Want to save the earth then don’t buy that shiny new iPhone

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/18/want-to-save-the-earth-then-dont-buy-that-shiny-new-iphone

by kefabean • 5 years ago

59 67 5 years ago

Barrin92• 5 years ago

Replace my phone about every three years maybe at this point. Blowing money on a phone that really is only marginally better at this point seems both like financial and ecological waste.

foepys• 5 years ago

The phone I remember we had at home when I was little was at least 20 years old. It worked fine, did exactly what it was supposed to do and never failed.

Three years is nothing, honestly, especially since we are now starting to reach a desktop-PC-like plateau in terms of performance for smartphone SoCs.

I admire Apple's dedication to their platform, even with all the criticisms about slowing phones down with each update. For Android projects like LineageOS are life savers for old phones and should be applauded or even sponsored by governments because they enable people to now throw away their phones but keep the for years after the manufacturer drops them.

imagetic• 5 years ago

I'd like to know the average lifespan of an iPhone with Apples 26% market share vs the Android market.

Maybe it's just me...but I usually make it through about 3-4 phone releases before I break something and end up getting a new one.

This applies to most of my friends. 5-6 years is a super long run and pretty rare. But Nobody in my social circle gets a new phone ever year, and 2 years is less common now.

But I don't see any Android devices over 2 years old in the wild, ever.

I'm excluding the sad fact that replacements are a common option over repair. I'd love to see longer lifespans with repairs now that processing power is so good. But I doubt the Apple investors will ever vote for that as an option as that's planning to move away from sales numbers and reenter the repair business.

cassianoleal2• 5 years ago

I have an iPhone X. I considered replacing it for a 13 Mini because I find the X very large and heavy, and uncomfortable to use with one hand. Otherwise I have no reasons to replace it. I have recently replaced its battery (same-day repair for £60 or £70) so it lasts as long as it did when I bought the phone.

When they replace lightning with USB-C I'll be very tempted though.

megraf• 5 years ago

I'm in the same boat as you. I think the iPhone X was the last 'great' iPhone. 3D Touch is part of my daily routine. Yes, I know you can just hold and tap on the new phones, but can you weigh things on your screen (even if it's hysterically inaccurate!)?

seb12042• 5 years ago

3 months ago I upgraded from my OnePlus 3T to a second hand OnePlus 7T. I bought the 3T when it came out, around early 2018 My reasons for the upgrade where mainly the camera which did no longer work at all. I did replace the camera module 2 years ago and probably did not do a great job though. I never had issues with broken or cracked screens so far and always wonder why as this seems to be a widely spread issue. So I guess the user plays a big role in longevity aspects.

plastic_bag• 5 years ago

Didn't the OnePlus 3T come out in late 2016?

nichos• 5 years ago

Of course this is antidotal, but in my circle the android users generally keep their phones for 4+ years. I'm on a pixel 3 I bought new right now. Whereas, the iPhone users are more interested in the latest iPhone, and the apple keynote hype.

The only reason I ditched my old Android was the battery couldn't make it half a day.

aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA• 5 years ago

Was it impractical to replace the battery?

tarsinge• 5 years ago

Well in my circles I see more Android users being the type looking at specs and upgrading frequently. I see people buying Apple for durability, like I’m currently typing that on a 1st gen SE. Previously it was a long run with the iPhone 4S while my friends on Android had to change their at least 3 times. Sure that Xiaomi or Nexus/Pixel had great specs, too bad they broke fast or stopped receiving updates after 2 years.

AnonC2• 5 years ago

But I doubt the Apple investors will ever vote for that as an option as that's planning to move away from sales numbers and reenter the repair business.

Well, at least one institutional Apple investor has raised a proposal for the right to repair recently. [1]

[1] https://www.greencentury.com/green-century-shareholder-propo...

Jap2-0• 5 years ago

I suppose this is all anecdotal, and probably depends on your circles as well. But personally:

I'm (very gradually) switching from a 2014 Android phone to a 2017 Android phone, both secondhand. I'd like something that can run Lineage OS (and wasn't entry-level several years ago), but both still manage most of what I need.

Most people I know with Android phones keep them at least 3-4 years. (Off the top of my head: one switched from his Windows phone a couple years ago, another has an old Samsung one with a physical home button.)

Similar with Apple: I know one person who will not give up his 6s until Apple stops supporting it (and only begrudgingly then); I know a number of other people with the 6s, and one with the new SE.

That said, I'm pretty sure all of that comes more from the perspective of money than saving the earth.

Edit: somewhat unrelated, but I hear a lot of people mention how Apple is much better with OS updates. That's true (although Lineage helps, and manufacturers are getting slightly better), but app support for old versions of iOS is horrendous. I almost never see support for more than 2 old versions of iOS, if that. Meanwhile, ~85% of apps run fine on Android 4.4 and half or so get updates, and just about all do on Android 6.

acmd• 5 years ago

I've had to jump through hoops recently to update my Android from 7 to 8, because Slack announced that it was going to stop supporting it starting from September.

Mind you, the last Android 7 version was released in Q1 2017, while the last Android 8 version is Q4 2017.

ksec• 5 years ago

I'd like to know the average lifespan of an iPhone

Not Lifespan, but average upgrade cycle of iPhone is roughly 3.5 years. If you consider a not small percentage of user upgrade their mobile per their contract cycle, the median of iPhone usage is roughly 4+ years.

But I don't see any Android devices over 2 years old in the wild, ever.

I dont know if that is true. Most data suggest Android keep their phone 3 - 4 years as well.

meristohm• 5 years ago

The author notes the Fairphone 3+ as a reasonable alternative to “no user-serviceable parts inside” devices. What would need to happen for such devices in general to be the norm? Universal Basic Income to meet our basic needs so we’re less incentivized to extract as much as possible from the earth and life here?

Going without and doing with less feels like a great step towards a healthier ecosystem.

seb12042• 5 years ago

I was tempted to buy one but the hassle to go though to do this from Australia was the reason I opted for a second hand OnePlus 7T one from the neighbourhood. Pretty happy with it

kashkhan• 5 years ago

yearly iphone replacement costs $1 a day. Cheaper than your daily latte. Hate to break it to you, but $1 a day won't save the earth.

moralestapia5• 5 years ago

Hmmm ... yes? Actually ...

If you instead gave that $1USD/day to whatever carbon ofsetting startup out there you would neutralize your carbon footprint and even go into "negative emissions" territory.

So yes, that dollar could save the earth.

vosper2• 5 years ago

Greenpeace claims that carbon offsetting doesn’t really work

https://www.greenpeace.org.uk/news/the-biggest-problem-with-...

adrianN3• 5 years ago

Carbon offsetting as it is sold today is mostly a scam.

nemosaltat• 5 years ago

How do you arrive at that number? Is that assuming a trade-in?

tcmart14• 5 years ago

I think it comes from the program that apple has. I think instead of financing the device, you can do the 'iPhone forever' plan where you pay $30/month and can upgrade at any time.

Edit: Here is the link. Looks like the price went up, but when it started I remember it being $30/month. https://www.apple.com/shop/iphone/iphone-upgrade-program

oh_sigh• 5 years ago

Trade-in math works even better. iPhone 11 came out in 09/2019 for $699. Two years later you can trade it in for $340, making those two years cost less than 50 cents per day.

georgyo• 5 years ago

If you lived in a vacuum, your dollar a day is not impactful.

But let's look at the US alone. The 2020 census says there are 258 million adults over the age of 18. If all of them followed your model then that would be 95 billion dollars a year. That is an amount of money that could do a lot of good or a lot of harm.

Looking at stuff at the micro level doesn't look impactful. But human behavior at the macro level is very impactful.

The decision to not change personal behavior because your action by itself does not make an impact is a way to rationalizing a death of a billion cuts.

bratcomplex• 5 years ago

Still rockin the original iPhone se. I’ve shown friends/others, with a little patients, replacing a screen/battery/port is fairly simple and cheap. the “new” feeling, and the feeling that you “cheated” the system wash over you... it’s great

dandotway2• 5 years ago

We hit peak cell phone back around 2015. Indeed, the older phones have a nice privacy feature the new ones don't: they are too old for Apple and Google to bother quietly rolling out their 'think of the children' spyware on, which, once installed, will be used to determine who photographed police brutality at protests, who photographed a senator with a young intern, who photographed Chinese PLA soldiers hauling those with 'low social credit scores' to Re-education Through Labor camps.

Unless you crack the phone's screen and the battery is shot, there's no point in buying a new one. I'll buy another used one on Amazon, eBay, or Craigslist when I must.

I use a 2014 mobile phone. It has a good camera with Optical Image Stabilization, just like brand new $1000+ phones. It has a high density retina display that displays razer sharp text, just like new phones. It can load all the web pages people read and all the most popular apps, just like new phones.

AnonC2• 5 years ago

We hit peak cell phone back around 2015.

It depends on what you mean by “cell phone”, and no, we surely didn’t hit the peak in 2015. We’ve had tremendous improvements in cellular technology, data speeds, camera and many other features. If you include Android in this, privacy and good app permissions control was almost non-existent on it in 2015, and has only improved at a better pace in the years after it (incrementally).

dandotway2• 5 years ago

But those improvements aren't worth buying a new phone for most of us, as the existing camera and speed is just fine for messaging, reddit, twitter, all the most common smartphone stuff. Also, the newest phones still cripple mobile WebGL game development so that gamedevs can't bypass the App Store 30% commission.

It's just like how buying a shiny new car is pointless for most of us: old cars get us from home to the grocery store and back just as fast, they have airbags and crash safety testing, etc. Older cars are also less likely to have broken software updates than newer "smart cars", too. In rural areas farmers pay premium prices for 40+ year old tractors because they don't have the anti-right-to-repair electronic doodads that ensure only dealers can service the thing.

nikau2• 5 years ago

2015 was when phones became "good enough" - the galaxy S6 of that era had 3gb ram, 1440x2560 display, decent camera, 301 Mbps LTE, etc.

Sure newer phones are better, in particular low light cameras, but most apps outside of latest games still run fine on the S6.

jobigoud2• 5 years ago

What kind of privacy or app permission control am I missing with my 2015's Galaxy S6? Honest question, I've never felt the need to upgrade.

m3nu• 5 years ago

Shoutout to the good folks at LineageOS[1] and PixelExperience[2]. They are really a key piece in extending the life of old, but perfectly working phones by keeping up with security updates in Android (but not in proprietary firmware).

Generally I just donate to them instead of buying new phones.

There is also a German startup[3] selling second-hand phones with warranty, but I don't see them dealing with outstanding software updates.

1: https://lineageos.org/

2: https://download.pixelexperience.org/

3: https://www.refurbed.de/

adrianN3• 5 years ago

I bought a used iPhone because I expect it to get software updates for a couple more years. I stopped using the Android phone I used previously when SSL broke due to a lack of updates. I really hate that mere software limits the useful lifetime of my devices.

ARandomerDude2• 5 years ago

My wife and I had similar experiences with LG, Samsung, and HTC. Then we switched to the Pixel 2 and have been with the brand ever since. The contrast is so bold that instead of thinking Apple vs Android, people should really think Apple vs Custom Android vs Google Android.

After extensive work experience with the iPhone and personal experience with Pixels, I won't buy an iPhone or non-Pixel Android for the foreseeable future.

Disclaimer: I work for a company only some on HN have heard of, and have no affiliation with or direct financial interest in any major device manufacturing company.

nikau2• 5 years ago

Samsung have improved by committing to security updates for at least 4 years.

This is confirmed as my 2017 galaxy s8 is still getting security updates this year.

webwielder2• 5 years ago

I’m always confused when people focus on Apple when it comes to waste. Aside from Apple’s best in class environmental practices, are people aware of the mind bogglingly large amount of crap that gets produced and disposed of every second of every day? Plastic bottles alone.

nverno3• 5 years ago

A couple reasons come to mind: the size of the company and the short lifecycle of fancy products. There is no doubt people could squeeze an extra decade or so out of most phones before they upgrade. I'm still on my 5s, for example, and aside from software being outdated it still runs fine.

tomc1985• 5 years ago

A decade? So that iPhone 4 I purchased around 2011 should be a viable phone up until about now or so?

As a pure phone, sure, but I don't think it'd be able to run much, even if its OS was still being updated.

stephen_g• 5 years ago

The ‘short lifecycle’ is a common idea, but it doesn’t match my experience. I think few people actually upgrade their iPhone every year or two, and if they are then they’re probably selling it or trading it in (in which case I assume it’s refurbished and re-used) because it has years left of life in it.

My friends who have Android phones seem to upgrade them almost twice as often as I upgrade my iPhone (about every four years). I’m still using my mid-2015 MacBook Pro for work every day, it’s a little long in the tooth so I will upgrade early next year (assuming there is a new Apple Silicon model around the end of this year). That will be six and a half years of heavy use out if it, which is longer than most laptops I’ve had from other brands have lasted…

landemva• 5 years ago

Have not seen this mentioned yet: FCC frequency changes pushed me to replace an aging phone which was having the supported frequencies phased out.

cagey• 5 years ago

Similarly AT&T shutting down their 3G in 2022 network is forcing a significant number of acquaintances (who are ATT MVNO customers) to replace perfectly good (4G LTE capable Android) phones because AT&T is using this event to require all network-attached devices to be HD Voice (aka VoLTE?) capable going forward [0].

[0] https://www.att.com/support/article/wireless/KM1324171/

etaioinshrdlu• 5 years ago

I assume the environmental impact is kind of peanuts compared to buying a car.

gumby• 5 years ago

This is nonsense. Devices with long life / good resale value sell more and/or can charge a premium (think German luxury models). This is true of iPhones as well, as even described in the article. Like the author I used an iPhone 6 until a few months after the 12 came out. I don’t see Apple driving “planned obsolescence”.

There is tons of cheap tat out there but high end phones are a peculiar target.

thedrbrian• 5 years ago

Well given that it’s replacing a 6s plus I think I’m ok.

bsharitt• 5 years ago

Android should be the focus of this. I’d be upgrading every two years with most android manufacturers, and maybe a year or two more with a Pixel, but I’ve got an iPhone XR than I probably won’t even think about upgrading until the iPhone 15 but will have to think about it because my XR will still be getting updates. The Pixel 3a is the closest Pixel Android contemporary to my phone and has been been in the new lately due to random bricking so… iPhones aren’t perfect but it’s been a while since I’ve needed to jailbreak to do something I’ve needed to do.

foxpurple2• 5 years ago

It’s unreal the difference. Almost every one of my android devices has bricked, failed in some other way, or become unusable due to a lack of updates while my apple devices have lasted so long that they become completely obsolete hardware wise long before they stop getting updates.

I have a 2015 MacBook Air and a 2014 iPad which both still receive updates and work fine while my 2017 pixel phone is unsupported and stopped booting recently. My nexus 5X also bricked and stopped getting updates shortly after release.

hdjjhhvvhga• 5 years ago

If we're talking anecdata, my original Samsung Galaxy Note (I think the first dual-core smartphone?) still does fine, whereas my iPhones from that period (4, 4S, 5) are all unusable now, in spite of replacing batteries in them (sometimes - several times). The most annoying was the failure of the Home button and, in the 5, the lightning socket.

But all this does not matter much. What's important for me is that if I wanted, I could still develop apps for the Galaxy Note, whereas it's practically impossible to develop apps for discontinued iPhones, even if they continue to work perfectly fine.

karmakaze• 5 years ago

Comparing many Android phone manufacturers to one iPhone manufacturer is apples to oranges. I've used a Nexus 6P (would have kept it longer if it accepted a memory card), an LG G6, and an LG G8 (still my current) as long or longer than those with iPhones around me as they tend to updated so they can 'have the latest'. Android devices aren't as differentiated in the hardware (from my perspective) and choosing a manufacturer that has a good OS update policy is really all it takes.

brokencode• 5 years ago

Almost every phone I’ve ever replaced has been resold to somebody else to live a longer life. I assume this happens again and again until the phone is broken and is no longer worth fixing.

Is this not the case? I mean, we can’t all buy used phones all the time. Somebody at some point in time has to buy a new phone.

My current phone is going to be sold at a steep discount to one of my friends who has a smashed phone from like 4-5 years ago. It’s not like it’s going to the landfill.

I do agree though that iPhones should be more repairable, such that battery and screen replacements are more affordable. That way, my friend might have been able to repair his phone instead of replacing it.

zaptheimpaler• 5 years ago

The larger point is that we have to reduce consumption to make a dent in climate change. The old slogan was "reduce, reuse, recycle" where reduce and reuse come first. But that requires giving up luxuries or learning to repair stuff which is much harder than sorting your trash a little bit while continuing the same consumption patterns - I think that's why reduce/reuse are largely forgotten now and the focus is on recycling. Meanwhile there's data showing most stuff thrown in recycling ends up as trash anyways because sorting and recycling is prohibitively laborious and expensive in most cases.

stoicjumbotron• 5 years ago

Bought my OnePlus 2 in 2016 and after the official software support ended in 2017/2018, I unlocked the bootloader and I'm since running a custom ROM and using it till now. Runs like a charm.

devwastaken• 5 years ago

I remember here apple employees truly believed in apples environmental mission, but could not resolve their cognitive dissonance in how apple actually operates. Big lithium batteries, significant incentives for whole device replacements when inexpensive design defects or damage require repair. And apples incredible, evil efforts to thwart the consumers ability to get the most life out of their products. Apple pays senators and city councilors to vote against right to repair, btw. They hire PR companies that will make false testimony and meet with your leaders behind closed doors. Commonly called "corruption".

Apple is the wealthiest company in the world, and if truly innovators could make their environmental goals a reality. Sadly, it's marketing, like everything else. It's about the fastest and coolest car, and always has been.

bryceacc• 5 years ago

Big lithium batteries

https://www.tomsguide.com/news/iphone-12-battery-life-result...

??? iphones have been barely breaking past 3xxx mAh and flagship android phones are breaking 5xxx mAh now.

also seems to me that they sell a lot of refurbs or recycle much of it when phones in decent quality are traded in, but yes that is a lot of their marketing speak

icha• 5 years ago

Not sure why the author targets Apple as his primary planned obsolescence criticism subject. They've actually made the whole product life-cycle as eco-friendly as possible, from working with zero-emission partners only to launching a proper device recycling program. Other e-waste producing companies could learn from them.

forgotmypw17• 5 years ago

I didn't read the article, but I agree with the headline.

After I spent a couple of years minimizing my "upkeep", and my spending had already gone down to almost nothing, I started thinking about the "sum expenditure" which goes into new items which I was still buying.

Even something as simple as a bag of lentils is composed of farming, transportation, packaging, transportation for the packaging, transporting of the packaged lentils, and the packaging for the packaging.

If I can get something already manufactured, like this very nice 2008 iMac I'm using to write this, I'd much rather use that than be complicit in "undersigning" all that goes into a new one.

Want to save the earth then don’t buy that shiny new iPhone

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