Take the Deal? Apple’s $29 iPhone Battery Replacement
Happy New Year from us and from Apple, which is offering consumers a great deal on iPhone battery replacement to apologize for deliberately slowing down older phones. (For good reason, but still!). The original late January offer has been updated to now. So, here’s the plan. If you have an iPhone 6 or later:
- Back up your phone, either with iTunes or to iCloud (slower) (or both).
- Make a Genius Bar appointment (Apple will run diagnostics on your phone and tell you the battery status) -OR- wait (briefly) for a software update that will enable detailed battery information.
- Check your battery status. If it’s 80% or less, replace it; 81-85%, consider it; above 85%, wait.*
If the battery’s in stock, you should have the phone back in about an hour for only $29. Brilliant!
*CAUTION: the deal does not apply to iPads (Apple doesn’t replace iPad batteries, they just swap devices) and it’s not yet clear whether they will allow you to use the deal more than once for the same device.
You’re a Renter Now
Old model: Buy software once and install it as many times as possible, upgrading only when required. Good for us, not so good for software companies.
The newer model is rental: Microsoft Office, Quicken, Adobe’s Creative Suite, even Apples’s 2017 App of the Year Calm are either subscription-based or pushing hard in that direction.
Many formerly free apps, like Duolingo (which can teach you to say “Jeff is a rabbit” in 28 languages) offer “in-app purchases” that either remove annoying ads or enable additional (sometimes essential) features.
This trend is great for developers: they get steady revenue AND a whole bunch of information about their audience (that’s us). While the old way was cheaper , ultimately this SHOULD enable better support and better products for consumers.
We hope.
