Hacker News Reader

If this is affecting printers in Australia, then HP are going to learn a very costly lesson in ethics. The ACCC will have to do an investigation, but the instant they confirm this has occurred they will face stiff fines for third line forcing and anti-competitive behaviour distorting the market.

View on HN

i'm in australia and bought some cheap fuji-xerox laser printer a year or so ago.

non-oem ink refills are far cheaper than oem ones. a large component of the cost of non-oem ink refills is getting a replacement chip that counts how many times you can print before it claims it needs refilling. you can buy more of these chips along with bulk ink refills. it's like DRM for ink or something.

There are no fines large enough the ACCC can serve that will stop them from this practice. ACCC is pretty toothless again big companies like this.

I dunno, they stopped Apple and HP from selling "extended warranties".

What ? Apple definitely sell extended warranties.

No, they do not. Not in Australia.

http://www.apple.com/au/shop/browse/home/applecare

Reply on news.ycombinator.com