Thanks, Trump tariffs, now I gotta replace my phone battery

After five years, I was still happy with my phone, even though its battery had started the inevitable process of slowing to a stop. But Donald Trump’s tariff nonsense pushed me to make a decision: buy a new phone or fix the old one now, before the prices go up. The answer was clearer than ever — I replaced the battery. I have an iPhone 12 Mini, a size Apple no longer makes. It’s small and light, which is what I want from a phone. When it came out, our reviewer found that the battery died on him every evening. I use my phone less than most, and so this was not actually a problem for me — until this year. My battery had degraded by 80 percent, which meant that my phone did actually run out of battery at the end of the day unless I switched on “low power mode” early. Apple has designed its iPhones to be disposable, largely because Jony Ive is an asshole obsessed with “sleekness,” a concept I do not find impressive. Its phones’ actual functions haven’t kept up with the constant churn of ... Read full article.