A while ago I saw a video by Louis Rossmann which talked about a proposal in the EU that would require batteries in phones to be removable. Mandating things like this usually isn’t a good idea, even if it’s something that I agree with. I also have very little confidence that this’ll work out in the end. Apple already seems to have an idea of how to get around the USB-C mandate. Which will most likely make the experience worse if you do not use a cable from Apple. I think that this legislation specifically states that this can’t be done with batteries, but Apple has enough money and lawyers to figure out something else.
In the video Louis talks about how people always argue that the market has decided that removable batteries are not desired since people buy phones with glued in batteries. Louis says that it’s the other way around. People buy phones with glued in batteries because they basically have no other choice since almost all new phones are designed like this. I think that it’s also important to notice that the market is driven by consumerism. My last phone lasted seven years before I finally decided to get a new one, and no it wasn’t an Apple device. When I got that phone removable batteries were still the norm, almost all Android devices had them. iPhones didn’t, and we all now that if Apple gets away with something other companies are soon to follow. Non removable batteries make it harder for normal users to change the battery once it’s reached its end of life so at that point its easier to just buy a new one. This is the business model that Apple capitalizes on which has gotten them where they are today. It simply is the most profitable approach and so everyone else follows in their footsteps since companies love money first and foremost.
Fast forward seven years and I’m looking for a phone that meets the following requirements (i.e. all things my then current phone had, just more RAM and a newer CPU):
- removable battery
- SD-Card slot
- headphone jack
- unlockable bootloader for custom ROMs
- not too big
- no stupid notch or hole-punch camera
- not six fucking cameras on the back
- decent price (I’m a cheap fuck so when I say decent I mean below $300)
- infrared (just a bonus)
If you’ve also looked for phones in the past you’ll probably know that a phone like this does not exist today so even without the bonus of something like infrared this phone is a pipe dream. But even if I was only looking for one thing, that being a removable battery it would already be nearly impossible. There are basically no new phones matching that criteria. Here’s what gsmarena shows for just this one requirement of a removable battery:
It doesn’t take long before the results show flip phones and the legendary Nokia 3310. It is that bad. However there are two options that aren’t totally outdated: the Nokia C12 (released February 2023) and the Samsung Galaxy Xcover6 Pro (released July 2022). Neither of these were around when I was looking for a phone, but I guess I could’ve gotten an older iteration of them. The problem is that I have two choices solely because I want a phone with a removable battery. This is basically the same point that Louis made in the video just that I could also just go back to flip phones instead.
The argument that you still have a choice is obviously stupid since the choice is either flip phones or a very small selection of very specific niche phones. The argument that the market decided this however is kind of true. I however had nothing to do with that. When I last bought a phone my preferences for phones was still the norm and the variety of phones that met my expectations was large. Now it’s not anymore and the reason for this is that I don’t buy a new phone every year. The consumerists shape the market and not someone who hardly ever buys anything. If I and others had kept buying phones with replaceable batteries and SD-Card slots every single year things might be different, but the whole point of having them is so that you don’t constantly need a new phone or fall for the “it’s easier to get a new one” Meme.
So who’s at fault here? I personally like to blame Apple for absolutely everything, but things are rarely ever that simple. Apple started it and it worked for them, which isn’t surprising considering that the average Apple user is fucking retarded (sorry I just can’t help myself). So nobody expected any pushback from them in that regards especially considering that they’ve been gluing their shit together basically since the very beginning. The real problems began when other companies started copying it and people just didn’t care. Arguments like “but it’s so much thinner”, “it looks better” and “it’s water resistant” were all it took to sell this change to people. We all now that that is not really true, but it doesn’t matter. When people who regularly buy new phones were presented with a new generation of phones that didn’t have replaceable batteries they bough them anyways. Why would they skip this years phone because of something like this? They will never use the phone long enough for the battery to become an issue and even if it does, they’ll just get a new one.
So these people gave the companies the green light. They signaled that the change was okay and nobody would care. Meanwhile the few people that might have cared were still using their old device and would continue to do so for a couple of years at which point they’d then be confronted with the reality that phones having glued in batteries are now the new normal.
I don’t blame any specific person that bought one of the first new Android phones with glued in batteries. I ultimately had to as well, alongside a bunch of other compromises, after realizing that there’s no chance that I’ll find a new phone that fulfills all of my requirements. The only defense I have is that by the time I was looking for a new phone the decision, on whether or not phones without removable batteries are acceptable, had already been made. The problem is that if we keep moving along with the shit that companies pull on us things won’t exactly improve unless you really only care about consuming a new product.