>I think the part that was really upsetting is they crushed real good objects. After all of that talks about climate friendly.
Considering how much global e-waste and environmental damage, companies like Apple(and others of their size) are responsible for with their products, destroying a few objects for an ad is like spitting in the ocean in the scheme of things.
People complaining about the waste generated from this ad, are really missing the big picture, and is one of the reason companies like Apple mostly focus on posturing the image of climate friendliness and environmental sustainability, rather than actually enforcing it across their entire supply chain where it actually makes the big difference.
"Sure, the minerals in our devices are mined by kids in Congo with chemicals dangerous for the environment, and assembled by workers in sweatshop factories with suicide nets, but our posh donut-shaped HQ in Cupertino runs on 100% renewables and serves only vegan food with soy lattes, that's how environmentally conscious we are here at Hooli." </gavin_belson.jpg>
^Because this greenwashing is what people buy into from advertising.
Reminds me when Formula 1 switched form V10 engines to hybrid V6 to be more "environmentally friendly", when actually, the gas burned by those V10 engines during races only accounted for <0,2% of the total emissions, being far offset by the massive emissions of transporting that entire circus around the planet bouncing across continents all year round, yet nobody addressed that, just the engines for some cheap greenwashing.
> if Apple actually cared about the environment they'd release new models every several years instead of several times yearly
Thankfully last year’s model still works and is supported for several years. Nothing prevents you from ignoring the new models and act as if they didn’t exist.
Auto manufacturers release many new models every year and most people do not buy them all. Nor do they wish that appliance manufacturers stopped releasing new models so they could keep their fridge for longer.
> Auto manufacturers release many new models every year and most people do not buy them all. Nor do they wish that appliance manufacturers stopped releasing new models so they could keep their fridge for longer.
Generations of vehicles seem to be sold for at least half a decade, with maybe slight facelifts but largely functionally unchanged. My 20 year old truck, perhaps barring some safety features, also does basically the same job as a newer truck and drives down the same roads and so on. Thankfully the auto manufacturers haven't yet found a way to make your car or truck obsolescent in 3-5 years.
As far as appliances I swear to god I know I and a large number of other people would absolutely kill for an older Kenmore washer and dryer as they basically run forever and are easier to service. We keep jamming useless crap on everything (of course my refrigerator needs an embedded screen and internet of shit connection, so that it can spy on me and generally be another worthless shiny doodad that's going to break) while making things simultaneously harder to service. My 15 year old fridge does the exact same thing as the newer shitheap Samsung fridges they sell at big box retailers but without needing to be replaced every 5 years. Barring some marginal advances in refrigerant and insulation, some of the old stuff legitimately is better.
It's like when I read arguments such as "Aramco most polluting company in the planet by CO2" or "eating a burger pollutes more than driving an SUV for 100 miles"...
Apple, Aramco, your local butcher are merely serving your needs. Aramco ain't forcing you to buy 5L V8 trucks, and you're butcher ain't forcing you to eat beef rather than poultry or vegetables.
Apple releasing new products is just a normal tech company serving the need of users to have the latests shiny gadget, shareholders to see equity and employees and contractors having jobs.
What do I mean? While in principal I agree that many companies should do a lot more to limit their pollution, at the end of the day this pollution is a direct consequence of us average Joes neverending consumerism.
If average Joe doesn't give a damn about using public transport or using a used hybrid or to adapt his lifestyle to be less polluting, legislators and companies are gonna adapt to people not giving a damn besides whining on Twitter.
> at the end of the day this pollution is a direct consequence of us average Joes neverending consumerism.
However the subliminal advertising of big companies causing manipulation of weak human minds is what drives the never ending consumerism. Take away the ads, and the buying of crap will drop significantly.
> Apple, Aramco, your local butcher are merely serving your needs. Aramco ain't forcing you to buy 5L V8 trucks, and you're butcher ain't forcing you to eat beef rather than poultry or vegetables.
Marlboro wasn't forcing you to smoke either, yet too many people did against their own health and own best judgement, so we had to get government regulators to rule them in to protect people form damaging themselves and others with their own desires.
Just because consumers want something, doesn't mean it's what's best for them and that the capitalist free market should just be free to unregulatedly deliver whatever consumers want, at the expense of societal health or the environment, because then that's just "privatizing profits while socializing losses" with extra steps.
We also had governments regulate car emissions to save our air quality which meant engines had to be much more efficient and less environmentally damaging. All for the greater good, and few people complained about the cleaner smog- and tobacco- free air despite loosing a few HP on their engines and Marlboro selling fewer fags.
What makes you think e-waste should be exempt from such regulations?
Devil's advocate: RAM on SOCs is not upgradable due to technical limitations on frequency and latency needing the RAM chips to be as close as possible to the CPU. You can't beat physics.
I do hold them accountable for the non-upgradable SSDs, which are not needed to be soldered to achieve their full speed, and slim PCB connectors for PCI-E speed connections do exist.
>Devil's advocate: sell replacement drop-in boards and reuse the chassis.
Apple's response if regulators push for that: "Sure, that'll be 1600$ for the board please. (on an 1800$ new machine). Oh, and BTW, the board is paired to your iCloud account so you can't then re-sell it on the used market, for your own protection of course. You're welcome."
> Devil's advocate: RAM on SOCs is not upgradable due to technical limitations on frequency and latency needing the RAM chips to be as close as possible to the CPU. You can't beat physics.
That just came out, let's see if it goes anywhere and if they keep pushing it in other products, or if it's just a marketing exercise for one product, but I'm skeptical its here to stay.
I also remember how upgradable GPUs in laptops using MMX slots were pushed by Dell and a couple of others a few times 10-15 years ago, but abandoned each time.
I hope this catches on though, but like I said, I'm skeptical.
> destroying a few objects for an ad is like spitting in the ocean in the scheme of things.
I understand your point but the greater irony of the expression is that, at scale, our spitting (flushing, dumping, spewing) into the ocean has created an ecological disaster.
> destroying a few objects for an ad is like spitting in the ocean in the scheme of things
Yeah I think the biggest lesson from this is that people don't understand the amount of resources it takes to build an iPad.
Another example: Apple removing the stickers because they're plastic. A tiny tiny bit of plastic. Probably 0.001% of the plastic used in the production of an Apple device but people think it's significant because they can see it, and all the other plastic is hidden behind closed doors.
Considering how much global e-waste and environmental damage, companies like Apple(and others of their size) are responsible for with their products, destroying a few objects for an ad is like spitting in the ocean in the scheme of things.
People complaining about the waste generated from this ad, are really missing the big picture, and is one of the reason companies like Apple mostly focus on posturing the image of climate friendliness and environmental sustainability, rather than actually enforcing it across their entire supply chain where it actually makes the big difference.
"Sure, the minerals in our devices are mined by kids in Congo with chemicals dangerous for the environment, and assembled by workers in sweatshop factories with suicide nets, but our posh donut-shaped HQ in Cupertino runs on 100% renewables and serves only vegan food with soy lattes, that's how environmentally conscious we are here at Hooli." </gavin_belson.jpg>
^Because this greenwashing is what people buy into from advertising.
Reminds me when Formula 1 switched form V10 engines to hybrid V6 to be more "environmentally friendly", when actually, the gas burned by those V10 engines during races only accounted for <0,2% of the total emissions, being far offset by the massive emissions of transporting that entire circus around the planet bouncing across continents all year round, yet nobody addressed that, just the engines for some cheap greenwashing.