoyed, until one of the girls says in Spanish, "You need to have bluetooth on." Oh yes, everyone else nods in agreement. Wired headphones for iPhones definitely need bluetooth.

What? That makes no sense. The entire point of wired headphones is to not need bluetooth.

So I turn Bluetooth on with the headphones plugged into the lightning port and sure enough my phone offers to "pair" my wired headphones. "See," they all say in Spanish, like I must be the dumbest person in the world.

With a little back and forth I realize that they don't even conceptually know what bluetooth is, while I have actually programmed for the bluetooth stack before. I was submitting low-level bugs to Ericsson back in the early 2000's! Yet somehow, I with my computer science degree, am wrong, and they, having no idea what bluetooth even is, are right.

My mind is boggled, I'm outnumbered, and my plane is boarding. I don't want wireless headphones. And especially not wired/wireless headphones or whatever the hell these things are. So I convince them, with my last ounce of sanity, to let me try one last thing, a full-proof solution:

I buy a normal wired, old-school pair of mini-stereo headphones and a lightning adapter. We plug it all in. It doesn't work.

"Bluetooth on", they tell me.

NO! By all that is sacred my wired lightning adapter cannot require Bluetooth. "It does," they assure me.

So I turn my Bluetooth on and sure enough my phone offers to pair my new wired, lightning adapter with my phone.

Unbelievable.

I return it all, run to catch my plane, and spend half the flight wondering what planet I'm on. Until finally back home, I do some research and figure out what's going on:

A scourge of cheap "lightning" headphones and lightning accessories is flooding certain markets, unleashed by unscrupulous Chinese manufacturers who have discovered an unholy recipe:

True Apple lightning devices are more expensive to make. So instead of conforming to the Apple standard, these companies have made headphones that receive audio via bluetooth — avoiding the Apple specification — while powering the bluetooth chip via a wired cable, thereby avoiding any need for a battery.

They have even made lightning adapters using the same recipe: plug-in power a fake lightning dongle that uses bluetooth to transmit the audio signal literally 1.5 inches from the phone to the other end of the adapter.

In these remote markets, these manufacturers have no qualms with slapping a Lightning / iPhone logo on the box while never mentioning bluetooth, knowing that Apple will never do anything.

From a moral or even engineering perspective, this strikes me as a kind of evil. These companies have made the cheapest iPhone earbuds known to humankind, while still charging $12 or $15 per set, pocketing the profits, while preying on the technical ignorance of people in remote towns.

Perhaps worst of all, there are now thousands or even millions of people in the world who simply believe that wired iPhone headphones use bluetooth (whatever that is), leaving them with an utterly incoherent understanding of the technologies involved.

I wish @Apple would devote an employee or two to cracking down on such a technological, psychological abomination as this. And I wish humanity would use its engineering prowess for good, and not opportunistic deception.

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[–] [email protected] 139 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I don't understand why you don't blame Apple first of all for their methods of locking up open standards and/or modifying them just enough that non-apple products won't work.

I don't support Chinese companies for doing shitty products, but fuck Apple for everything they do to lock you in their "ecosystem."

[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Yeah, I feel like oop reached the wrong conclusion after this. Apple treats its consumers as if they were mindless children and they (for some reason) love it. Just look at the whole "green texts" issue, for example.

Some manufacturers found a smart workaround but the apple brainrot is stronger, I guess.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

I wouldn't call this a "smart workaround". I mean, I can hardly blame the opportunistic fucks for doing it this way, and certainly the original sin in Apple's licensing/certification bullshit, but it's just an amazingly stupid way of doing this all around, brought about by both Apple's and the earbud manufacturers' greed.

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[–] [email protected] 77 points 1 year ago

Stupidity at its finest. The whole point of cheap 3rd party apple accessories is to use workarounds to get past apple DRMs and use them without paying the apple tax.

Blame apple foremost for creating such a market in the 1st place. You don't need such workarounds in other phones because they just work.

[–] [email protected] 66 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Wow that sucks. I'm glad I'm not in the apple ecosystem.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, this would never work on Android! Oh, wait…

[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It wouldn't because USBC doesn't have those expensive standard requirements.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (2 children)

And you can still get (non-flagship) phones with the fucking 2.5mm jack

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah. With non-pixel phones you can still get SD cart slots, headphone jacks, etc. I think motorola still has cheaper phones that has those things.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I wish I could still get a higher end phone with an SD card slot. I'm holding onto my s20 ultra (I like the pen) until I'm forced out for security update reasons.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The only flagship phone I know that has all the features (3.5mm, SD card,...) is the Xperia 1 series, and those are kinda expensive, sadly.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Yeah. I have t mobile, so the xperia 1 V, and the newly released but not officially sold in the US xperia 1 VI would work, but rare phones tend to lack support, amd I can't bring myself to shell out $1400 for a phone like that.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

I haven't seen a 2.5mm jack on a phone in a long time. I still have a 2.5 to 3.5mm adapter that I used to listen to music on my flip phone in 2006 though.

[–] [email protected] 63 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I lost my earbuds in a remote town in Chile, so tried buying a new pair at the airport before flying out.

...

True Apple lightning devices are more expensive to make.

...

I wish @Apple would devote an employee or two to cracking down on such a technological, psychological abomination as this.

He wants to take away a budget option from developing countries where people can't afford the expensive version of the proprietary technology, and he wants Apple to be the one to do it?

Fuck this guy.

[–] [email protected] 50 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Idk....seems like the average apple user to me.

Trillion dollar company Apple is right and can do no wrong.

It's all those other people who need to do better.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

~~I suspect the ranting author failed to appreciate that Bluetooth is probably cheaper to implement for the audio because regular headphones require three wires while power supply only requires two. Ingenious really.~~

~~EDIT: Proper wired headphones would also require a soundcard in the dongle.~~

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

There is a soundcard in the bluetooth headphones and wires are dirt cheap, it's not about that. Proper lightning headphones require getting your product certified by apple ($$$) and a special apple chip added in ($$$) because iPhones refuse to connect to devices that aren't.
But they will connect to all bluetooth devices.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does he want to take a budget option away? At one point he says “And they still charge $12” to me that says that’s close to what proper wired earbuds should cost. People are getting screwed buying something that should have higher sound quality and getting the cheapest Bluetooth quality instead.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

He was in the airport, remember. Not in a local market.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

Not only an airport, but elsewhere would likely not have been able to negotiate to same prices as a local. Sticker price is almost always the foreigner price, at least when it's matching or higher than the price one would pay back home.

I'm almost certain I've seen $5 "lightning" headphones here in the midwestern US.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Sure, but I have no idea what prices to expect in Chile, airport or otherwise. Just trying to extract some info by the author’s choice of wording.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nah, it should be like the audio jack, you plug in the headphomes with no proprietary bullshit...Apple is locking poor people out of this easy method by being dicks about lightning connec tors. Im glad EU forces them to USB-c but Apple will probably lock devices out on this also

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (2 children)

The iPhone 15 has been out for over half a year now and people still spread this FUD. The iPhone 15 does nothing special with its USB C port.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Also I mention apple locks poor people out of headphones and you reply IPhone 15 is out. You realize many people can not afford a brand new iphone just because it came out?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Every iPhone has been expensive on release. As time goes on more and more people get newer and newer phones. And what was new and expensive becomes cheap and available.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Not so much in places like Brazil, Africa, India etc. you can get a cheap Android phone for $25 but iPhone is still a premium luxury. The new phone every two years is a privalege thing.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Yet... have you tried a non apple USB headset to see if it works? Just becauae you have USB doesn't neccessaeily mean kernel allows all devices. But even if it works to placate EU now have you noticed that all giant companies start out with something that is OK, then later alter the deal, once you are trapped.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Any USB-C headphones work.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I have tried the Google earbuds, they work, even in the terrible condition that they're in after 5+ years of rough use

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The guy was having a funny geeky bitch. He was laughing at himself. ~~He doesn't expect Apple to change anything.~~

EDIT: I think you are right, that last paragraph of his is weirdly serious. Would have been pure comedy without it.

[–] [email protected] 61 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Apple puts a DRM chip in their peripherals, the fault for this happening is mostly on them.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 year ago

That is actually kind of brilliant. Having to go through MFi and getting the Apple DRM chip into the manufacturing pipeline can be a real pain (and expensive).

With this scheme, they could also run all the wired on/off and volume control actions through Bluetooth AVRCP. Even have a Mic on the wire, so if a call comes in, switch to HFP to talk/manage the call.

Damn, that's clever. Hats off to whoever came up with it.

Incidentally, there's very little Apple can do to make this stop, unless they decide to break Bluetooth and third-party accessories.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

They are buying cheap earbuds and rant about cheap manufacturing. Doesn't make sense. I think it's a genius solution to avoid ridiculous licensing costs. Also why does it matter if the audio goes through the cable or wireless? In this price range it all sounds like shit.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Those earbuds are not so great for flight mode.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

Even if it's a nice solution the licensing issue, they are still deceiving their users. I don't think I have seen anything like them but they should be clear that they are bluetooth.

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (2 children)

As horrified as I was to read this, it is a little exciting to think that I live in a world where Bluetooth radios are so inexpensive that building it that way is cheaper

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't want to rain on your parade, but maybe that's more of an indictment about ridiculous licensing costs for lightning

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

LOL. Not in this case. Cheap headphones do not pay Apple a dime. And Apple can’t go after every little headphone manufacturer they have real things to deal with like entire knock off Apple Stores that push millions of dollars a month.

In this case, the answer is less insidious. It’s the batteries. These headphones have BT but no batteries, hence why they are wired (need the power).

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why do they need Bluetooth at all though? Why not pull the audio through the Lightning plug like official Apple accessories do?

If I had to take a guess, it's because the audio signal coming out of the Lightning port is encrypted because Apple hates everyone who isn't them

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Two reasons. One, it’s actually expensive to wire up lightning to audio. Because the connection is digital, not analogue like the headphone jack. Two Apple can detect data thru software and even disable it, leaving the headphones useless. Why would they? Because you didn’t apply for their mifi program and pay them. These headphones don’t have data, they just plug directly into power.

Its basically how they bypass the “Apple tax.”

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Bluetooth's digital too, my guy. You need a digital-analog converter either way. It's just that when you use the Lightning port for audio you don't also need a Bluetooth radio. Besides, USB DAC chips are like a dollar.

Also you just proved my point that they only did this to avoid licensing fees.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

They are cheaper than batteries. The cost of shipping and adding batteries to the production line. They are volatile and require strict regulation so most cheap manufacturers just don’t want the hassle. That’s why it needs power. It has BT, but no battery.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)
  • Plug lightning cable of faux-wired headphones into a charger brick.
  • Turn on Bluetooth and connect the faux wired headphones via BT while it not being connected to the phone via cable.

TAKE THAT, SMARTASS REMOTE CHILEANS VILLAGERS!!!

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I would love to see the looks on their poor faces when they witness this.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I can tell you what they will look like. They'll be as convinced as in OPs article that they are still right and say "see, I told you!"

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Or next thing ya know, it turns out the brick has bluetooth too and is required to connect to the phone in order to charge it during normal use, so OP'd have to pair it with the phone as well in order to power the headphones, further reinforcing the locals.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

Everybody bashing this guy.

First of all, he is an Apple user... What do you expect?

Bet he was happy to pay cheaper price and disappointed to be... Tricked into buying something of the same value he was paying for?

Hard to stay serious on apple brainwashed guys.

At the same time, interesting to learn how even the most idiotic restrictions are always bypassed one way or the other. This fills me with hope for the future.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Dude is just upset he lost his expensive earbuds.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I got second-hand annoyance for the people standing behind this guy in line while he argues with the clerks and tries to flex his "computer science degree", only to be proved wrong again and again. Is there a techbro equivalent to a Karen?

I mean he's not wrong, wired bluetooth earphones are a weird thing! But I'm getting huge Redditor vibes off this dude and I mean that in the worst possible way

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