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Apple needs to return its beloved features to iPhones

Apple has made a series of regrettable decisions recently that have had consumers up in arms when it comes to iPhones. It started with the removal of the headphone jack with the iPhone 7 and ended recently with the removal of the home button. Instead of listening to what consumers want, Apple has continued to do what they think is best, and it’s up for debate if the reason they think their decisions are for the best is money.

After all, with the removal of the headphone jack, Apple was able to push the purchase and use of their easily broken adapters, which currently have a 1.5-star rating on the apple website. The far more expensive AirPods are another apple product that consumers are more likely to buy when they purchase an iPhone 7 or the phones that were released after it..

Apple needs to listen to consumers and walk back their decisions instead of chugging ahead with the mistakes that they have made. Buyers pay into the hundreds and thousands of dollars for their Apple products and their opinions deserve to be heard about what they are buying. It is easy to say that if consumers are dissatisfied they can take their business elsewhere, but for some that’s easier said than done.

For those with multiple Apple products, such as people with some combination of Macbooks, iPhones and iPads, the devices might be synced in a way that gets disrupted if you use different brands for any of the devices. So in this case giving Apple your money has ensured that you have to continue to give them your money, or else disrupt your life.

Apple products have been integrated into people’s lives far too much for the “simple suggestion” of just getting a different brand. Here at UMBC for example, visual arts majors are strongly encouraged, if not required to have a Macbook, because they are told professors will only be using them in visual arts courses.

People should not have to shell out extra money just to be able to use all of the functions on their extremely pricey phones. One of the many reasons Apple users have remained faithful to the brand is the supposed superiority of the products, but that should be called into question if the products don’t reflect the desires of consumers.

I love being able to access Facetime and talk to people instead of relying on some external app like skype. I would rather have my portrait mode camera, and an iPhone group chat is just one of life’s little pleasures. These perks shouldn’t come at the expense of having the expected functions that smartphones have had along.

What Apple could do now is release a line of phones that still have the features that people know and love along with some of the newer features of the iPhone 7, 8 and X. Until then I guess I’ll have to hold on to the phone I have along with the army of adapters growing in my desk drawer.

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