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0 pointsRetroTechie2y ago0 comments

Requiring the use of an app, in order to use some kind of adapter cable? I must be getting old, feel like I've just crawled from under a rock... :-)

That would also mean this cable becomes useless the moment URL encoded in the QR disappears?

As for the app: even if it's total crap, if only 50% of cable-buyers proceed to install the app, that 50% is still gained as potentially spied-upon subjects. There's a new please-spy-on-me sucker born every day, so to speak.

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7 comments · 3 top-level

bitwize2y ago· 4 in thread

It's not really an adapter cable. It's got a little SOC in there that streams your iPhone's display from the app to the HDMI port.

Meanwhile, your personal data is being streamed back to China...

ASalazarMX2y ago

Part of me is looking forward to the time when a government activates a significant part of all the spyware/adware/backdoors/etc in the world as part of a cyberwar. COVID would be a child's game compared to that, but that disaster would at last make people understand how bad tech has become at this point.

Double points if the operation is started by another state/group that stole those backdoors.

eastbound2y ago

The worst part of adult life is realizing you already live in a world where this happens. Regularly. And no-one bats an eye. And you try to maintain sanity by adding hypothesis (“But I mean, with the government giving the keys to…”) and all of the evil you can think of, also exists.

ThatPlayer2y ago

The official Apple HDMI adapter does the same thing with an SoC in there. The difference is native iOS support instead of a 3rd party app needed to support it.

MBCook2y ago

I still find it hilarious that that’s how the old cable worked, the iPhone encoded an H.264 video stream and sent it to the dongle, which decoded it and sent it down HDMI.

Now that iPhones have USB-C they no longer need a custom adapter. A standard USB-C to HDMI cable is supposed to work. I believe.

2 more replies

MBCook2y ago

Does it really matter? This isn’t a real product. It’s a scam product to trick people trying to buy a real Apple part and con them into the app’s clutches.

The real part doesn’t need anything. Plug and go.

eastbound2y ago

The nice thing about such a cable is that it could connect to the cloud to display that screen without plugging the other end.

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