The issue for Apple is that in the EU, they're still mainly characterized as the company that dragged their feet on using standardized chargers, leading to there being a law on the books that mandates USB-C. (As in, it's obvious to literally everyone that if Apple just used USB-C, that law wouldn't exist, since literally everyone else was willing to use microUSB and then USB-C for their regular charging devices; without Apple, there'd be no incentive to do it, but because they're a major player that refused to co-operate, it's now required.)
That law axed a lot of the second-hand grey market for cheap Apple cables of poor build quality (something Apple also worked towards because their official cables have had poor build quality since forever), and is generally seen as a positive for most people, since everyone who's ever had an Apple device is also familiar with the growing collection of cheap chargers that are varying degrees of functional that comes with it; instead a USB-C charger can often be repurposed to charge e-readers, tablets, lights and so on, while Apple chargers could only be used to charge Apple devices. It also eliminated all the problems with audio docks, where before you had to pick between buying one for Apple and one for Android/everything else.
Basically it's made less e-waste people directly have to engage with, and is generally seen as a good thing... but Apple kept whining about it, so their reputation as a customer-friendly company is in the gutter as a result; even most Apple users I know of still don't even bother trying to defend the company on how bad they are at interoperability/standardization.
To be fair, poor-quality cables are a more recent development at Apple.
It basically follows the Tim Cook takeover, where full on greed has become the "raison d'être" of Apple at the expense of everything else.
I had the 1,5G iPod (10GB variant) which was sold with all the accessories, including a carrying pouch, very nice quality remote (that could be used with any headphones, not just the ones included) and a very nice FireWire cable. It was literally one of the best quality cable I ever used.
The first iPhone also had a pretty decent quality cable (and included a dock).
Back then, iBooks/PowerBooks also included many adaptors for the various video-out standard of the time, that is to be contrasted with their all USB-C release MacBooks, where they basically told their customers: "fuck you, buy the necessary dongles at a nasty markup".
It all went to shit when Apple became very successful with the iPhone and the bean counter fully took over, saving pennies everywhere he could (at scale it does makes a lot of money).
And this is what feels so bad with Apple today, you pay a premium price, only to be taken for a fool and have a mediocre experience in the name of "ecology" (who are they kidding, seriously).
That law axed a lot of the second-hand grey market for cheap Apple cables of poor build quality (something Apple also worked towards because their official cables have had poor build quality since forever), and is generally seen as a positive for most people, since everyone who's ever had an Apple device is also familiar with the growing collection of cheap chargers that are varying degrees of functional that comes with it; instead a USB-C charger can often be repurposed to charge e-readers, tablets, lights and so on, while Apple chargers could only be used to charge Apple devices. It also eliminated all the problems with audio docks, where before you had to pick between buying one for Apple and one for Android/everything else.
Basically it's made less e-waste people directly have to engage with, and is generally seen as a good thing... but Apple kept whining about it, so their reputation as a customer-friendly company is in the gutter as a result; even most Apple users I know of still don't even bother trying to defend the company on how bad they are at interoperability/standardization.