But I am wondering why the author does not value his personal time. I can‘t help but think of opportunity costs. He spends a lot of time writing this article, reverse engineering backups and whatnot instead of shelling a hundred dollars to get a new device? I see this pattern so often in the tech world.
Maybe, because it is fun reverse engineering stuff?
Maybe some people are happy with either option, but it sure is unethical to force that choice, especially when all the effort it could have taken from the manufacturer was to add a boolean flag.
I'd complain too, not everyone is in the same situation, and this is dodgy behavior anyway regardless of me liking the workarounds or not, simply having to workaround is bad enough in principle.