Why the hell does this mouse need to connect to the Internet? | Hacker News Reader

Why the hell does this mouse need to connect to the Internet?

arstechnica.com

105 pointsSeanDav79 comments

> Now we have a new entry in the saga of "Why the hell does this thing need to connect to the Internet?"

We live in this age for some time now already, but 'till recently it was only "why the hell does this software need to connect to the Internet". On-line document editing, on-line spreadsheets, on-line 3D modelling, on-line recipes, on-line weight tracking, on-line todo lists... Store everything in the cloud, use everything through the browser. So now I don't own any data nor can I easily export it, can't integrate tools with each other and have to choose my tools out of sea of unfinished, half-assed apps (also known as MVPs) that stop being supported or just disappear when developers get acquihired or just move to another project out of boredom.

Leave my files to me, give me off-line tools and a working sync. I just want Emacs to work on my tablet, and some sane way to seamlessly sync data between it and my desktop. Or personal cloud. Or whatever. And then I won't need all those fancy todo, note-taking and calendaring apps that all together can hardly beat org-mode.

Internet is not electricity, it's not always on and not always free. Until someone figures out how to put Internet into a bucket to use as a battery, please let me work off-line when I want.

>On-line document editing, on-line spreadsheets, on-line 3D modelling, on-line recipes, on-line weight tracking, on-line todo lists... Store everything in the cloud, use everything through the browser.

Documents, recipes and to-do lists gain two legitimate and significant advantages from being cloud based: sharing and collaboration. There are disadvantages too, but it's a trade-off.

With a mouse driver, there's no trade-off; it's just all disadvantages.

There are some advantages, at least in the case of a programmable mouse like the one in question. Once you've got all seven thousand buttons programmed Just So, you can then upload the profile to the cloud and have it automatically synced with any other machine you might happen to use the mouse with -- say, a PC at a LAN party.

Of course, this is about as small as an advantage can get, since I'm struggling to think of a person who cares that much about their mouse profile who wouldn't also lug their own PC to the party. So it's not all disadvantages, it's just nearly all disadvantages.

just save the settings to a human readable file instead of something ridiculous like The Registry then they can symlink it to dropbox if they care that much

The advantage you named is no advantage: the mouse could store its configuration on the mouse, just like other gaming mice do.

It's a "professional gaming mouse", it's supposed to be used by progamers (the ones that regulary go to LAN tournaments, have many gaming computers, and destroy 20 mouses a year). I can see how syncing mouse settings between mouses can be useful for them.

Still the execution is awful.

That's true. The difference is that the cloud is a really good way to solve collaboration and sharing, and a really poor way to solve settings syncing for a device that is not otherwise internet-related.

No one has to let you work offline. You can choose to do so yourself by using offline applications if that's something you care about.

But web-based applications have major advantages to the application provider. First and foremost they have better distribution. I can write an app, and then hand you a link (and you know there's no commitment in clicking, so you do). I can show you why you should use my app on my front page, and then I can give you a demo, all without you having to confirm any "are you sure you want to make permanent changes to your system" dialog.

Now of course one can't easily make the above argument for a mouse driver. But I'm responding to your sentiment that too many things are web connected in general.

> No one has to let you work offline. You can choose to do so yourself by using offline applications if that's something you care about.

Except that it's hard to do this across multiple devices now (especially when most of them are not PCs), because everyone got on the cloud bandwagon and don't let user own the data anymore.

> But web-based applications have major advantages to the application provider.

(emphasis mine)

> Until someone figures out how to put Internet into a bucket to use as a battery, please let me work off-line when I want.

Offline storage. Page caching. It does exist. It is the functional equivalent to batteries in more ways than one too - you are limited in capacity, but not as much in transfer rate.

> Offline storage. Page caching. It does exist.

But unfortunately it doesn't always work. Point in case: Google Maps offline mode on tablet sometimes doesn't work, because every now and then Google Maps app needs to contact Internet for something, and won't let you use it off-line until it connects and gets what it wants. Not fun if you're in the middle of nowhere at that moment.

Making everything SaaS neatly solves the piracy problem. There's a business incentive to only let your users rent your software.

It doesn't solve the piracy "problem", but it does mitigate it somewhat, and it prevents file sharing. Piracy is still very simple for SaaS. It's just a matter of sharing an account between multiple users. That's easy to detect on a large scale, but basically impossible to reliably detect when it's just between a couple of friends. And once you start trying to detect and prevent the latter case, the solution stops being so neat after all.

A better solution is to make sure that there is significant value for a user having her own, personal account. I think in many cases, if you can solve that, you'll be able to solve it for either SaaS or the classic installation model.

A good company shouldn't forget who their customers are. In this case it should be obvious, but evidently it needs pointing out: your customers are the people buying your mice! Not potential advertisers you can sell their data to. What were they thinking?

Their privacy policy prohibits sharing of personal data with third-parties, so I assume that they don't. There really seems to be nothing to see here.

Cloud storage of mouse settings is perhaps a bit wacky, but I really don't think there is a conspiracy behind it.

It might make more sense for the driver to allow local configuration, and then sync that to the cloud, rather than the other way around - but meh. The lack of internet connection probably isn't a real-world problem for users of a mouse targeted at MMO gaming.

I've got one of these mice, and I can't reproduce any unresponsiveness when the driver transitions from online to offline.

I think the real lesson to be learnt here is that even if you've done nothing wrong, if you don't want to be the target of internet hysteria, be very careful that no feature in your product can inaccurately be described by people on forums with the letters D-R-M... especially when it isn't.

> Their privacy policy prohibits sharing of personal data with third-parties

That's good to hear. Based on what I'd read elsewhere* I'd thought otherwise. Still bizarre though.

*e.g. http://boingboing.net/2012/11/07/razer-naga-gaming-mouse-req...

Inaccurate?

You can't access the mouse settings without creating an account. Whether it's a cryptographic DRM or not is irrelevant - it's ridiculous you need an activation server for a mouse.

If you read the article, it will tell you that once you've created your account, it will then work in offline mode, just as you found. But if you can't get to the activation server that first time, then no settings for you. Braindead design - particularly given how unforgiving and self-entitled gamers are as a demographic.

Yeah, you have to create an account by entering your email address and a password. That's all. I don't think there is an association between the account and device - the account is just where your settings get stored.

I agree that the requirement to be online to use the config program is silly, but most of the conspiracy theories, talk of DRM, and vilification of the company that are flying round seem a bit overblown.

>> It might make more sense for the driver to allow local configuration, and then sync that to the cloud

I still think that's a terrible idea. Imagine scaling it: every device you have gets a separate account for syncing its settings to a separate site.

If I wanted the drivers I've installed on my OS to be backed up, I'd want the OS to take care of it.

I really like my Razer Naga, but one day I went to install new drivers and found that they required signing up for their "cloud" service. Worse, the old drivers weren't available from their site.

So, now I'm using the mouse without drivers and am unable to benefit from the extra buttons much of the time. I refuse to sign up for their cloud service when all I need is hardware drivers.

I sent Razer a polite but angry e-mail about it a while back. I won't be buying Razer hardware again if this doesn't change.

It's unlikely Razer will change their business strategy, but in the meantime you should be able to download old drivers from Softpedia here: http://drivers.softpedia.com/dyn-search.php?search_term=raze...

If the particular OS/version is absent from that list, then googling around will likely get you what you need. Zero point in enjoying less than the full potential of your hardware. Good luck!

Actually: "For one thing, Razer now plans to make Synapse 1.0 drivers and other legacy drivers available shortly on its support site"

I went through the same experience as you. One day I downloaded the drivers after reinstalling Windows and found it asking for a username and password. The old drivers are still on the site though, just hidden. To find them, follow these steps:

1. Go to http://www.razersupport.com.

2. Scroll down the page, and then click on the Drivers, Firmware And Manuals Download button.

3. From the Main Categories menu on the right side of the screen, click Razer Mice Products.

4. From the Download Categories list, click your mouse series.

5. From the Download Categories list, click your mouse model.

6. From the Download Categories list, click Drivers.

7. If the Legacy drivers are available, they will appear in this Downloads list.

The Naga ones are here: http://www.razersupport.com/index.php?_m=downloads&_a=vi...

To quote myself from Reddit (the article hints at this but it's a bit less than clear):

"When I was perfunctorily reverse engineering the (OS X) driver for my Razer mouse for this reason, it didn't seem to be doing anything special - even if the mouse is more accurate, this seems to be reported the standard way, and the software DPI control is just multiplying the value. I could be mistaken, but you shouldn't lose any functionality by simply using the standard mouse driver with third party software for hotkeys etc."

I love my naga, but dear god almighty I experienced the same thing when I plugged it in. Frankly anyone who thinks it is a good idea is fucking idiot.

The company can simply turn off the activation server in a couple years when the mouse becomes "obsolete," "end of life," or "no longer supported," forcing people whose mice work just fine to buy new ones.

From the company's point of view, how could it possibly be a bad thing to make people buy a new mouse they don't actually need?

Because when that time comes up, Razer may find they're losing users to Logitech. End-of-lifing my mouse is not a way to get a repeat customer out of me, creating great products is.

This story can serve to save many of those people their money by not buying a mouse that can be EOL'ed in the first place.

Razer may find they're losing users to Logitech

Which wouldn't be a bad call on the part of the users. Logitech isn't cheap, but I've found the quality and support are both excellent.

> End-of-lifing my mouse is not a way to get a repeat customer out of me

You may be in the minority. People buy products with huge ridiculousness factors -- DRM, region locking, DLC, retroactive feature removal (I'm looking at you, Sony), the mess that is the US cell phone carrier industry...The number of customers who simply don't care about such things is large enough to support a lot of companies.

Losing access to one desirable program is nowhere near as bad as losing access to being able to use your computer at all (except for the keyboard shortcut gods). The latter will leave a much more indelible impression.

"Because when that time comes up, Razer may find they're losing users to Logitech."

You assume long-term planning. It does not appear to be in play here.

I doubt this is malicious, just stupid. They wanted to have some sort of cloud feature, either because it's the latest buzzword and they want to be up on the times or they had some legitimate reason for a minor feature or for getting data on how people used the mice on games.

If you make something like this opt-in no one will do it, so to justify all the work you did or ensure full buzzword compliance you have to do it. It's just a heavy handed way to go about it.

Perhaps an upside is that a move like this might indicate that they're living on the precipice of financial failure, so not buying their products will take care of the problem for everybody.

But they still didn't allow an opt-out, which is just idiotic.

Very annoying. Reminds me of the Kindle Fire which requires an Internet connection for basically any app to work. I just wanted to play some dumb game, _that I purchased_, but couldn't because of no network connection.

Lets hope more people switch to roccat mice. Roccat[1] is the only vendor that I know of with actual Linux support[2].

[1] http://www.roccat.org/

[2] http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ODY1M...

I've worked with ROCCAT for years (as well as other companies like Razer) and never heard about this before. How do other gaming mice do on linux if they haven't focused on supporting it?

There is an open source app for Razer mice, but it's fairly basic (or was, the last time I used it) and doesn't have support for very many mice.

That said, I use a death adder, a mamba, a lachesis, and an Orochi with Linux just fine. Admittedly I don't have the advantages of advanced configurations, but that's what you get without An Internet connection with Synapse 2.0 anyway.

I've used a Razer Naga Epic for more than 8 months at my job. Having useful keys, like enter, spacebar, ESC, f5, and arrow keys on my mouse has been a dream for years, and the programmable 12-pad makes this a reality.

The Synapse service was designed for someone like me, who uses the same mouse at home and work, even though I don't use it. Synapse syncs mouse configuration settings across different computers, installs, etc. This way, you don't lose your sensitivity and custom keybinds and macros.

However, being required to use Synapse is madness. The Naga Epic has "offline" drivers. With Synapse, I wouldn't be able to use the mouse at work because of (realistically) strict IT security standards. It's a shame, since I really enjoy my Razer mouse, and was going to start supporting them.

Of course at some point it will have its own wifi or cellular. Modem and you won't know that your settings are in the cloud. That is when it gets really strange.

This seems like some horrible over-engineering. Storing settings that are tied to the mouse rather than the computer is a cool idea, but... It's hardware. Stick a couple K of non-volatile storage inside it and your settings are saved as long as you've got your mouse.

And your settings are still there even if the vendor goes out of business or Oracle buys them and changes the license.

Absolutely, but if I may suggest that you are looking at it as an engineer :-). Shortly (and by that I mean some few years, not a decade but more than a couple of years) there will be an abundance of cellular equivalent 'data' space. So a manufacturer will be able to 'add' to their devices a small transceiver which can make small data transactions on this spectrum for 'free'. The manufacturer will pay a 'remainder' type fee to the cellular carrier in exchange for their simple device sending the occasional small packet through the network or getting back a packet. This ability will let the manufacturer effectively 'remote boot' your gizmo with firmware that the person who manufactured it didn't have access too. That helps on copy cat stuff but it also means that small changes or 'improvements' can be pushed out to the field as necessary, but you see this gizmo is mostly software, it looks like a hardware device but it really only has enough hardware to run the software that makes it amazingly gizmotic. And of course there are the good, better, and best versions of this gizmo which all have exactly the same hardware but they get their software based on some sort of exchange between the device and the 'cloud' which tells them which beast to become. All of this benefits the manufacturer quite a bit and the consumer not a bit, but as long as it is reasonably 'transparent' to the consumer nobody is hurt or gets upset.

Gamers go to experience a similar effect where the manufacturer would ship the box art, a CD (which contained basically a playable demo) and an authentication 'key' which would download the 'patch' which was bigger than all of the data on the CD to install the game. I have some of those games for Win98 and its hilarious (not) to try to play them on a VM running Win98, they can't even patch to a playable level.

So that your manufacturer wants your mouse to connect to the Internet means that they are pushing the edge of the envelope and are only slightly ahead of the curve when the mouse will talk to the internet without your permission to update itself and figure out what features it should 'expose' to you based on how much money you paid for it. I would love to be wrong on this but sadly I don't think that I am. We'll see.

Razer is experimenting with a new business model: gathering personal and usage data from players and the PC's they use, to sell to interested third parties.

From the article: "For instance, he says, Razer is moving toward cloud storage because "we realized that as firmware, profiles, macros and other settings stored in onboard memory became more complex, more memory space was required."

Er, that doesn't explain why the settings can be saved to the mouse after online setup has been completed. I'm with you on the notion that they are gathering data for sales to other parties in order to boost their bottom line.

Is that it? It doesn't have anything to do with a second hand market?

Intentionally destroying the resale value of your product wouldn't be a smart move when the target market is fairly technically sophisticated and prone to post rants on internet sites frequented by the rest of your target market.

Uh, they did it with video games.

There's more competition for the same users when it comes to things like mice. There's only one Mass Effect 3, and some other game, no matter how good simply won't do if you want to play Mass Effect 3.

Mice substitute for each other much better than games do. If someone replacing a Razer mouse discovers it's difficult to resell because its functionality is crippled, they're not real likely to replace it with another Razer.

"Intentionally destroying the resale value of your product wouldn't be a smart move"

Yes, because companies only make smart moves.

The idea of a second hand mouse makes me gag

I think this is less about selling data, and more about marketing another perceived desired feature and trying to gain an edge on their opponents. This happens frequently in this space, where mouse sensors with maximum DPIs no one would actually make use of are the key selling point.

What exactly is that edge supposed to be?

Another bullet point full of buzz words on a feature list. I wish I was kidding. See: http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-mice

Someone should analyze how much data is actually transferred. I doubt it's more than $0.12 worth of NVRAM that could be stuck onto the mouse itself.

Tan wrote. "If an Internet connection goes down and if the user has enabled offline mode by checking the "stay logged in" box, Synapse 2.0 automatically goes into offline mode."

Seems bass ackwards to me. You have to create an account online to be able to use your mouse offline. Offline should be the default mode, and it should give you the option to enable online mode. Saying the settings require too much storage space to be stored locally just sounds ridiculous to me. That response only serves to make me suspicious.

Also a bit surprised at the apologetic tone of Ars. Maybe Razer is not spying on everything you do, but this is still a really dumb move on their part.

Posting from http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=379...

>> The extent to which Razer collects information is not much different than your average terms of service for most software you use. Like teamliquid, they collect anonymous aggregate and individual data. Unlike teamliquid, they reserve the right to collect personally identifiable information. This personally identifiable information must be volunteered by the user. This includes, your name, email address etc. This information is not shared with any third parties except in a few instances where it is necessary to provide a service or comply with the law. In all circumstances, the user voluntarily provides this information.

===

And you are silly to think otherwise. My first impression upon hearing this was immediately positive, even without hearing this. All my settings anywhere I go with my laptop, without having to retweak it on a new computer.

Do you have multiple profiles? Do you have multiple profiles with a lot of different settings? If you want to store it all offline, then you'll need more expensive memory, and have to pay more for your mouse. Use the new cloud based Synapse and you don't have to store all your profiles on the mouse. Store it on the cloud, then sync it to your mouse when you want to use that profile.

I don't see why everyone is making a big fuss about this. I don't need the features, so I just don't download Synapse.

From http://www.razerzone.com/synapse2/faq

>> All Razer products function as plug and play devices. Razer Synapse 2.0 offers a service above and beyond basic functionality to enhance your Razer product's capabilities. This includes features like configuring and saving macros, key binds, and preference settings. Razer Synapse 2.0 also maintains your devices in optimal condition by automatically updating and downloading driver and firmware updates, in addition to its cloud-syncing ability.

Razer Synapse 2.0 is not compulsory software to get your Razer peripherals working - but it is advisable if you want to get the best out of them.

===

> Do you have multiple profiles? Do you have multiple profiles with a lot of different settings? If you want to store it all offline, then you'll need more expensive memory, and have to pay more for your mouse. Use the new cloud based Synapse and you don't have to store all your profiles on the mouse. Store it on the cloud, then sync it to your mouse when you want to use that profile.

Just put a $notmany flash drive there for those settings; it shouldn't really change the price, and it would give benefits like:

- mouse can work to it's full potential without Internet access

- orthogonality of computer systems is retained (why on Earth should a mouse depend on being able to talk to someone's server)?

- no tracking

- can't remotely brick my mouse to encourage me to buy a new one

I don't know that I'd connect to any website in a cafe, and when I did go to LAN parties, they were riddled with people scanning the network, and so forth. I'd be much more comfortable paying more for more storage in the device.

I'm trying to find a positive interpretation to this:

Could it be that they are trying to find out how the customers actually use their products in order to allow them to build a better product?

So they force all their users to go through a process that has 1) never been seen before for a mouse, and 2) absolutely asinine in concept anyway? It's a MOUSE. If you want feedback, ask for it. Don't force the user to jump through hoops to utilize the product you just sold them.

Look at all the pro gamers; they aren't bringing their mouse every where they go, they just save their settings rock in another mouse and are ready for gaming.

Huh. This is an interesting point. It may be a good feature for internet cafes.

Maybe that's the market they're trying to target.

> It may be a good feature for internet cafes.

Do those still exist? I remember playing StarCraft a lot with friends in such a place, but this was like... 8 years ago?

It depends where you are in the world. I believe they're exceptionally popular in some parts of Asia like China and Korea. In places where everyone has a personal computer powerful enough for everything they do with it, and with a tablet/laptop just about every cafe is an internet cafe.

Even still, there are niches to fill in such places. Relatively recently (last year I think) a place here opened with exceptionally high performance PCs/net connection, comfortable chairs, etc, which focuses on gaming. Every time I walk past it's packed, so they're doing something right.

Internet cafes don't let you install your own software and drivers, so no. This is not being marketed to that demographic.

Are you sure? That seems counter-intuitive. If I were a pro gamer (and were allowed), I'd sure bring the mouse I was most comfortable with.

Correct, pro-gamers (and amateur competitors too) will take their mouse to any tournament, and if they forget it they will try to find the same model to use.

Pro-am gamers bring the rest of their PC hardware to the tournament.

You would bring your own mouse, however when you sit down at a tournament machine you will need to install specific mouse drivers and get it configured. Being able to sit down at any machine and just plugin your mouse/kb and have a familiar setup seems like a great idea to me.

You would still need custom drivers to use the cloud mouse.

Why not just give each mouse a unique ID then, sync the settings anonymously against that ID. Don't even have to log in anymore

Pro gamers are the only people that would do this. No one else, using gaming mice like these, move around enough to locations guaranteed to have their mouse on the premise to justify this sort of behaviour.

Hmmm ... you could do the same thing with any device. Phones, tablets, computers. Make them dependent on the cloud for daily operation, then drop support later and force new sales.

Relevant: http://bues.ch/cms/hacking/razercfg.html

Somehow I am reminded of rms.

Actually, the mouse needs to connect to the Internet in order to tweet to your followers that you clicked on a button.

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