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Danger Removing Games From Sidekick

Posted by simoniker on from the nothing-playable-will-robinson dept.

gad_zuki! writes "Danger, the maker of the slightly-revolutionary Hiptop/Sidekick 'all-in-one' phone/browser/camera/etc., is now remotely removing the built-in games with the newest Color Sidekick software update, allegedly because of licensing concerns. This is why vendor lock-in and a thin-client system can be a very risky gamble." Another reader points out that Cory Doctorow over at BoingBoing has some heated comments on the very same subject.

2 of 18 comments (clear)

  1. Not to whinge, but this sucks. by KILNA · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I purchased a B&W sidekick in November of last year, and all of the puzzle games were marginally playable due to the underpowered processor of the SK (or the inefficiency of the game depending on your perspective). But I loved the SK, having all of your stuff synced to the network was great and it was a handy gadget. On wednesday of this week my local T-Mobile store finally had the Color SK in. Wow. It looks great and the web and the camera functions are both much more usable now.

    Last night, I was playing Rat Maze at the very time they performed the update. I hated the game up until that point, and I actually discovered I liked it with the new speed. Likewise, the Shuffle game was mediocre on the B&W but the Color was much snappier. 4 games on it, and now I had only one... well, one and a quarter. The 'Snobored' easter egg game they consoled me with in the notification email was essentially the same thing as one I'd programmed in AppleSoft Basic on my Franklin Ace 1200 back in the day. Grrrr.

    Inexplicably, my old B&W SK still has the games.

    I sent them a couple of emails chewing them out for removing them.

    --
    Error: PANTS NOT FOUND. Press <F1> to continue.
  2. Not *ALL* of the games by rit · · Score: 3, Interesting

    They are removing the 'Arcade' application that came with the t-mobile build of the sidekick.

    Rocks & Rockets will remain on device.

    Note also that this is ONLY for Color SideKick users - B&W SideKick was properly licensed for the Arcade application and will continue to have it. T-Mobile neglected to license Arcade for the new Color units and violated their license. Likely they'll renegotiate and we'll see it back on device sooner rather than later.

    Also, I see some confusion on how this is being done. HiptopOS has the ability to do an OTA (Over The Air) update; you'll receive a popup saying "A new software patch is available, would you like to install?" or something along those lines. You *can* decline it, but I get the feeling sooner or later you'll be forced to be running latest OS.

    -rit
    (aka z_ on efnet #hiptop)