Speculation on whether Apple is planning to abandon the headphone jack for the iPhone 7 has intensified over the past few weeks. It looks like quite a few fans of the brand are up in arms over the potential development and have decided to take action against it in the form of a petition.
The SumOfUs petition has already gotten 227844 signatures, well on its way to complete its 250000 goal. The angry plea asks Apple to keep the standard headphone jack in its iPhones. The document argues that taking the port away will result in users having to pay extra money to replace their existing earphones and the creation of tons of electronic waste.
The petition goes on to claim the change is well in line with what Apple has forced upon customers before, citing the example of the company replacing the original iPod-dock connector with a new one. It accuses the manufacturer of only investing in renewable energy and using non-toxic materials when people began protesting against its practices.
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It should be noted that Apple has not confirmed it is indeed getting rid of the 3.5 headphone slot. The petition may be a bit premature in that regard, but clearly shows there are many who don’t want to see such a huge change happening. The handset maker is reportedly considering the switch in order to make the iPhone 7 completely waterproof and 1mm thinner.
Users would then have to listen to music through the Lightning port. This is completely plausible, since there are currently firms out there who produce headphones for such a purpose, Apple subsidiary Beats among it. 9to5Mac reports that the two are creating a set of Bluetooth earphones which will be completely wireless, with no cables connecting the right and left units.
The product might be called AirPods and is likely to be sold separately from the iPhone 7. The phone could ship with a new version of the EarPods which will support lighting port connectivity. Apple has apparently not finalized the look of the handset yet and is currently considering 3 potential designs for it.