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Comment by mankyd | Hacker News Reader

Im curious how you think they'll shut your router off?

Certainly, they could turn cloud based features such as this off, but the router itself?

Your question rests on the assumption that it's "my" router, since it's a piece of physical hardware that I bought, and that it will continue to function after they shut down the cloud-based features that they used to lure customers in and justify the price tag.

Past experience - most recently with Revolv - suggests that your assumption is wrong and Google has no problem bricking the device instead of letting it function without cloud support.

In other words: When Google shuts down a product, it's 100% shut down. Hence, I cannot understand why anyone would buy non-throwaway hardware from them.

what computing hardware have you bought and not thrown away at some point?

I expect infrastructure hardware like routers to be used and supported for a minimum of five years. Google changes its policies and dumps products on a whim. It cannot be trusted with such hardware. Phones, sure. Chromecast, fine. Anything that has longer life expectancies, never.

My understanding is that OnHub routers are managed through a mobile app via Google's cloud. If Google end-of-lifed that service, owners would have no way to manage their routers.

The mobile app connects to the router directly not thru Google' cloud service.

The only thing that probably relies on Google's service is their "Send Feedback" feature.

What if they remove the app from the Play Store? Then I have to download the apk from random web sites and trust that they aren't trojaned?

OnHub runs (effectively) ChromeOS and self-updates, so in theory Google could send an update that bricks it but they'd have to be stupid to invite that class action lawsuit.

What would stop them?

EDIT: @sohailk, think you're missing the point, which is not if it's logical, but what literally would stop them from doing this?

(Hardware, legal, etc.)

common sense? locking down unnecessary software features is bad but not gamebreaking. locking down hardware would just be crazy.

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