If someone cannot remember the dominat (smart) phones of the 2005 era (17 years ago), they are either very young or lived in an undeveloped area upto then, likely the poster is young and doesn't know the history of the market.
You made out like (smart)phones had USB all along, they really didnt. USB was in widespread consumer use and the phone manufacturers persisted with their proprietary connectors (even making new ones as linked above). Exactly what you and that poster say wouldn't/didn't happen. I'm not picking out some obscure minority brand here, those were the dominant players in the market and they went for profit ahead of standardization/convenience. They weren't all using 5V or USB power for charging which made 3rd party cables a minefield, that changed only with standardization to USB connectors on the phones.
I certainly do. I have a box full of bricks to remind me at any time (already wrote that). At least nokia at some point stopped using a different barrel jack for every new model
It was europe that mandated usb charges in the first place, let's go back to 2010 for micro USB
https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/IP_10_1776And mini usb before that (the RAZR, anybody?)
What would have happened if they didn't is that every major brand would have kept using proprietary connectors and charges, period.
maybe, i say maybe, the eventual flood of chinese phones that really started in 2015 in europe would have harmonized the connector to usb, but let's look at the timeline.
Motorola RAZR 3 with mini usb launched in 2004, so let's assume that before 2004 you could use whatever you wanted
2010 micro usb enforced (my shitty samsung at the time -2011- had micro usb, was the first i had with usb, i had only nokias before that kept using custom - but didn't change it anymore - until the brand died, though the very last ones used usb as well)
2015 first flood of phones from china, let's assume they all used micro usb and that from 2016 major brands would do the switch
more than 10 years for "the market" to adjust.
I also remember that at the time the data cable was mostly an accessory, 20+ euro for the genuine one (who dared use ebay or aliexpress at that time? scams were all over and customer awareness and protection was very low) sure they gave you the charging cable, but not one that would connect to a pc.
As i said before, i welcome this decision from the EU.
And i understand how most users that has a certain flag can not like it, it's just not in their DNA
US: throw a bunch of standards and let the market - or rather the biggest corporation - decide
EU: pick a standard and mandate it - possibly not choosing the best standard
sure it's because i was born and raised in the EU but i prefer how we do things around here