At Techdirt, Karl Bode reports on efforts to get the Federal Trade Commission to do something about companies that ruin hardware with software updates. Some will remove features or limit functionality; some will outright turn what you bought into a brick to avoid the costs of maintenance or to get you shopping for more. Bode cites two recent strikes—Peloton adding a $95 fee to its bikes "for no coherent reason" and the Snoo smart basinet suddenly paywalling key features—as examples of a growing problem.
In a letter sent last week to key FTC officials, a coalition of seventeen different groups (including Consumer Reports, iFixit, and US PIRG) requested that the agency take aim at several commonplace anti-consumer practices, including "software tethering" (making hardware useless or less useful later via firmware update), or the act of suddenly locking key functionality behind subscriptions:
Both practices are examples of how companies are using software tethers in their devices to infringe on a consumer's right to own the products they buy. While the FTC has taken some limited actions with regard to this issue, a lack of clarity and enforcement has led to an ecosystem where consumers cannot reliably count on the connected products they buy to last.
How qaint the term "nickel-and-diming" has become. If only! Even "Dollar and pounding" loses a zero or two to reality, though it does arrive as pleasantly kinetic innuendo.
