iPhone 6 flip tip slips in Aussie's clip: Apple's 'reversible USB' leaks

Standards?

We've heard of them.

"The nice thing about standards is there are so many to choose from" :)

You only need to take one look at the photo to realise that this claim is complete bollocks...

Tripp Lite made these a long time ago. The middle part is thin enough to fit in either way and has the metal contacts on both sides so it will ALWAYS work. I know it's only 9 in the morning right now, so drink some coffee and take a peek at the USB port on your laptop and then you'll get it. End of discussion.

The problem with the USB plug & socket...

...is the number of different size & shape plug/sockets combinations. To cover every possible device-A to device-B socket combination you would need 21 different cables, albeit some deprecated. Why not have a single full size and single mini/micro socket/plug? Like unburdening the legacy of x86, ISA et al, these standards organisations should really be called lowest common denominater, commercially motivated, compromise committees. The one thing they never achieve is a true technically perfect standard.

The other prevalent problem is that many USB cables are NOT marked right way up or down, and even those that are tend to be very inconspicuously marked, usually lightly embossed into black plastic which is next to invisible. The obvious way forward would be to blatantly colour code one side of the socket and plug as well as embossing. Device manufacturers would put the colour side of socket either up or down depending on the standard, and people would quickly learn which way to orient the colour side of the plug. Sideways out of sight USB ports would be no different to today, but they are the least likely use case for USB sockets in modern consumer devices.

*shrug*

Normally, I love slamming Apple for gratuitously and unnecessarily using non-standard plugs for no good reason. And I still do. For instance, running thunderbolt on the device end is still dumb.

But, if the goal on the other end of the cable is a reversible USB cable? It makes much more sense to do what Apple did (make a reversible USB cable) than to go with USB type C (apparently reversible, but not compatible with any existing USB connectors.)