BasicAppleGuyApple has removed all remaining leather accessories from display, including iPhone cases, watch bands, and AirTag accessories.
Christopher Keener, pHd 
@BasicAppleGuy @brennansv apparently S&M is not alive and well at Apple
Brennan Stehling@RoboticistDuck @BasicAppleGuy Fine Woven was announced as the replacement to leather at the event on Tuesday.
https://www.apple.com/shop/watch/bands
It was apparently done due to environmental concerns.
@brennansv @BasicAppleGuy they might have ulterior motives
@RoboticistDuck It makes senses when it is not really sustainable compared to the alternative materials when it is at such a large scale.
@brennansv but at the end of the day, are all the rare earths and exotic metals in a smartphone or other modern electronic devices sustainable and any better for the environment than the petrochemicals of past technologies? Time will tell!
@RoboticistDuck Here's an article on it. I always thought of leather as a byproduct of beef production. And I am not expecting people are going to be cutting beef from their diets.
https://www.greenmatters.com/p/impact-of-leather-industry-on-environment
@brennansv I’m not convinced that apple cares about the planet as much as they care about pleasing stockholders. If they cared about the latter they’d stop making their customers replace their devices after a year or two and genuinely embrace right to repair and modular design components.
Gen X-Wing@RoboticistDuck @brennansv Do they care as much as the ads says? I doubt it. Do they care more than a lot of their competitors? Probably, as they see it as a competitive advantage.
I believe Apple is doing something with right to repair in California. There were news about it recently, they joined the initiative or something. Time will tell there how it turns out.
I’m getting a new phone now. This one is 5 years old. Hoping the next lasts as long as well.
@breadbin @RoboticistDuck You’ll never know what anyone truly cares about. What you can know is what they’ve done. I saw a post earlier that shows a store no longer has any of the leather products. I expect once supplies are sold out that’s it.
California passed a right to repair bill which is probably more meaningful than what NY did last year.
I’m going to keep my iPhone 13 mini because there will be no more minis. Once I get a new iPhone I’ll change to Pro and do the trade-in every year. I know someone who is trading in a 14 to get a 15 for under $250. It’s like renting on for $20/mo.
https://www.theverge.com/2023/9/13/23871712/california-right-to-repair-act-sb-244
Gunnarsson@RoboticistDuck @brennansv I think iPhones have a very good life expectancy these days, both compared to the competition and early iPhones. The hardware bumps seem less and less necessary, and the latest OS versions are supported on pretty old devices. For example, iOS 17 drops support for the iPhone 8, and that was introduced in 2017. My wife has an iPhone 8, and it's still working really well. I'm sure she'll be able to use it for a few more years.
Jonathan@BasicAppleGuy this announcement was foreshadowed, suspiciously about 6 weeks ago almost all iPhone leather cases were marked "sold out” online, with stores having only trickles of stock, seems they've been clearing the channel for a while
@rawrdimus I had the same hunch
Dan Morgan 
@BasicAppleGuy Right wing MAGA chud outrage in 3… 2… 1…
Paul Gessinger@BasicAppleGuy I bought a replacement one for my current phone when that rumor started going around.
Torstein@BasicAppleGuy good on them. no need to dress tech stuff in dead animal.
christianraddatz@BasicAppleGuy I would understand if they positioned #FineWoven as a cheap option in their accessory lineup. But they chose to place it as their top end material (and priced it this way) which it doesn’t live up to.
I will send both back, the wallet and the case. It isn’t haptically feeling good and too light. There’s no premium feel to it.
So leather, from my point of view, will be an even more exclusive (and pricier) material, now that „the normal user“ is cut off from first party supply.
@speedlimiter not yet sold on the feel of the case myself.
Miłosz Bolechowski@BasicAppleGuy …and didn’t replace it with the newer versions. I’d love to see a FineWoven case for 13 mini, for example, but it seems I’m in minority.
Anthony Lee (Created Hey.Cafe)