this post was submitted on 10 Jul 2023
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Phone and laptop chargers converged from numerous standards to just a few all on their own I think, no?
Yes, but under treath of lawmakers mandating a single standard. And the EU has now forced a single standard anyway on smartphones, tablets, etc.
Although I agree that there are quite a few examples of a "naturally emerging" single standards without lawmaker intervention, but this is not really one of them...
That was for Apple.
The micro USB standard was also an EU thing, just voluntary, and not just for Apple.
Indeed, the law applied to all manufacturers, but no other manufacturer wanted to remain with microUSB Type-B 2.0 due to economies of scale, etc. The loophole that Apple used was available to everyone anyway, so it's not like they couldn't have followed suit.
I thought this is an example where standards in part converged naturally. But I agree that regulation was fundamental part of this process.