HP bricking printers remotely if the client's credit card expires [video]
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What's next? Scanners only working under a subscription? Your Wi-Fi router or switches only working when a license is active (even your LAN)? Your chargers, PSUs or UPSes only being allowed to work for 6 months, before you're forced to buy a newer model? Needing a monthly subscription to use your OS or browser? I don't even know anymore...
The printer example feels like it shouldn't be legal. The whole printer ink situation feels a lot like that. The companies are probably going to get away with this, because they're the ones setting the rules, you're free to not use their services and instead turn to the non-existent companies that will put the users over maximizing profits.
Edit: Louis suggests Brother as a brand that doesn't do this. However, what guarantees are there that they won't?
With electrical equipment like oscilloscopes it is quite common to sell the physically identical unit with different softwarelocks for different prices (Want 350 MHz bandwidth instead of 80? Pay some extra).
Want that HDMI cable to run 8k? Here os a simple subscription. As resolutions go up there comes a point where cable will have to have some active components in them anyways.
The basic model XX40 gives you 40 pages a minute. Want the XX80? An engineer comes out and flips the DIP. Exact same hardware.
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/general-computing/hacking-nvid...
I'm 100% okay with artificial limitations on hardware I buy, too, so long as they're upfront about capabilities - Running something at half capacity for service reliability reasons is still a valid strategy when dealing with warranties. I have no problem buying an AMD Ryzen 7900 which is literally the same silicon on the same fab as the 7950, but binned differently. They are clear about what they're providing, what the specs are, and it's possible that it could perform better, but I know what they're guaranteeing. Sometimes I don't like it - If yields are good, they could bin many more cards at the higher tier and drop the price, but they're under no obligation to provide me a better product out of charity; They should have competition that forces their hand.
It's where it's unclear or deceptive that it's a problem, and HP's scheme is a shakedown. We should invest in competitors.
AT&T already did this. You were paying not only for the service but all of the equipment as well. You didn't actually own anything from the phone company.
Literally every "scan tool" for troubleshooting machinery is like this.
The upgrade consisted of popping open the case to pull an SD card out and update a text file with a list of enabled features. Could be a few grand in new features after the ‘upgrade’.
I can only imagine a few technicians figured this trick out on their own.
The.
Fuck.
We live in that world today. Most enterprise networking equipment operates with the licensing model.
Your IOTs are all on subscription plan. All it takes is a defunct company, yank from the App Store, or unpatched CVEs and you'll need to physically uninstall that puppy, whether it's your dishwasher, fridge, thermostat, or lawn sprinklers. Have fun.
OpenWRT says hi. https://openwrt.org/toh/start
Only if they require some internet connection.
If you are buying an enterprise switch you know exactly what you're getting
(In reality it features you don't buy on Juniper seem to still work, just print nags to the log file. Arista from what I can see are fully featured anyway. I'm talking basic routing features like BGP rather than some cloud based librenms the sales guy keeps trying to flog)
We have been explicitly told that a DNA Advantage 3 Year License will continue to work after the 3 year license though. All companies are moving to a per-year charge though, as it keeps the money rolling in.
This is what OpenWRT is for.
We need FOSS scanner and printer stack.
Given we have open source 3D printers… why are there no good open source regular printers? Does no one really care that much? Is it too much of a niche desire given the ubiquitous nature of shitty printers round the world being sold for less than they cost in a parasitical effort to trap owners into a sunk cost fallacy of paying for overpriced ink?
This sounds plausible, the actual nozzle holes in an inkjet printer are around .003 inches (76 µm for the rest of us) according to Wikipedia [1]. That sounds like some pretty high-order manufacturing is needed, I'm not drilling that out in the shed.
Perhaps the best bet would be to find a commercially available printer (laser or inkjet) and reverse engineer it, perhaps replacing the control board with a Raspberry Pi or something more suitable (ESP32?) to drive the existing electro-mechanical components with an open firmare.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inkjet_printing#Continuous_ink...
It wouldn't be easy, but 3d printers also made immense progress despite technical challenges. I first heard about them in the reprap days and now we can buy well-engineered 3d printers with fancy features like resonance compensation ("input shaping").
It’s sort of surprising there isn’t a well established reprap of plotting given it’s simplicity. The biggest missing piece is arguably the paper feed.
And as for an inkjet… why does a reliable printer need to be that good, I’d be pretty happy with a “higher dpi” pseudo dot matrix printer using a lift retract style mechanism and a hacked up refillable ink pen. Tapping out the art one dot at a time.
It’s not a bad argument for a lot of consumer printing use cases, but the “they need too much precision” never felt compelling to me given the breadth of printer technology both past and present.
Most engineers can get an adequate printer - such as a small office laser printer - for 1-2 days wages. And can print things at work, their boss doesn't mind a few pages here and there. And can get photos printed at the supermarket for 10 seconds wages. So there's not much motivation to scratch an itch.
Existing printing technology can also produce photo-quality prints, and is heavily cost-optimised (albeit with very expensive ink). So there's not much motivation to improve on the state of the art in regards to print quality, or upfront purchase price.
I now see that he was probably right about everything, and every year, users lose more and more ground in the war.
How is this the same at all?
There absolutely is an upfront cost - a company has paid to create the software that enables that SaaS.
They are simply hiding that from view of the customer, and only offering a rental option.
You used to be able to actually buy stand-alone software, which you installed, and managed on hardware you'd bought, and which upgraded only when you decided to buy again.
But... it turns out it's less profitable to sell standalone software - so the vast majority of vendors are just quietly dropping that option and moving to subscription only licenses: SaaS.
Basically
> there is nothing you "buy" that you can reasonably consider to be "yours" and use in isolation.
Is entirely intentional, and exactly what the printer manufacturer wishes they could do - except they have the pesky problem of having to provide hardware that actually prints at some point. But it's DEFINITELY not the only way to sell software.
> You used to be able to actually buy stand-alone software, which you installed, and managed on hardware you'd bought, and which upgraded only when you decided to buy again.
That's not what Saas is usually considered though, at least in my experience. A note taking app needing a subscription to work isn't what I imagine this thread means when we talk about SaaS.
It's like those terrible runaway train memes where one track has 100 people and the other track has 1 rich man. Guess which side they always choose to run over?
I think the question is whether you're providing an actual service that has value, or just charging rent for the software and calling it SaaS. Software has a marginal cost of ZERO, so SaaS is often simple rent-seeking. A company might actually use the money to develop a better version of the software, but that's actually optional on their part.
There is no ongoing cost (to HP) when I buy a printer from them. Whereas, a SaaS has to pay (presumably) server fees.
reddit.com/r/printers/comments/s9b2eg/brother_mfc_firmware_update_nongenuine_toner_now/
https://www.theverge.com/2022/7/12/23204950/bmw-subscription...
This should be illegal.
I’m not sure how to feel about it now. I think the satellite version is more secure, but does have a different cost structure.
(I only found this out when our account wouldn’t work for months. Then a few months ago there was a security issue with that system that reset our account.)
There is at least one Indian manufacturer pushing subscriptions on some features on their high end models.
Thin end of the wedge.
And IMHO it's a done deal. Almost no one nowadays listens to MP3s, rather than Spitify or Apple Music. Few people buy or download movies, rathen than subscribing to Netflix and other streaming services. Most people are accepting the requirement that they need an online account to use an iPhone, Chromebook or a Windows PC.
If we want a different slate of choices we should use the collective power we have to make it happen. ‘People vote with their wallets’ is just a way for self-interested companies to shift the blame.
Nobody is saying that, though. Time is money, and if your printer is bricking itself because you forgot to update your credit card information, that will be wasted time, and you'll remember that when it comes time to pick a printer vendor in the future.
US is world's biggest market and home to most big tech companies. It has a two party system. Do you suggest that the majority of people will select which of the two parties to vote for, based on their stance on subsriptions? Or that it's possible to force one of the two parties to take a strong position against subscriptions?
On second- and third-tier issues, politicians take their cues from friendly activists and interest groups, for whatever "friendly" means to that particular elected. Think about how many politicians' reelection messages are basically bullet-points of small-bore asks delivered. Each individual item may not win many votes, exactly, but they create a general sense that the candidate is engaged and effective. And perhaps more importantly, it's hard for potential opponents to build support when the incumbent is delivering for the most engaged voters in the district. Anyways a politician needs to do something while in office; it might as well be the stuff that people they respect want.
So: you frame this issue, and how it's confluent with the broader [Democratic/Republican] outlook. You clarify the desired legislative outcome. You show some public support, which takes many fewer people than you might think, and set up some meetings. Hopefully you find a sponsor. Then repeat as necessary to get the bill introduced, voted on, and maybe even passed.
None of this is easy; it's a ton of work, and by no means guaranteed of success. It's especially difficult in today's US where so much gets bottled up behind partisan showboating. But it also happens all the time. See the traction the right-to-repair movement is getting.
Of course not. Culture war bullshit will keep them distracted.
Same with Apple. At the time we moved, we had a few movies in our library that wouldn't transfer to the new region. We had to go "buy" them again (at which point it would realize you already owned it and charge zero currency). FWIW, Apple has since fixed this and when you change regions, your purchases come over (mostly) without any issues.
If we could fix the region shenanigans, all of this would be fine IMHO. At least when it comes to digital content.
People just don't want to vote with their wallets. Voting with your wallet isn't sustainable when the options you have to pick from are what's on the market. What's on the market will never be what you want to vote for; you want to vote for change.
-Emily
No, they can't. A lot of new releases never leave streaming services.
You still need a Netflix subscription to obtain some of the DVDs for their "netflix originals". They do still ship DVDs, but they aren't available to buy separately, you need the streaming subscription to access them.
Some "netflix originals" have DVDs sold outside of Netflix (i.e. on Amazon), but not all; you need to order DVDs directly from Netflix as part of their DVD service, I believe. (If they are even available at all.)
> Can buy a digital recording of a song, or a Spotify subsription
No, they still can't. A lot of indie artists release on Spotify but never make physical media of any kind. You can't buy songs DRM-free from Spotify.
The answer is "well don't listen to that song then" but this kind of voting is really dumb and people do not like to do this. They'll suck it up and throw money even if they hate it with their entire being. Because society as a whole has been conditioned to do this, unfortunately, and no matter how hard you try to start a revolution, this is a fact of life and you cannot avoid it.
Tell me: when what you want is no longer on the market at all, how do you vote for it? With your wallet? Do you just not buy its replacement? Nobody will care. Unless you manage to start a revolution all at once, you not buying something will be statistically insignificant.
-Emily
The only way to have the option to have your preferences met in a large and mature enough market is to be completely price insensitive.
A long time ago, I once had a Netgear WGR614v10 (802.11g router). Imagine my surprise when I learned that it was possible to enable telnet access, alter the model number in the NVRAM, and flash WNR1000v3 firmware onto it, converting it to an 802.11n router. They were identical internally.
Everybody I know buys Brother because they don't do that shit. And, of course, they produce decent printers that do their job properly and aren't that expensive to maintain.
There should be a law against this tethering of devices by the vendor when you buy a product as opposed to a service.
That's a slightly different world than requiring a valid, working credit card. iPhones work without a working credit card.
And if you use the device long enough, I'm sure there will be sufficient information for Apple to link the device back to you.
I do appreciate that many of these decisions have required effort and self actualization. Like I'm not particularly expecting a non-tech yuppie to seek out a libreboot machine. But if I were in the market to replace any of these things, I'd turn to the commercial and the used markets rather than walking into Best Buy (or worse searching Amazon) and narrowing my field of view to only shiny surveillance traps.
I do have to wonder what it will take to get the technologically sustainable choices into the general public consciousness, so they stop buying things designed to milk your wallet and spy on you for a few short years, before they're deliberately obsoleted.
Because manufacturers will not mention their product is defective by design. Until I heard of the HP ink subscription scheme a year or two ago, I would not think twice if they advertised such a feature since the expectation is that I could still buy ink independently. I would not expect the printer to stop functioning if I did not subscribe.
That's not to say that I would have bought HP. I already knew that they were not upfront about a lot of things and I already had a company that I trusted. (Ironically, a company that people claimed produced cheap junk back in the 90's.) That said, there are a lot of people buying their first printer and who have little concept of what the pitfalls are. Certain types of pitfalls are rarely mentioned in reviews and, when they are, they may come off as hyperbolic. That said, even commercial products have their pitfalls. I had to deal with a Xerox printer a while back that refused to work with a toner purchased under a support contract since the printer was not covered by the support contract. (The printer was purchased separately since the Internet connection wasn't reliable at that site.)
And yeah the same crapification is happening to commercial markets, at slower or faster paces. The point is that most of this gimmicky consumer shit is just advertising skins on functionality that was already solved 20 years ago, and buying a new old stock or refurbished products would meet the need while avoiding backdoors.
It just feels like so many of the headlines these days about Internet of Trash and subscription service rugpulls are like the old doctor joke - "Doc, it hurts when I do this" ... "Well, stop doing that".
What's the sustainable alternative to buying a new locked-down laptop? If it's a ten-year-old laptop running coreboot then almost nobody is ever going to go that route. You could explain your principles until you're blue in the face but it will never seem like a better alternative than a fast, warrantied new laptop that does almost everything they want to do fairly easily.
Also the point of opting for media self-ownership (which may include piracy) isn't to save money on subscription services, but rather to avoid the inevitable rug pulls and other backstabbing down the line. All these articles about Netflix clamping down on account sharing are only relevant if you've bought into their zero sum world. I understand that's where pop culture is these days, but it's unfortunate that the tech community, who should know better, treats it as if it's anything more than a passing fad.
Imagine your printer fails, and you need a new one ASAP for work. Now what?
I'm a member of the 10 year old printer club, and hating the idea of needing a replacement at some point.
I totally understand the impulse to spend a bit of money and feel that you're solving a problem now and for the future. But these companies have evolved their offerings to fully take advantage of this behavior, and the only way to protect yourself is to take a step back and act deliberately.
> you're free to not use their services and instead turn to the non-existent companies that will put the users over maximizing profits
This is just a strawman argument though. No company on earth is putting users over maximizing profits, but that doesn't lead logically to your conclusion that people don't have choices. People have plenty of choices, because the act of maximizing profits requires exploring and providing many ways of buying something. Some people want to pay per-page, some people want to buy a printer outright and handle maintenance themselves. Both options are available.
> Brother as a brand that doesn't do this. However, what guarantees are there that they won't?
The void in the market it would leave, and some company would (and as you can see, has) take advantage of it to provide consumers with this buying format.
That isn't even remotely true. Many companies are run by people who actually have morals and, even if only for selfish reasons, want customers to not hate them.
I've worked for companies that refused to do things like sell user data, knowing full well that they'd be making lots of money doing it, but knowing that it was wrong and would make customers hate them. They weren't worried that unhappy customers would flock to competitors either. One was a telecom who was the only game in town for many of their users.
It's not always and entirely a race to the bottom where companies do as little as possible for customers while charging customers as much as humanly possible and it shouldn't be, but that is how things often end up. It's why we have that cycle where good products/companies gain massive popularity by putting users over maximizing profits until someone steps in who is too greedy and suddenly users are forced to find alternatives when greed ruins yet another good thing.
There are good companies and great products that put users before maximizing profit every single day. The fact that exploitative assholes also exist doesn't mean that's how everyone behaves, or that it's how everyone should.
> That isn't even remotely true
> even if only for selfish reasons
So we're on the same page. You just repeated what I said. Companies don't put users before profits, but the act of seeking profits (the "selfish reasons" as you put it) require stopping short of some things.
I promise you, there really are companies that put their users before maximizing profits. There genuinely are people who aren't obsessed with money over all else.
There is something to be done in legislation, or such malicious behaviors will become more and more rampant.
These were banned in America decades ago because they were unfair to women (urinals were always free.) So this one at least probably won't be coming back.
The apparent wear on the head seems minor, so far. The $80 brush came with only one head.
Some people seem to be getting counterfeit brush heads from Amazon, so I'm going to have to visit my Walgreens for a spare, and then wait to see what happens.
I also have a Sonicare toothbrush, and other then the head it came with, I only use generic heads on it. The "feature" you are talking about is called the "BrushSync" and it enables the "Brush head replacement reminder". That feature doesn't activate with generic heads, and you can easily turn it for Sonicare heads. Here's a link to the manual for my brush. See page 11 for the feature description and 12 for the instructions to turn it off. Depending on your model you may need to do a different sequence.
https://www.manualslib.com/manual/1507567/Philips-Sonicare-P...
Now, you might say that without reminders, I'm not getting the clean I deserve, but I buy heads with those fade away indicator bristles, so I just change it out when the blue turns white.
Cisco says hi.
I guess the enterprise customers don't care about everything being a subscription.
I know. All of it, and worse, unless we fight back. And no, "voting with your wallet" is not fighting - it's retreat to not yet conquered ground, which is shrinking daily.
Ads. There could be a freemium model where, before every print job, a couple of pages of ads are printed if you don’t have the premium ink subscription.
> The way Salima found out that Boulangism had gone bankrupt: her toaster wouldn’t accept her bread.
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/01/unauthorized-bread-a-...
Definitely entering the surreal disposable humanity
And inkjets are such a PITA for low volume printing. I wish dotmatrix printers would come back. The output quality is poor, they're loud, the paper is iffy, but ink ribbons last a pretty good amount of time for low volumes, and there's near zero warm up time; and you can print banners!
I expect them to stop sending me more when I stop paying, not to sabotage what I had left.
Technically you are just renting the ink.
I use this service for years. I use the legacy free plan and have been printing for free for years.
As soon as somebody develops the technology they will make all the ink on your already printed documents turn invisible too.
It's only half a joke, if this becomes feasible I'm sure the business and marketing folks will have some urgent meetings to bring this along ASAP.
Our financials focused system is good at exerting pressure for people to do stuff, anything, but it fails miserably in promoting reason, instead creating narrow minds narrowly focused on The System itself rather than on the broad set of inputs our minds were originally evolution-made to handle. No wonder that than in turn those narrow minds are much more easily replaced by automated processes.
We keep calling people disregarding their humanity "bad people", but we never discuss the incredible pressures we put on people in the first place. If somebody doesn't focus on the financials we call them lazy and failures and many refuse to support them, we force people to think - and act - that way. Sure, in theory money could be made in better ways than, for example, "extracting value" from people who urgently need some drug, but fact is that this is not nearly as easy as it sounds, with much of the basic needs already in well-established hands and things people really need very complex to fulfill. Individuals and organizations with little capital can mostly only find some local niche, if even that. "You don't need to be an asshole" (to make money) is one of those "works for anyone" but it does not scale to "everyone". Even small local mini-entrepreneurs often have to rely on tricks and cheating and using the inexperience and lack of knowledge of their customers.
So, when we look at such developments, please, let's not stop at "those are horrible people". Just look back at the explanations for why Pizarro's was so brutal, if I read that correctly the conquerors themselves were put under huge pressure due to... debt. We can't expect people to act ethically, to their own big disadvantage, while having to live in a highly competitive system that forces them to make money.
I wonder if it's at all possible for us to develop and install a system that prevents us from exhibiting behaviors learned the hard way by our ancestors (most of which were not even human).
Maybe our digital descendants are able to get it right, if we don't also ground them in survival!
Capitalism is a brutal system. It’s becoming more obvious the longer it runs. I don’t have answers, sadly. Only the ability to see and recognize the failure.
well, different times and standards etc. but there is a quite bit of difference between brutal genocide to get out of debt vs. not allowing your printer to work unless you keep your subscription with our company so our revenue keeps coming in.
I personally abuse the hell out of HP subscription service as I’m on their legacy free plan. 30 pages a month, and run a full set of cleaning cycles each time because I print so infrequently.
If I rent a car and stop paying for it, if I were to say "I expect them to leave me with the car I rented and just not provide a replacement when it needs to be replaced" people would look at me like I was trolling. The nature of renting a car, and the prices involved in renting vs buying are great enough that people understand the market.
With ink, they are doing something similar. You aren't paying $1/month (their lowest tier plan) to buy a cartridge of ink until it runs out. That pricing would be unreasonable compared to the current market price of ink (regardless of what that market price should be if we had better competition). Anyone thinking they found a hack to get HP to give them ink cartridges for $1 is like my example thinking I found a slightly used 2022 car for $500 because I can rent it and then stop paying and get to keep the car.
In this specific case, they aren't taking the ink back, not worth it, and instead creating waste by disabling it. We could say there market shouldn't exist and outlaw it to reduce waste, but that's a different argument than to argue they are selling you a cartridge of ink (technically 2+ for black and color) for $1.
1. Pay $1 for a subscription, print like crazy until your first set of cartridges are empty, then immediately cancel
2. Pay $1 for a subscription, immediately cancel, then keep printing with your first set of cartridges until they're empty
Today, HP allows 1 but not 2. Why?
My body, my choice.
I would expect sufficient ink for the number of pages I signed up for to appear periodically until I have a large surplus, at which point I can either reduce my subscription, or cancel it.
I wouldn't expect that ink to retroactively be bricked.
Laser printers are far, far better in terms of consumables, as long as you avoid the very lowest cost units, and DRM hobbled units.
The ink is only valid during your subscription period, like most other service subscriptions. When you cancel your phone, you don't to use the excess minutes. When you cancel your insurance, you don't get to make a claim for an event after the expiration date. It's 10 pages a month (or whatever plan you sign up for), so you didn't print and the month is done, so is your ink. You can put in a regular cartridge if you want regular rules, but $1/month to maybe print and they'll send more ink when it dries up seems like an ok deal to me? (Was better when it was free, but they got bills, I guess)
Frankly, I don't expect ink cartridges to work after a month or two if I haven't printed anything, either. I'm happy with the color laser I got from CDW Outlet, but while discounted, it was still probably the cost of 4 inkjets and I don't know if I'll really use it enough to justify. But other than some duplexing oddities sometimes, it just works and that's really nice.
Name one other subscription service that sends you physical stuff every month that they remotely disable all of when you cancel.
The fact that there’s physical ink cartridges involved is neither here-nor-there. It’s a practical requirement, nothing else.
Rental cars these days will disable themselves if you don’t return at the of the rental. The SIM card in your phone stops working when the subscription ends etc etc. There are plenty of services involving physical assets that stop working when you stop paying.
Also how much printing do you do? I get an ink cartridge maybe once a year.
Incidentally you can still install standard (non-subscription tied - e.g. bought at Costco) cartridges and the subscription status is then irrelevant (but of course you pay for those cartridges so they're yours to do with as you please unlike the rented subscription ones), but that's not the point (for the most part).
I find it handy for super low volume printing needs at home.
My trash service will come and pick up the cans when I cancel service.
The ink is what?
Don't want to pay for subscription ink? No problem, get the regular ink. Have some account problem and can't pay for subscription ink, you can still get regular ink and use that (subject to the usual inkjet printer woes that come with not printing much).
Seems like leasing a car and complaining you're expected to return it after the lease.
I have a Deskjet 4515 for a decade or so. I use regular ink cartridges with it, and even if I don't print anything for three months, it just prints fine. Sometimes a couple of nozzles get clogged, but printing or a quick clean restores them to perfect order. When you're printing in "Normal" quality, these clogs are tolerated somehow, so you don't see the degradation in the quality either.
Modern HP printers came a very long way since 500C/550C days. These are resilient machines now, even if they're made to home-duty level of robustness.
HP may have many quirks and unethical practices around ink, but ink quality and machine resilience are not two of them.
The same thing that happens when I sign up on amazon for a 'subscription' of diapers or dog food.
When I stop the subscription, I expect them to stop sending more. I don't expect them to take my child...
I print maybe 20-30 pages a year, mostly return labels, around 4 years ago I had to print around 200 pages which it did without a hiccup.
Once a week it wakes up and does its maintenance and I truly love it when it does it.
During these 23 years I've bought 2 sets of 20 inks at less than 15€ per set (2010 and 2014, which reminds me that maybe it's time I buy another one). The printer itself did cost 160€ in 2010.
I think I'll never get as lucky again as I did with that printer.
This is actually not always true. When I was looking at a printer on Amazon I noticed in the small print of the description that it had to have the subscription ink and there was no alternative. It was a printer that was on massive sale and it looked like a great deal but I'm very glad that I passed up the opportunity.
(Admittedly it's towards the end of the page.)
How does HP Instant Ink work?
HP Instant Ink is based on pages, not cartridges. Choose a plan based on the number of pages you would like to print monthly. Your monthly fee allows you to use our subscription cartridges to print your plan pages and includes ink or toner, delivery and recycling.
Can I still use my Subscription Cartridges if I cancel the service?
From the moment you insert the first service cartridges received with your Welcome Package, all following cartridges received will be Subscription Cartridges.
If you cancel the Service, even if the Subscription Cartridges provided with your subscription are not empty, they will stop working in your printer and you will have to replace all of them with standard cartridges.
Yes, it's not ideal to waste the remaining ink, but that's such a non issue as you can still use it by paying the subscription until it runs out (which is basically equivalent to paying for the ink they sent you).
I mean, hardly the same here. Offline content is only available to subscribed users, so it makes sense that it's physically deleted from your computer, but you don't lose it: all your "favorites" are still attached to your account.
I do agree that it's a pain if you rely on offline music, but not re-downloading previously-downloaded content is more of a programming issue than a policy one, unless they specifically do it to save on egress fees.
With their generous freemium program, I don't really fault Spotify here and it's unfair to compare it to HP.
Different terms apply to streamed music vs downloaded music, so offline-caching of music would have required negotiated exemptions from the licensing organizations. They probably had to limit the period of time that a downloaded song could be accessed offline.
If you listen to these songs so much, just buy them. If you're a programmer it should be pocket change for you.
Real HP cartridges are about $80 - the cost of a new printer. So you can guess what our next step will be and which brand we won't be buying.
Re: printers, I recently replaced the toner cartridge that came with the Brother B&W multifunction laser printer I bought 12 years ago. Could not be happier with that thing. I sprung for the extended capacity cartridge at Micro Center for the replacement so there's a decent actuarial chance it will outlive me.
That thing is unstopable. Incredibly cheap to purchase and use. 100 would buy again.
bought for $100 eight years ago -- I took it with me when I moved countries -- still going strong. toner refills available from third parties on Amazon for very cheap.
features
wifi + ethernet
laser monochrome printer with 2-sided duplex printing
flatbed scanner & automatic document feeder for scanner
no duplex for scanning (you will have to manually flip over the source pages if you want to scan the back side too)
This is like digital files instead of DVDs, CDs, Cassette tapes, etc. With DRM they can shut off your access to the files. With the physical media you have unlimited access to the medium.
You don't need physical media: it takes up a lot of space. Digital files are usually better. Digital files with DRM, however, are crap. Don't use it, and don't buy it.
>This is the you'll own nothing and like it movement from HP. You pay per number of papers printed, and get ink in the mail but you are only renting the printer from HP and not owning it. They can also shut you off if they want to.
Even worse, since this is crappy inkjet technology, unless things have improved since I last looked at inkjets (I doubt it), the print heads dry up over time if they're not used, requiring replacement of the print cartridges even though there's still ink. This doesn't happen with laser printers; you can leave them for a year, and then print out a page and it works fine.
I keep trying to tell non-technical people I know not to buy into this scam of an industry (inkjet printing), but no one listens to me.
I own a MacBook from 2010, fully equipped with software that cost me 4 figures back then (Adobe Creative Suite, MS Office, various bits of commercial music production software etc. etc.) and came with perpetual licenses and physical media.
...yet somehow they managed to render it worthless so that they could charge me again for what I already owned, namely office software and design software.
Writable optical discs are far, far worse, and are completely untrustworthy as a long-term archive solution.
So I don't think you really can avoid the need for constantly managing and migrating your backups.
Finally, "a set of shelves" with movies can take quite a lot of space if you have hundreds or thousands of movies. To me, it's easier with music: I don't listen to that much music, and I listen to a large portion of my library many, many times over. Movie-watching is quite different from this; I don't re-watch movies or TV shows very often, but it's nice to have them available for those times I want to, or when a friend wants to watch something. So it's quite possible to collect far more video than audio, at least in my personal experience.
You still get that with physical objects. How are your shelves of VHS tapes and LaserDiscs doing?
I have no idea what you mean by "the format in question becomes deprecated". A physical disc will become deprecated long before the ripped version ever will.
Also I don't see mpv/Kodi ever deprecating support for x264. And even if there were some compelling reason to leave the format behind, you can always transcode or just redownload.
This is how a lot of businesses do their printing/photocopying. And it can make sense if you're printing a lot per month. They don't have to worry about repairs/servicing or upgrading and can pay monthly/quarterly from expenses rather than capital outlay.
Doing it for home use/small printers/small usage seems madness though.
That said the printer only prints well for about 2 years before color images just start to streak no matter how new your print cartridge is or how many times you clean/align. I'd love to invest in a color laser but last time I went through this it was close to 600 bucks to just get started.
I wonder if it's time to check that option out again...
A color laser is effectively four laser printers in one box, so it is inherently going to be multiple times the cost of a single one.
That said, unless your wife is printing mostly actual photos that she cares about having in top quality, the color laser is the right answer if she actually needs color.
Inkjet printers are for photos and nothing else. They range between not good and bad at documents, always have, and always will. Anything greyscale made of mostly solid colors is laser's territory.
This is really a key point. Inkjet printers are great for printing photos and will work great if you do so frequently. But if you don't, they have issues.
Unless you print something in "full color" (and even if you do), you rarely use the inks evenly. One cartridge will always run out or dry out faster than another. Also, ink can dry out in the jets - causing clogs and resulting in streaks. Also, if a cartridge dries out, the printer thinks it is empty and almost always requires you to replace it before printing even if you don't need it.
They're great for photos (especially Canons), but a simple BW laser is a better investment if all you print is documents. If you need color (for documents), a color laser is also more ideal. It is much more expensive up front, but also a good long-term investment. Toner you use less frequently (like cyan) won't dry out. It'll just sit there until the odd day that you need it. Prints-per-cartridge are usually higher since the cartridges are typically larger, physically. Streaking in the conventional sense isn't even possible with how the tech works. Price-per-print is typically much lower. Especially if you consider less trips to the store, and less replacing of wasted cartridges.
A $600 color laser (more like $400 now) can be an expensive upfront investment, but for printing color docs, it's almost always cheaper in the long run.
Source: I worked retail in college and sold printers and had this conversation literally thousands of times.
It's unlikely HP would bother with the envelopes if it wasn't cheaper for them then building new cartridges.
If:
A) You have subscribed to HP Instant Ink and B) You stop paying for your subscription
The ink you have in your home as part of that subscription will no longer work in your printer.
You can use other ink in the printer. The printer is not bricked. It simply disables the revocable license you were paying for to use the ink in the cartridges they shipped you. They sell cartridges that don't have this model.
Whether or not the model is dumb or the idea that the ink "stops working" if you stop paying makes one chafe, the printer itself does not magically turn into a paperweight. (And the ink is supposed to be returned to HP.)
With so many issues affecting humanity, it's impossible to address them all and immediately unless you live in an authoritarian yet super-efficient regime. If you like that, look into Singapore.
Edit; brand not important
Depending on brand and model they call them inktank/eco-tank/mega-tank/inkvestment ... and so on.
Mine is a Canon, but from what I've seen/heard Epson, and Brother have happy users as well. Honestly haven't heard from anyone using a Hp inktank so I can't say anything about it.
We print from our phones over WiFi, we print all sorts of colouring in and cards and various things for the children, it's barely 1/4 through the tanks of ink which came with it.
The print quality is _ok_, not good enough to print family photos to go in a picture frame, but good enough for an invitation to a children's birthday party etc, but I had had enough of buying printer after printer where the 3-4 weeks between needing to print would dry out the cartridge and I'd be throwing away another £40 (or fighting with 3 or 4 sets of "compatibles" until one worked.
This feels as close as it can be to how 3D printing is for me, where I can stick basically "anything" I want, with a 1.75mm diameter and a melting point below 300C into the "print head" and it'll just work.
It matters for mental effort when you just want to sit in your comfy chair and have a talk; all you have to do is hit record or stream on your computer, not mess with hooking up a microphone and a hardware recorder and such.
It's not (always) because these microphones have superior sound quality or anything. It's because of the convenience.
-Emily
Sound quality is also a consideration, although that probably doesn't matter as much for this kind of video.
The lamest part is that it does print a test page AND prints the windos test page too. It bricks it self with a cartridge error the moment it receives a normal print job.
It actually made me stop and think about starting a printer company, until I remembered Brother exists and isn't garbage yet. But even they have started a print rental service. :(
Edit: also kind of funny to see the printer we changed over to mentioned in this thread as a common replacement.
https://www.cnet.com/home/smart-home/amazon-echo-shares-your...
Example:
-The Framework Laptop (Came at the height of the right-to-repair crap)
-Linux (Remember them unix wars and specialised-expensive hardware)
It will just be another "segment" to compete in, ie being more free-and-open than your competitors ?
EDIT: Formatting
I wish people would throw out "thin and light" and make something practical. Nobody does it right. There are heavy laptops out there but they always sacrifice things like the display for that purpose.
Maybe one day we'll try to build our own laptop, but that requires such an astronomical level of expertise and commitment and money that we probably won't ever get to.
-Emily
Yes/No :) YMMV, but I do rate the framework a tad higher than just an experiment. This is technically the 'first-of-a-new-kind' of a product and or laptop. Give it a few more generation.
The FW-Laptop might not have been the best example but my point is as much as these "evil-companies" do "evil-things" (like H.P now) there will arise a natural counter-market force an products (opportunities) to be "less-evil"
We contacted Framework directly and asked if they planned to build any larger or more powerful laptops. They said no. The most they can do at this point is try to set a precedent.
-Emily
Currently have a ten year old HP printer, constantly causes problems. If Framework actually makes a printer I'll buy it instantly.
I'd buy something like that yesterday already !
It appears not. Apparently the desire of 'the market' to extract maximum profit at ANY cost right here and right NOW tramples everything else. Consumer trust and the next decade's profits that hang on that trust be damned. Better to extract everything NOW, rather than build something long-lasting.
This can only be solved by regulation now. We are back to where we were at the turn of the century before consumer protection laws and regulations existed.
I never wanted a mobile with non-replaceable battery but suddenly the "market" decided that this the only option on offer
I never wanted a social network or search engine that spies on me and creates my behavioral profile for sale, but suddenly the "market" decided that this the only viable business model for those services
I never wanted a digital only payments system but soon the basic anonymity of using cash will be "suspicious" activity
> My car and no car I will ever buy will have a subscription model
You don't want a "subscription car" but I can assure you pretty soon both you and your car data will be traded amongst insurance companies, "brands" and who knows who else
Joe Consumer doesn't have the time, education or energy to do anything about all this. This is down to regulatory capture of the institutions that should protect us from out-of-control corporate or state interests. This is the stark reality especially in the US. There are slowly diverging attitudes e.g., in Europe, where 500 million people and 27 countries don't agree on much but managed to agree on a few consumer / data protections.
Lets hope we can reverse this dystopia before it becomes inescapable.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comprehensive_Crime_Control_Ac...
Even in a perfect society that is not run by private rackets, captured governments, prone to drifting into authoritarianism etc, making the entire economic system contingent on particular electric/digital infrastructures seems absurdly cavalier and asking for deep trouble in the future.
Coincidentally, you could harvest a typical printer for many parts it needs.
Me, with a plotter instead of a printer: UHHHHHHHH
I extolled how about my black and white laser printer like 5-7 years ago and I am still on the toner that came with the printer.
I don't know what kind of sadist looks at printers and says "I want to make those even worse", but apparently HP hired them.
We have extremely cheap pens. If only we could use them to get output from a computer...
DIY Pen Plotter with Automatic Tool Changer | Arduino based CNC Drawing Machine
Why on earth people fell for this subscription racket in general is beyond me. I understand "subscribing" for things like Netflix. But "subscribing" for things like heated seats in your car I think is pure insanity.
Cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubik
Edit: And one of Perri Air too. Just to be sure.
Customers will demand refunds for printers that print obscenitys and self-destroy.