USB-C and Lightning headphones aren't great news for everyone
I understand why manufacturers are keen to get rid of the 3.5mm jack. Phones are constantly getting thinner, and the jack isn&#x27;t. It&#x27;s also another part on the BOM that manufacturers have to allocate PCB space for and pay money for the jack.<p>But here&#x27;s the thing. 3.5mm jacks are analogue, and they&#x27;re everywhere. They&#x27;re out dated by modern standards, but overall they just work. If the industry actually cares about thickness, they&#x27;ll put a 2.5mm jack on the phone, or cut the 3.5mm jack in half (this was talked about a few years ago, but I haven&#x27;t seen any production phones implementing this).<p>As the article points out, the phone still needs a DAC and an amplifier to, you know, be a phone. Phones will typically have an earpiece speaker and a loud speaker, so you still need a DAC and amp to power those.<p>So, apart from reducing the port count (cheaper BOM, yay!) and making phones thinner, what is this really about?<p>It&#x27;s about DRM.<p>As soon as headphones are digital, manufacturers can start locking down headphones.<p>Oh, you want HiFi audio? Well, the iPhone 9AB is only HiFi certified with Beatz(TM) headphones, so those fancy Bose headphones you bought for $500 last year, yeah, those are gonna give you ear-bud quality music.