Apple has agreed to pay $50 million to customers affected by the unreliable typing surface on some MacBook models.
According to the suit, Apple knew about problems with its keyboards but sold devices that used them anyway. If the judge approves the settlement, customers who purchased MacBooks with butterfly keyboards in seven US states between 2015 and 2019:
Positively named Typo.
The mechanism beneath each key is used to register a key press. The butterfly keyboard was introduced on the fourth- generation MacBook. The laptop was reviewed by David Pierce and he gave it an 8/10 rating. We didn't know what it would turn out to be.
When you pressed the butterfly keys, they had very little travel. Apple was able to shave a few millimeters off the depth of its MacBooks due to their small size. The keys were prone to breaking due to the ultra thin design. A small amount of dust could cause them to be useless.
The move to butterfly keys was a design decision that came at the height of the former Apple chief design officer Jony Ive's tenure. Sometimes it's even functional. Around this time, Apple made a number of controversial moves with its laptops. Many users had to haul around dongles due to the removal of many of the ports. The fourth-generation MacBook also introduced Apple's touch bar, a feature that has been mostly derided despite offering some useful accessibility features
The butterfly keyboards caused the most ire. The keyboards were the subject of complaints right away. The keys on Apple's previous laptops didn't work as well as the ones on this one. It was hard to get a broken key fixed. The whole keyboard might have to be replaced if the repairs were small. There were two class actions against Apple in the same month last year. Not willing to give up on the design, the company modified the keyboards of its MacBook models to include a separator below the keys that would prevent some of the dust from getting through MacBooks with damaged butterfly keys were repaired for free.
After nearly five years of expensive repairs and technical changes, Apple has finally stopped using butterfly keyboards. There were three good things that happened in 2020. Since then, Apple has reined in its aesthetic ambitions, returning to computer builds that make sense for a majority of users.
$50 million is a lot of money for a company. In 2020, Apple agreed to a $500 million settlement in a class action after it admitted it had been deliberately slowing down older phones. Each person involved in the class action will be paid out when the money for the butterfly suit is distributed. If you replaced key caps, the maximum is $50, $125 if you had one keyboard replaced, or $395 if you had multiple keyboards replaced.
Apple has not acknowledged any wrongdoing, no matter how much it is spending. The company did not reply to the request.
The owners of MacBooks that were purchased in California, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, or Washington, DC will be able to collect their compensation once the settlement is approved.
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