That’s a strong claim. Can you back it up with hard data comparing what you claim about Apple to equivalent companies, coupled with a comparison of the sustainability efforts of those companies?
There’s no question that making electronics is not good for the environment—no modern production is. However, Apple generally does an above-average job of building quality products that don’t fail prematurely, supporting products for significant periods of time (Big Sur, which received updates until last month, runs on 10-year-old MacBook Pros), offering trade-in or recycling during every purchase, and more.
I haven’t, but I have seen the packaging for the M1 and M2 MacBook Airs, which have likely sold vastly more units, and that packaging is a marvel of minimal resource usage and sustainability.
Then allow me to suggest that you read TidBITS, where I accurately noted that the prices are the same as last year and said:
Because the iPhone 15 gains the A16 Bionic chip, 48-megapixel camera, Dynamic Island, and computational photography improvements, it’s an easier upgrade decision if you’re coming from an iPhone 12 or iPhone 13. It’s harder to recommend upgrading from an iPhone 14 that’s only a year old, but even that jump is likely something you’ll notice.
I agree. I don’t agree with the reasoning for removing the leather products, which I have always enjoyed (there’s a leather case on my iPhone as I type this). If an animal dies naturally, I don’t see why we cannot use the hide from that animal. YMMV.
Unfortunately as you get off the current releases, security patches and bug fixes are harder and harder to come by. Which presents a problem for those that want the flexibility to keep running that older hardware. You have to choose between unsupported science projects (OCLP) and unsafe. Bottom line: Apple’s software support policies don’t match the lifespan of their hardware.
If Apple really wanted to make sure we could use their products for as long as the hardware may be viable to minimize the environmental impact, then perhaps they need to be looking at a paid support option for older releases. That way, those who want/need to extend the life of that hardware can be assured they’ll get software updates because they’re funding the maintenance stream.
There are two Apples. The one that Mother Nature visits in progressive California, which is leading the way in “doing the right thing”, and the other, everywhere else, that customers visit.
Find the loading dock and trash disposal area behind your local Apple Store to see if the “other Apple” is true to its sustainability goals. (I realize this varies from store to store, mall to mall, and probably state to state.) At the one I worked, in New Jersey, cardboard shipping boxes were compacted separately into one giant container. Was that recycled? Maybe. The frequent overflow was put in a dumpster. As for all the other trash generated off the sales floor? The “Leaders” were blind and staff pretty indifferent to containers labeled “trash” or “recycle”, which always had the wrong stuff in them. At the end of the day it all went in the same dumpster. (Yes, in true Apple fashion, I provided feedback, on the issue, more than once.)
This is a big claim with little evidence supporting it. Apple’s products have always had extremely good ROI value. At my former employer there are still machines in daily use which are 15 years old. People like new things and will buy them - iPhones being the most obvious - but that’s not Apple “designing to be obsolete” - that’s consumers wanting the latest gadgets.
Apple are a business like any other and there comes a time where supporting old hardware is both uneconomical and impractical. As @ace mentioned, there’s still updates for Big Sur which can run on very old systems. If your machines aren’t exposed to security risks there’s no reason not to keep using them until the expire.
Recycling them is good, as would be sending them to 3rd world countries where they can live again. I’m not sure exactly what you want Apple to do with old products. It appears you’re saying they shouldn’t create and sell any new ones.
If they are ‘working fine’, why do they need the newest software features?
The simple option is not to purchase it. As always, the market will determine if the product is good enough.
Apple’s packaging sizes have dramatically reduced over the years. Of course it’s not solely altruistic, they get significant savings in shipping and packaging costs from doing this.
Your opinion is as valid as any other, but my opinion is it’s a little misguided.
My iPhone 8+, which I purchased immediately after the model was released in 2017, has been around for considerably longer than 5 years. The battery did drop dead about 5-6 years ago. The “genius” at the Apple Store replaced the battery quickly, and I had it covered under Apple Care. There was absolutely no attempt to try to convince me to buy a newer model. My husband has the same 8+ iPhone and never had a problem, and we both use them just about every day. My MacBook Pro is so ancient that I don’t remember when I bought it. I am so committed to my very long lasting Apple products that I am willingly and most probably incurring the Evil Eye with this information.
And Apple is a publicly traded for profit company owned by individual and institutional shareholders who want positive results.
I found the entire event boring for the first time since I’ve began watching keynotes back in the MacWorld days. The “Mother Nature” skit was the most inane thing I’ve ever seen from Apple. Oh, where were the iPads?
Yeah…I thought that was really dumb myself…but I guess they thought it fit in with all the carbon neutral marketing speak…and while reducing the carbon footprint of product x is a fine idea…it’s not really that much of a change in overall carbon problems and they carefully do the graphs or fine print to whatever is needed to put themselves in the best light. They’re not lying…just telling part of the truth and using the correct wording to make it seem like a bigger deal than it is. All companies do that though…so I’m not finding fault with Apple for doing the same thing that everybody else is doing. However…it seems almost like they’re trying to hard to be both environmentally, socially, and every other brand of…virtue signaling I guess.
In the future, companies shouldn’t have to show us grandly how they are doing their part to decrease any environmental problems, we would just expect that of them.
Is everyone else doing it? That doesn’t seem obvious to me. Obviously, there’s nothing in Apple’s announcement about independent verification of claims, but lots of companies aren’t meeting their goals.
And far fewer private companies disclose what they’re doing than public companies, and even with public companies, many don’t provide details.
And this looks like a great evaluation of Apple’s claims that both acknowledges that the company is doing better than most and explains where the claims are overhyped.
I hate to bring this up again, but reading this page it looks to me like Apple has really reduced the carbon footprint by 78% - which is great. But the last 8.1kg of carbon they are offsetting with carbon credits, and those, to me, are always a little dubious, and Apple isn’t being as transparent about what those credits exactly are - just a footnote that lists examples of the credits that they purchase, or plan to purchase. One of the offset credit sources listed in the footnote is Verra.
Almost two-thirds (32/50) of the most traded projects were certified by the US-based non-profit Verra, which operates the world’s most prominent carbon standard or registry, and included 18 forest offsetting projects known as Redd+ schemes.
Twenty-eight of the 32 Verra projects the Guardian/Corporate Accountability analysed were classified as likely junk; the other four were problematic and potentially worthless. Verra has faced mounting criticism for its methodology and lax safeguards including a Guardian investigation that found that its forest carbon offsets are mostly junk and could make global heating worse.
So I’ll applaud Apple for reducing carbon emissions so dramatically, but I think I’ll hold my applause for the carbon neutral claim for now.
I just purchased a CarLinkit 5.0 Wireless CarPlay adapter…to try out with the wired CarPlay in my wife’s Chevy Bolt. I was super-impressed. It was hard to tell any difference between the wired and wireless connection…not even in terms of response lags. And, once set up, it seamlessly switched between my iPhone and my wife’s — depending upon who was using the car.
Overall, I am prepared to drop “wireless CarPlay” as a required feature in my new car purchase. Wired CarPlay + CarLinkit seems just as good (maybe even better, as it gives me the choice to use wireless or not).
What you say is true. But when was the last time you were offered a security update? What kind of support do you get from Apple if you have issues? Will Apple repair it if it breaks? If you have a hard drive failure with you MacBook and need to replace it, will you be able to download a version of macOS that will run on it? If it is less than 10 years old will you be able to buy parts such as a keyboard? If an App gets corrupted and you don’t have a backup of it, will you be able to get a version that will run on either device? The is not necessarily a hardware failure it is the total lack of support from Apple to coerce you to buy a new device if you have issues with an older devices. It costs Apple next to nothing to keep older versions of software for older machines available yet trying to get an official version from Apple can be extremely challenging if not impossible. If the only sources are 3rd parties, the risk of flaky versions, viral marketing, hidden software sending you data somewhere, or viruses is significant. And after a certain amount of time, your older hardware is open to attacks due to Apple’s refusal to provide security updates to older hardware. Additionally much of the 3rd party security software that could be substituted is designed not to run on older machines. So in essence you are left hanging out to dry if you continue to use an older machine with no safe or affordable options for support or repair.
jweil:
In my opinion Apple is one of the least environmentally friendly companies on the planet.
That’s a strong claim. Can you back it up with hard data comparing what you claim about Apple to equivalent companies, coupled with a comparison of the sustainability efforts of those companies?
There’s no question that making electronics is not good for the environment—no modern production is. However, Apple generally does an above-average job of building quality products that don’t fail prematurely, supporting products for significant periods of time (Big Sur, which received updates until last month, runs on 10-year-old MacBook Pros), offering trade-in or recycling during every purchase, and more.
The box that my MacPro Desktop 2019 came in, which the replacement also came in a year ago almost required a reciprocal saw (Sawzall) to take it apart for recycling. It took me hours for disassembly. The trade in offered for major older equipment often won’t cover sales tax in California. Lots of places offer free recycling for computers and you don’t have to drive to an Apple Store to do it. I consider Apple’s recycling offer a marketing ploy to get you into the store to purchase new products at full price. I suspect that the ‘Apple Tax’ more than covers any recycling costs. In the case of iPhones it provides them an opportunity to refurbish them, and resell them to 3rd world countries without any support. I was told this by an Apple Support agent. I have a perfectly working MacPro 1.1 desktop hardware wise. Apple froze macOS updates at Mountain Lion. Yet with 3rd party instructions I was able to get Mavericks running on it just fine and with other 3rd party tricks I likely could get more advanced macOS to run on it if I wanted to. Apple froze my MacPro Desktop 5.1, the last of the ‘cheese graters’ at High Sierra. All it takes to get it to run more advanced macOS is a new GPU. Does Apple offer one for sale. Absolutely not. Will they support the machine if one is installed? Absolutely not. A user has to research the Internet to find a compatible GPU then ’shoehorn’ the macOS update to a perfectly good and working piece of expensive hardware. These are just some basic examples of my contention that Apple is not environmentally friendly.
jweil:
Another example: If anyone has ever seen the packaging of the MacPro 2019 7.1 computer you will totally understand what I am writing about.
I haven’t, but I have seen the packaging for the M1 and M2 MacBook Airs, which have likely sold vastly more units, and that packaging is a marvel of minimal resource usage and sustainability.
Please see above.
jweil:
Based on some reports I have read, I have been given the impression the iPhone 15 is nothing more than an iPhone 14 with a different connector and a slightly faster process which is programmed to allow some new software features to work on it, but ~$100 more expensive.
Then allow me to suggest that you read TidBITS, where I accurately noted that the prices are the same as last year and said:
Because the iPhone 15 gains the A16 Bionic chip, 48-megapixel camera, Dynamic Island, and computational photography improvements, it’s an easier upgrade decision if you’re coming from an iPhone 12 or iPhone 13. It’s harder to recommend upgrading from an iPhone 14 that’s only a year old, but even that jump is likely something you’ll notice.
I was only quoting what I read from other resources. That said what percentage of those with iPhone 12-13 actually use those features and would find them useful given the price point of the iPhone 15? History to me indicates that iPhone enhancements have mostly been small incremental mostly software enhancements over the years lacking real innovation that Apple was famous for when Steve Jobs was alive.The basic design of the iPhone has not significantly changed since it was introduced. Neither has most of Apple’s hardware. Additionally much of Apple’s GUI has significantly strayed from Apple User Interface Guidelines as developed by Bruce Tognazzini, the guru of GUI, I suspect much to his dismay. He holds many of the patients used for GUI today. If you are skeptical of this I invite your to visit the website www.asktog.comhttp://www.asktog.com/
jweil:
In reference to Apple’s, in my opinion, hypocritical claim to be environmenty sensitive and focused, I take strong issue with that. They design products to be obsolete in ~5 years coercing users to dispose of them and purchase new ones for the likely reason of increasing profits.
This is a big claim with little evidence supporting it. Apple’s products have always had extremely good ROI value. At my former employer there are still machines in daily use which are 15 years old. People like new things and will buy them - iPhones being the most obvious - but that’s not Apple “designing to be obsolete” - that’s consumers wanting the latest gadgets.
I could quote various examples but the big picture here is the lack of repairability; forced obsolesce due to ending security updates or upgradable parts; predatory marketing for minor changes and updates to existing products; challenges to obtain older versions of macOS for older machines; packaging for my MacPro 7.1 Desktop that almost took a Sawzall to take apart to recycle.
jweil:
They do this by withholding bug fixes and security updates for older products.
Apple are a business like any other and there comes a time where supporting old hardware is both uneconomical and impractical. As @acehttps://talk.tidbits.com/u/ace mentioned, there’s still updates for Big Sur which can run on very old systems. If your machines aren’t exposed to security risks there’s no reason not to keep using them until the expire.
It cost them next to nothing to maintain older macOS versions on a server for easy access. Yet try to find them if you need them. Withhold security updates from older versions older than around 5-8 years old. Big Sur is only around 3 years old which is not old. Vehicle manufacturers make parts available for 10 years or more. I still can get parts for my 20 year old Speed Queen washer. Most of Apple’s products are not user repairable and Apple makes it difficult to impossible for 3rd parties to get repair parts.
jweil:
What happens to those products? If returned to Apple for either no or minimal compensation they are either ‘recycled’, often either partly or wholly into landfills or refurbished and resold to 3rd world countries,
Recycling them is good, as would be sending them to 3rd world countries where they can live again. I’m not sure exactly what you want Apple to do with old products. It appears you’re saying they shouldn’t create and sell any new ones.
Live again while Apple provides no support and makes a second profit off the device.
jweil:
They also restrict new software features to the latest products when older models can often support them in order to sell more and higher priced products despite the fact that the older models are working fine.
If they are ‘working fine’, why do they need the newest software features?
Because often the older hardware can support it or only require minor hardware changes to support it. Why should a user have to throw away a perfectly good piece of hardware just to get a few new software features that they desire when the old hardware is capable of supporting it?
With Apple not soldering in CPU’s and RAM instead of using sockets, why should users have to be stuck with only the RAM that came with the machine if their needs change or toss the motherboard/buy a new machine if the CPU fails.?
jweil:
Based on some reports I have read, I have been given the impression the iPhone 15 is nothing more than an iPhone 14 with a different connector and a slightly faster process which is programmed to allow some new software features to work on it, but ~$100 more expensive.
The simple option is not to purchase it. As always, the market will determine if the product is good enough.
jweil:
Another example: If anyone has ever seen the packaging of the MacPro 2019 7.1 computer you will totally understand what I am writing about.
Apple’s packaging sizes have dramatically reduced over the years. Of course it’s not solely altruistic, they get significant savings in shipping and packaging costs from doing this.
I almost need a SawzAll to take apart the box the replacement MacPro Desktop 7.1 computer came in a year ago.
I was offered multiple security updates yesterday. The answer to all the other questions is yes.
That’s simply not true. I’ve had many old machine repaired by Apple service centres over the years in preference to buying new ones.
Exactly what evidence do you have that it costs next to nothing? Perhaps you could share the experience you have in developing and financing highly secure operating systems which support hundreds of millions of users and many tiers of hardware using multiple chip sets?
Getting older systems isn’t challenging at all. A simple search on Google and download from Apple. All the way back to Lion (from 2011).
It’s clear from your replies you’re more interested in ‘bashing’ Apple than having a reasonable discussion. Your talk of power saws to open a box is silly.
I’m always open to debate and learn but if you want to convince me I’ll need more than unsupported claims. I don’t think this ‘discussion’ is going anywhere so I’ll leave it to others to continue.
“The 2023 Clean 200 from nonprofit shareholder activist As You Sow and research firm Corporate Knights leveraged the Corporate Knights Sustainable Economy Taxonomy to rank the top 200 publicly-traded companies, out of a pool of 6,720 global firms, “based on rigorous assessment of the amount of revenue each company earns from products and services.”
Apple (AAPL) topped the list with $259 billion in sustainable revenue, with an estimated 71% of the tech giant’s revenue coming from sustainable sources, after not even making the list two years ago.”
Apple is a for profit, publicly traded corporation. It continues to boggle my mind when people assume Apple would function like they are a non profit or not for profit company.