Sorry, what's the advantage here? People are going to unplug the mouse anyway when it doesn't need charging because it feels much more natural. _Forcing_ people to stop using the mouse to charge is a braindead decision
The problem is the software. macOS could remind you to charge the night before, but it always ends up needing charging in the morning as you're ready to start working. One engineer could fix the problem in under an hour if anyone at Apple cared about user xperience.
I’ve used one of those for years and there’s never been any impact on the user experience. Every few months, the low battery warning pops up. At that point, it will still work for hours and it only takes a few minutes to charge so even if it popped up first thing in the morning I’d plug it in the next time I got coffee, went to a meeting, walked the dog, etc.
Designing the mouse so it is useless while the charging cable is connected means that if the battery no longer takes a charge the mouse becomes e-waste.
The idea was to prevent non-techy users from using it plugged-in all the time, which would look stupid. They wanted to accentuate the wireless nature and easy connectivity of the mouse. Essentially a marketing decision.
I disagree with this take but it's worth remembering that it's marketing that turned computing from a niche activity to what it is now (which, by the way, is what makes it a viable career to the people here)
This is ugly. User behavior modification as a product goal. The reverse of how you should build products. You need to start with "The user wants to do X." rather than "I want the user to do X." Who is Apple to dictate the "correct" way for me to use a mouse?
Users aren't designers, they don't know what they want and will put up with bad experiences because they don't know it can be better.
If Apple let the mouse be used when plugged in, everyone would do it immediately and never try using it unplugged cause of their battery anxiety from every other device. Then you try it unplugged and you realized you have to plug it in for like an hour every couple months and it's way better than tethering yourself with a cable.
I've used a Magic Mouse daily for work for years and it's literally never been an issue once.
> Users aren't designers, they don't know what they want and will put up with bad experiences because they don't know it can be better.
First, I definitely know what I want from my computer.
Second, flipping my mouse over and being forced to stop using it is an objectively worse experience than plugging it in for charging while using.
I have an MX Master 3 which is also wireless and charges with a cord. While it's charging, I definitely have a degraded experience relative to the wireless one, so I unplug as soon as I can (I sometimes don't even wait for the full charge!) to go back to the better experience. Never once have I considered keeping it connected indefinitely.
> If Apple let the mouse be used when plugged in, everyone would do it immediately and never try using it unplugged
So what? Why should that bother Apple so much? They sold the mouse. Who cares how the user uses it? A user who chooses to use their mouse while plugged in does not in any way affect the mouse's manufacturer. My Apple keyboard lets me use it while it's plugged in, and the world hasn't ended. Why didn't they put the charger on the bottom of the keyboard too? Why don't they make their phones so you can't use them while charging?
> So what? Why should that bother Apple so much? They sold the mouse. Who cares how the user uses it? A user who chooses to use their mouse while plugged in does not in any way affect the mouse's manufacturer.
If the user has a worse experience, that's a lose/lose situation. Of course they should care about things that affect the experience.
> My Apple keyboard lets me use it while it's plugged in, and the world hasn't ended. Why didn't they put the charger on the bottom of the keyboard too?
A cable doesn't impact a keyboard because it's not moving.
> Why don't they make their phones so you can't use them while charging?
The chance of a phone being left plugged in forever is minimal to begin with, and the hassle of not being able to use it while it charges would be much larger.
How is using a peripheral while plugged in a worse experience? It's a better experience: I've had many more problems with wireless peripherals than wired ones. Bluetooth disconnecting randomly, batteries discharging while I'm working. Wireless is a worse experience in almost all ways.
If you make a wireless peripheral and everyone keeps using it while plugged in, the solution is not to force them to use it wirelessly. The solution is to make the wireless experience actually better so the user voluntarily chooses to use it.
This is about charging, not how it sends data. And the batteries last a long time for this particular device, so there's minimal downside to unplugging. The downside to staying plugged in is there's a cable dragging around that makes the experience of moving the mouse a little bit worse all the time.
A user has to be thinking about something to make a choice. Depending on the user to think about all these little aspects degrades the experience all by itself.
I guess we have to agree to disagree. To me, it's not about charging at all. It's about wireless vs. wired, and wireless is a buggy, defective user experience. I want to use my mouse full time while plugged in due to poor reliability when unplugged, and only Apple's devices say no--for reasons that don't make sense.
I've never been bothered by a cable sticking out of my mouse.
>I want to use my mouse full time while plugged in due to poor reliability when unplugged, and only Apple's devices say no--for reasons that don't make sense.
The reliability would not be affected since it moves data wirelessly. The data will never go over the charging cable so your reasons for keeping it plugged in don't make sense.
If I turn off bluetooth and plug my "wireless" Apple keyboard into USB, it works fine, sending data over USB. There's no reason why they couldn't make the mouse the same way.
I don't know how much users "want" to have a cord dangling off the mouse and doing nothing.
If your starting premise is "the user wants to use the mouse and have a good experience", you can see how a designer can get from there to a feature that causes/encourages an unplug. Even if you disagree, they're not going backwards.
No, it's utility that turned computing from a niche activity to what it's now. Apple is a fashion statement and it's okay for them to market to that effect, but don't credit the growth of computing to Apple's aesthetic but oft-ill-designed stuff.
> don't credit the growth of computing to Apple's aesthetic but oft-ill-designed stuff.
I'm not; I'm crediting the activity of marketing.
It's an engineering blind spot to think utility = adoption. Emacs is more powerful than MS Word; which one has more users? Which one has an organization dedicated to going around and pointing out how and where it is useful?
It's when you have utility + marketing that you get something like the computer revolution.
