If Apple, Tandy, or Commodore sold a computer that stopped working altogether after some flag day when the company decided to stop supporting it, there would be... I'd like to say "rioting in the streets" but that's a little too on the nose right now so let's just say there would be significant consumer backlash.
[1] https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/chromebook-6-years-expira...
This Echo thing depends on some cloud service to even function. And I doubt Amazon built hackability into 'em. Once they pull the plug on the cloud service, the device becomes junk.
There's more than it seems on the surface.
New hardware brings new mitigations, like the Pixels + GrapheneOS for example.
Used to think Android/mobiles were awful from a security perspective. Boy was I wrong.
Still awful for privacy, if Airplane mode is off, but, still.
I often wonder what the world would be like if Apple still made computers.
This is more of a hardware interface to an unpaid network service than a personal computer.
Most middle-aged, and old reviewers didn't complain much about these changes (with the exception of "dongles", at least). I assume because they blamed themselves for being out of the loop. Eg: "Touch UI is extremely error-prone, inaccurate, physically fatiguing to use, and unsuitable for large displays... but I surely just feel that way because I'm a dinosaur with an irrational love of computer mice."
Meanwhile, younger customers didn't know any better, and now accept all this nonsense as the unchangeable facts of life. And perhaps they are? Maybe the world really has entered "late stage capitalism." I look at the state of tech, and it's hard to explain why the user experience stopped improving, unless customers just have less power over manufacturers today.
my thought was that amazon had too many nudie pixs for thier desired optics and just said oops and stop it all