Firmware Upgrades For Everything

eggoeater writes "Forbes Magazine has an article discussing how more portable electronics are not only suggesting firmware upgrades, but requiring them in order to get all the features! Apparently the new Lyra A/V Jukebox will sometimes display a message stating that 'this feature will be available in future upgrades.' In addition, the article states that some patches are difficult and dangerous depending on the component. Some cell phone patches require a proprietary cable ($25) that will then wipe out your phone book. This raises concerns over alienating users that aren't tech-savvy and how this could affect perceptions of portable electronics as a whole."

Comments

Dude, where's my shares?

[monstroyer]

The concept is called time to market, the price you pay is quality. This is what happens when a society values profits over sustainability. The more faceless, the less accountable. One million marketers can't be wrong. Dude, where's my shares?

Yes, I am cynical.

Let's start the discussion by raising the concern that if the majority of users aren't tech savvy and society is dominated by technology, doesn't this sound like a new dark age? History has shown that when the peasant mass is uneducated, the church and monarchy rule. Are we not heading in this direction again? Technology being the new "power"? How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

The concept is called time to market, the price you pay is quality.

No, that concept is called "vaporware," and in general, it's the company that pays the price.

1) Announce Product with features X, Y and Z
2) Ship Product with feature X
3) ???
4) Go bankrupt.

About the only industry where people have tolerated the missing Step 3 ("Make people pay, then pay again for the features they wanted in the first place") is MMORPGs. I don't think it's going to work with hardware.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[TheLinuxSRC]

How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

When corporations are held criminally liable for this sort of deceit. Don't hold your breath.(I too am cynical;)

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well said. Bravo.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, while your uninformed opinions are very popular on Slashdot where every corporation is EEEVVIIIILLLLL (except for AMD, IBM, VA systems, and occasionally Novell) the real problem is not really in the EEEEVIIILLL corporations at all, but rather in the consumers that give them all the money. Despite the common knowledge of Slashdot readers, companies do not produce crappy products simply to 'force' you to buy them. They produce crappy products in response to customer demands. It is what the nameless, faceless, CONSUMERS demand that causes companies to put out what they do. When competitive pressures are great, and they are often in the case of electronics, things slip to the floor, one of which is quality. If the nameless, faceless, consumers demand quality and simplicity then there will be companies who respond to those goals. Right now, I'm sure you think that EEEVIL
corporate planners are intentionally breaking their own products just to mess with you, but the fact is that right now consumers want whiz-bang products that come with every feature known to mankind, and they want them last Tuesday. There is no magic formula to get everything they want so the features come out but often with a bunch of bugs.

So how do you as an individual get around this? Easy, instead of rushing in to buy something and then whining about it later, read some objective reviews of the products you buy, talk to people (either in the real world or online) about them, and lastly take all the advertising you see with a grain of salt.

Yes I am realistic.
Yes I do eat meat.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[AKnightCowboy]

History has shown that when the peasant mass is uneducated, the church and monarchy rule. Are we not heading in this direction again? Technology being the new "power"? How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

Historically speaking it would be about 750 years from now. System administration.. it's the new priesthood! Bow down lusers and pay homage to the messiah Simon.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

As geeks, we can join the Church and Monarchy, and enslave the worthless tech-illiterate proles as their weakness deserves.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[seanadams.com]

The concept is called time to market, the price you pay is quality.

What's your point? Where is it written that this compromise must be made if you're to have upgradeable firmware? It just makes updates possible after a product has shipped. There's nothing inherently bad about that.

Products that support and responsibly apply upgradeable firmware capabilities are better in every way. Products that ship early with buggy firmware "because they can" will still suck, just like there are sucky products that don't support firmware upgrades.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[LinuxGuyFriend]

"How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?"

Probably never, sadly. That, in my opinion, is the problem with democracy as we know it in general. People can vote to express their opnions etc, but what if they don't care enough to know anything?

That sort of reminds me of something I don't like about a number of posts here. There seems to be a desire to make linux and open source "mainstream" and "ready for the desktop". Although I agree that a lot things in Linux could be easier and nicer, is taking market share from UNIX and MS the goal of open source, or should it just be a natural side effect? I hope it doesn't happen too quickly that Linux becomes driven by time to market (which obviously it is not right now) as opposed to driven by other values.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[cherokee158]

If no one buys the products without reading objective reviews or talking to other product users first, then who will be doing the obbjective reviews?

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Lemmy Caution]

Corporations aren't evil. They're simple. They will do anything they legally can get away with to increase their profits and the value of their shares. Most will not break the law. But if they don't pursue the most straightforward legal avenue to near-term profit, they will incur the wrath of shareholders and lose out to competitors.

Shipping vapor with promises is the best way to make profits in the long term. People have short memories. At least enough of them do. The ones who don't ship until they have all the features they promised will suffer in the marketplace against those who ship with vapor, and the fact that there's a handful of discriminating consumers out there won't change that.

The answer, then, is sensible regulation, so that even those corporations who would act ethically do not work under a competitive disadvantage against the others. One of these sensible regulations would be insisting that any manufacturer that ships a product with extensible functionality, when that functionality is not yet available, be committed to providing that functionality for free *if the product was marketed with that extensible functionality as a differentiator*. No more bait and switch.

It's why we have regulation in, for example, the food industry - we don't want a situation where producers are "playing chicken" with standards in order to reduce costs. Consumers could very well drive down the quality of food that way by being too willing to take risks in order to save money: I'd rather the law of supply and demand *not* work so well in that case.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm inclined to agree with you. I'm in my mid-40's and have noticed a major shift in the last 5-10 years from the purchaser being a company's primary customer to the stock-holder being a company's primary customer with the purchaser relegated to the role of necessary evil - a dupe who supplies money in exchange for tricks, dodges and (often) unfulfilled promises.

I have nothing against corporations, profits or capitalism per se, but I believe that we have entered the age of an aberrant form of capitalism that is driven by greed and unfettered by ethics.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[hamsterboy]

Where's the criminal act? Say I make an electronic gadget, and you buy it. Even if my gadget doesn't work very well, I haven't committed a crime. You chose to buy my gadget; I didn't make you, and you probably should have done more research.

There's also the issue of how to send a corporation to prison. Jail all the employees? (Is the front-desk receptionist responsible for a product defect?) Or just those responsible? (Of course, every product has an engineering team, etc. etc.) If we're punishing a corporation for an incomplete product, how do we define "incomplete"?

Yes, the ignorant masses are being duped by the marketing dollars of large corporations. This has happened throughout history (ask any woman if Victoria's Secret underwear is actually comfortable), and it's not likely to stop.

I've got to admit that I'm a bit awed at the sheer volume of ire aroused about firmware upgrades. Aren't there better things to be angry about?

-- Hamster

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[SeinJunkie]

Let's start the discussion by raising the concern that if the majority of users aren't tech savvy and society is dominated by technology, doesn't this sound like a new dark age? .... How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

What I've noticed while working software support is that an increasingly large number of users are much more willing to admit to me something like this, "Hold on... lemme tell ya somethin'... I... am... computer illiterate!"
I struggle with the fact that when people are required by their occupation to make moderate to full blown use of their computer, they still do their best avoid everything about a PC. We have had a paperless office now for about 2 years, and you would think that would have weeded most of the dissenters out of the company. Yet, they continue to whine on about how the system is #$@% and they're "Gonna throw this thing right out the window!"

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[TheLinuxSRC]

Where's the criminal act?

False advertising.

There's also the issue of how to send a corporation to prison.

Pressing charges against the board members and advertising agents would be a start.

Yes, the ignorant masses are being duped by the marketing dollars of large corporations. This has happened throughout history (ask any woman if Victoria's Secret underwear is actually comfortable), and it's not likely to stop.

Doh! I've been trolled!

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Quobobo]

...on Slashdot where every corporation is EEEVVIIIILLLLL (except for AMD, IBM, VA systems, and occasionally Novell)

Don't forget Apple. I love their products but people seem to get sucked into the RDF sometimes.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[shepd]

>This is what happens when a society values profits over sustainability.

Okay. Let's take this opinion and run with it...

>How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

How can you define the "masses" as being screwed if they're getting exactly what they wanted (Profits). The individual, small group might be screwed, but not the masses.

>Let's start the discussion by raising the concern that if the majority of users aren't tech savvy and society is dominated by technology, doesn't this sound like a new dark age?

Yup. However, the absolute *most* technology anyone is expected to have today is a wired touch tone phone. Even not having a computer is still totally acceptable, although you'll be looked at as old fashioned. I don't call a phone a dominating technology, and it certainly isn't complicated (considering my gandparents figured one out...)

So, where I'm driving with this is, no, we aren't heading for a new "dark age". The technology of today is nothing but frills. If, somehow, we built replicators and transporters, I'd be agreeing with you. These would quickly become a necessary technology to live a modern life. However, a broken RCA Lyra is hardly something to write home about.

But, seriously, the most complicated technology required to live a modern life, today, is a phone. That's it. And if that's blowing someone away, technically, then they have *way* bigger problems to worry about.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[TheLinuxSRC]

OK, false advertising could be argued as being a civil matter. Maybe I should have said fraud, which is a criminal matter. And isn't that what false advertising is?

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean this Simon.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[robohacker]

Hmm... Well, if a company provides a free firmware upgrade to a product I own, and the upgrade fixes bugs and adds features, who am I to complain. I don't think this is evil, I think this is great. Take, for example, the proteus 2000 that I bought a few years ago. Emu systems has provided a few OS releases that have enhanced functionality and bug fixes for free. All I needed to do was download the patch and run it on my PC. I guess the key here is to make it easy to upgrade. I would be a bit pissed if all my presets were erased by the upgrade. But I think the market handles this quite well. If a product sucks, people won't buy it.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[SagSaw]

Where's the criminal act?

Well, start giving advertising the legal weight of a contract. If I buy a product which says "Supports Feature X" only to find out that it doesn't support feature X out of the box, I can go to small-claims court and attempt to recover whatever portion of the purchase price I feel feature X was worth.

There's also the issue of how to send a corporation to prison.

That's a very tough issue. Assigning guilt is going to be very hard to to in many cases. If you fine the company into oblivion, you are going to hurt many of the companies employees, customers, and suppliers who had nothing to due with the problem. Here's my thought: Doctors, Lawyers, Professional Engineers, and may others can be sued for malpractice if they perform their job in an incompetant or illegal manner. I think we need the concept of a Professional Manager. If you fail to keep your employees within the law, you can be held responsible. Extend the liability all the way to the board of directors. To extend the previous example, if a company has a habit of listing "Supports Feature X" on the box without actually supporting feature X, let the FTC (or their equivalants) go after the company. Determine who approved the working "Supports Feature X", and divide the fines equally among the approvers manager, the manager's manager, ..., the board of directors.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Luigi30]

I thought vaporware was this:

1: Announce Product with revolutionary features X, Y, and Z.
2: Take orders, but don't ship product.
3: ???
4: Go bankrupt.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

This raises concerns over alienating users that aren't tech-savvy and how this could affect perceptions of portable electronics as a whole.

Personally, I'm more concerned with everything being `fixable'. At least in the olden days when you bought _hardware_ it was assumed to be `bug-free', but the more firmware upgradable hardware I see, the more of it seems to have stupid bugs.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[AKnightCowboy]

You mean this Simon.

Yes, sorry, I just assumed everyone knew Simon the BOFH. :-)

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[linkdead]

As far as who to jail...

First look at who put out hte specific product, and who knew about it. Marketing would be hte first to go, then the VPs, then anyone else that was part of this.

Very rarely is a whole company part of something like this...but in cases like this, there are always at least 10 people at fault....and that's in a company that's too small for anyone to give a crap about.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[mcknation]

The "crime" here would be if you were to market and advertise a product as having features not yet implemented. This not only a crime in the legal sence but is also unethical. Not that any mega-corp in America today would do such a thing...not that i'm cynical or anything.

McK

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[zangdesign]

False advertising? If the product performs as advertised (even at less than optimum) you'd have to work pretty hard to prove it.

Which advertising agents? I freelance to a marketing firm who works with the salespeople for a particular gadget. Who's liable?

Marketing is a fact of life. Without it, companies have to wait for consumers to come to them. No one has that much time or money. And without that, no gadgets.

It's kind of like that line from from "The Right Stuff": What makes this spaceship go up? Funding.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

ask any woman if Victoria's Secret underwear is actually comfortable

You must not get around too much. There are both a wide variety of styles of underwear sold with the VC label and there are also a wide variety of women's opinions about what styles of lingere are comfortable. For the most part, comfort is defined by familiarity (exempting the obvious like tags placed so that they irritate the skin and badly fitted clothing).

Many women hate g-strings(butt-floss) and even thongs. In my experience, the girls that have, for whatever reason, regularly worn g-string panties for more than six months aren't bothered by the butt-floss effect and some even find regular bikini-style panties too constricting.

No surprise, but these women tend to be pretty stylish dressers too and may have been willing to endure the initial loss of comfort for the sake of making their ass look good in a pair of tight pants.

What does this have to do with firmware upgrades? Well, these girls are rarely in need of firmware upgrades, they usually keep their wares quite firm just by going to the gym. Ba-da-dum!

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

(ask any woman if Victoria's Secret underwear is actually comfortable)

For the record, it is.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[petecarlson]

no No NO
He ment on WOMEN.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Yer Mom]

Determine who approved the working "Supports Feature X", and divide the fines equally among the approvers manager, the manager's manager, ..., the board of directors.

...who then give themselves nice juicy pay rises to offset the loss, or allow themselves to claim the fines as expenses - then stick a pay freeze on the lower ranks so that profits aren't affected, natch.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[NaCl]

companies do not produce crappy products simply to 'force' you to buy them. They produce crappy products in response to customer demands. It is what the nameless, faceless, CONSUMERS demand that causes companies to put out what they do.

So, from your point of view, drug dealers are right, since they are only fulfilling a demand.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[ITeacher]

There's also the issue of how to send a corporation to prison.

You can't send a corporation to prison. But you can hold the board members and executive staff personally liable for such conduct. Unfortunately, I don't think that will ever happen. The legislators that will have to pass such laws are all future board members...

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[TheLinuxSRC]

False advertising? If the product performs as advertised (even at less than optimum) you'd have to work pretty hard to prove it.

I agree, however my point was that they were selling features that did not currently (and may never) exist. This is not a performance issue, this is snake oil.

Which advertising agents? I freelance to a marketing firm who works with the salespeople for a particular gadget. Who's liable?

Another poster had what I consider to be a great idea. Professional engineers, architects, doctors, lawyers etc... are held directly responsible for their actions. What about the concept of the professional manager? If that person gives the final OK on fraudulent marketing techniques, that person is held liable.

Marketing is a fact of life. Without it, companies have to wait for consumers to come to them. No one has that much time or money. And without that, no gadgets.

Agreed. But they can bring products to market and they can market them without being fraudulent.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[cptgrudge]

Are we not heading in this direction again? Technology being the new "power"? How long until the masses catch up and stop being screwed?

And we, the tech-savvy, will rule as the bishops in times of old.

Now, you go tell your computer illiterate boss to fetch you a cup of coffee.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Ensign Grimes]

The problem really becomes intense when there are an unending stream of "critical updates". It would appear that some of the manufacturers believe that the only reason you purchase their product is the pleasure you derive by frequently updating it. This policy of having the end user patch and fix constantly will eventually fail, as the majority of the user base does not care about updating. It is a real possibility that the majority will end up walking away from such situations in frustration.

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure, blame the victims, they were asking for it.
right?

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[enigmals1]

Yeah...and how'd that work out for the people that sued "the group" of major hard drive manufacturers for playing on consumers ignorance about HD size?! Big Business won that one too... they always will...they have more money. The irony being that your money goes to them to help them fight you back... so they can take more of your money.

Hey, I'm a lemming too cuz I keep giving them my money and always will.

MOOOOoooo...

;)

Re:Dude, where's my shares?

[Keybounce]

Two problems.

First, you won't solve the problems by making the _CORPORATIONS_ criminally responsible.

Second, it's not the customers demanding "low quality now" that causes the problems.

The brief answers: You don't want to punish shareholders and employees for actions of the board and vice presidents. (Think AA after Enron). Customers cannot demand a certain quality unless that quality is actually out there -- right now it's all too often a choice of several different things that are bad in different ways.

The long answer:
Yes, I agree that companies should be liable for bad products. I agree that product liability laws should extend to software. I think it's stupid to allow companies to say "This product is not guaranteed to work, and may have no actual use for what we market it for" (ok, that's not the actual words, but every software product has that disclaimer, even OS's.).

But you want to target the right people. If you go after the company, and put the company out of business, what happens? Answer: Shareholders lose. Bond holders get pennies. Banks collect what they are owed at the bankrupcy auctions. Employees are out of work. The number of companies in the business go down, so there is less competition => consumers lose.

But have you hurt the people responsible for this disaster? Not really. They might even get a job with another company :-). Or start another one.

Choosing good quality products? Well, ...

I'll try to explain by two examples how hard this is. First, let look at a VCR.

What do you want a VCR to do when it reaches the end of the tape?

Choices:
1. Do nothing.
2. Rewind.
3. Eject
4. Rewind and eject
5. Rewind and replay.

Now, I don't know about you, but to me, the answer could be different depending on:

1. Viewing a regular tape.
2. Viewing a non-erasable (rental?) tape.
3. Recording in regular mode
4. Recording in timer mode
5. Whether "memory" mode is turned on.

Now, when was the last time you even checked this behavior before buying a VCR? Or met a sales person that even considered, let alone knew, the answer to this?

Consider telephone answering machines. Consider digital ones.

Can I play back new messages, stop after some of the new, and not have all of them marked "Old"?

Can I play back a bunch of new messages, skip some, and leave those skipped ones as new?

If two people share the machine, can I play the "tape", and say "leave that as new, mark that as old" to explicitly leave messages for my roommate?

Again, when was this ever even listed on that 4x6 card at Fry's?

Demand quality? Sure. Tell me who to talk to. Or do you actually expect me to track down ALL of the companies that make answering machines, and explain to all of them what I want, when most of them have no way for me to talk to a person?
[ Side note: In economic theory, this is why middlemen exist -- if you have a lot of sellers, and a lot of buyers, there are much fewer transactions if every maker sells to a middleman, and every purchaser buys from a middleman. It would be much easier to have "product enhancements" if everyone that wanted to say "improve this" only had to go to one place, and product makers only had to check one "What do customers want" place. Now tell me how to make money running such a web site and it'll spring up.]

Haven't you noticed that most companies now only have automated help lines, with no ability to speak to a real person, unless (maybe) you've purchased a new product within 30 or 90 days and need help getting it set up. But product improvement?

I finally got so upset with bugs in the Dish Network receivers that I started calling, and reporting them. I also reported some "I'd like to see this" feature requests. I reported two such things, had two different people at the other end say "Hey, that sounds really good". But when I tried to report a 3rd, I was told "We do

Wow

[Pingular]

Sounds like an extension of the registering thingy in XP (where you have to register to use it). Nice.

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

RRrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhttttttttt tttt

Re:Wow

[Merlyn MacGreine]

Birth first, death next. That is how it is arranged. It's BC!

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

I bow to you oh masterful troll

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it.

I slave away for hours over a hot keyboard every day with little or no recognition; it's nice to know my efforts are appreciated. Thank you.

Re:Wow

[ameoba]

I'm sure you could draw parallels between this and Microsoft's (and software houses in general) actions, but comparing it to registration is way off base. XP registration is an anti-piracy measure; the article talks about companies rushing unfinished products out the door.

I don't see any connection.

Re:Wow

[spectecjr]

Sounds like an extension of the registering thingy in XP (where you have to register to use it).

You don't have to register to use it. Registration gets you technical support. Activation (no user data required) gets you use of XP. Only activation is required to use WindowsUpdate.

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Now you *know* they didn't mean registration [but meant activation]. You were probably one of those smart asses[1] who corrected people after they provided an answer to the teacher, right?

[1] Definition of smart ass: someone who can sit on an ice cream cone and tell you what flavor it is.

Re:Wow

[spectecjr]

you *know* they didn't mean registration [but meant activation]. You were probably one of those smart asses[1] who corrected people after they provided an answer to the teacher, right?


So what. There's no excuse for getting things factually wrong just because of lazy language - that's how bullshit rumor mongering like "Microsoft stole code from Stac" start. You end up with a pathetic game of chinese whispers, and it gets damn near impossible to ferret out the truth.

You know what?

[grasshoppa]

I wouldn't have much of a problem with this if it weren't for the fact that updates tend to break stuff as often as it fixes them.

Even mobo manufactures say to upgrade only if the update fixes a specific problem you are having.

Re:You know what?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because a freak power outage (mine went out twice today--snow in North Carolina) will render your precious gear useless.

That, and 90% of idiot users fuck it up anyway.

Re:You know what?

[Carnildo]

Even mobo manufactures say to upgrade only if the update fixes a specific problem you are having.

Mobo manufacturers say that because a failed upgrade (say, due to a power failure) will leave you with a product needing a very expensive repair -- you don't get a second chance at upgrading. Most other products, if an upgrade fails, you can try again until it succeeds.

Re:You know what?

[jared_hanson]

I mind it for the simple fact that a good portion on the time the updates never arrive.

If a product doesn't ship with the advertised features, its a good chance that the company simply didn't have the money to put them in their in the correct time frame. Who's to say, then, that the company has the money to implement them at all.

I'm sure the hope is that they can release to generate some revenue. However, when the user gets their hands on a shoddy product, it doesn't take long for negative reviews to crop up on the net. This means that the company in question will likely sell less of the shoddy product than they hoped to, decreasing the revenue brought in ergo increasing the likelyhood that they will go out of business. The only people getting screwed in this scenario is the consumer who bought the product.

Re:You know what?

[Eraser_]

You're right, because popping off the EEPROM is so expensive. I had to do this to a bunch of computers back when that chernoble virus decided to erase their BIOS. Back In My Day cpu upgrades came with a small booklet on how to do it, and a leverage rake thing to pry the old chip out.

I must say Mac users have been doing firmware updates for a long while now, and I don't hear many of them screaming about toasted computers. It is mainly the conception that is has to be hard and difficult to do. ASUS has a nice little utility to update its motherboards.

Does the power really go out that often around you that a 15 second process risks failure? If so, buy some batteries and a generator. Don't do it in a rain storm. My internet gateway shows 120 days since my last power failure. People throw $5 away on a hand of blackjack with worse odds.

Re:You know what?

[MoonBuggy]

You can easily fry phones this way too - a power outage during a firmware upgrade on a phone can easily kill it, and when it's a top of the range device that's a lot of money.

On most Nokia Symbian60 phones even the factory reset can kill them. If you select 'Clear all' from the menu you'll be OK, but there's also the industrial strength reset code ( *#7370# if anyone is interested) that I think reinstalls the OS from the internal memory and wipes everything in the process. If the battery dies or the user touches the on off switch during the process (which can take up to 15 mins) it doesn't install and your only hope is to have it reflashed by the manufacturer. This is why we generally don't tell customers the code.

Re:You know what?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because a freak power outage (mine went out twice today--snow in North Carolina) will render your precious gear useless.

What's freak power, how does an outage happen and when your freak went out, where did he go?

Re:You know what?

[afidel]

Yes and some of the time things don't go so well. I bought the first CDRW drive available (Ricoh MP 2600A) and when the Multiplay standard was finalized there was an incompatibility between the standard and something the Ricoh did. So they put out a firmware upgrade. Well being a person who likes my equipment to conform to standards I upgraded the firmware, only when I rebooted the unit couldn't be found, not by windows, not by linux, not by the SCSI card's firmware and not by Ricoh's diagnostics. Of course this was 13 months after I purchased the unit so no waranty support. I lucked out and found a hack on a support site, you needed to unplug the power connector and replug it before the SCSI bus was finished initializing. This wiped the firmware update area and put the unit back to origional factory code. Turns out even Ricoh's senior support engineer didn't know about this! That was NOT something a normal person would have done but the power didn't frighten me in the least and I figured I had nothing to lose.

Re:You know what?

[afidel]

Not only that but really good equipment like HP Vectra's has a way to recover from even a dead BIOS. With most Vectra's you can place a floppy in the drive with just the BIOS code and hold down a special key to have it load it without a firmware loader program (F12 if my normally faulty memory serves me right, haven't had to do it in several years).

Re:You know what?

[Anonymous Coward]

So if I print up stickers that say "New service: free phone sex for the first 2 minutes - call *#7370# on your cellular phone!" and put them in interesting places, countless Nokia owners will shoot themselves in the foot?

Interesting...

Re:You know what?

[Anonymous Coward]

The juice probably went out because of the snow. There's nothing quite like watching people driving on ice and knocking over all of the utility poles.

Yeah, yeah, I know not everyone down there is used to driving on that stuff, but when they show people trying to drive by standing on their gas pedal, it's about all one can take to figure out why they thing a car with no friction will suddenly gain friction. It's like watching a clump of lard skid across a hot skillet.

Unfortunately, there's no way Darwin can help us out here.

Re:You know what?

[Sabalon]

Did a firmware upgrade that failed once. Borrowed a friends BIOS (same one), booted off it, pulled the BIOS out while the system was running, popped my dead one back in, and reflashed it. Scary as hell, but it worked.

My current motherboard has a jumper that if the BIOS fails in a flash, you set the jumper and it boots off of a "backup" oh-crap BIOS.

I've learned however not to flash my BIOS unless absolutely needed!!!

Re:You know what?

[laugau]

My mobo has two bioses... one is broken, the other works.

In otherwords, one to play in, one to stay in. Sounds kindof like when I check into a hotel with 2 double beds. Noone wants to sleep in a wet spot.

Re:You know what?

[Eraser_]

That makes a heck of a lot of sense. I was wondering if anyone did something just like that.

Include essentially two BIOS codes, one simply a wrapper for the "real" one with the feature of detecting a single keystroke, and executing a copy. I believe that Cisco IOS supports this feature as well. Loading a IOS image over the console cable might be painfully slow, but it works.

Re:You know what?

[sjames]

PCs are moving in that direction in general. Commonly, the boot block contains just enough to boot a sort of mini dos or a full DOS floppy (with no video). As long as the boot block doesn't need an update, it's quite safe.

There's absolutely no reason it can't be made completely safe, even when the boot block is being flashed.

With other devices, there's simply no excuse to require flash upgrades AND sell the cable needed to accomplish it seperatly, and certainly no excuse for allowing a bad flash to disable the device AND render it impossible for the owner to try the flash again. Design for recoverability is well understood.

Re:You know what?

[Ben Hutchings]

Gigabyte motherboards now come with two BIOS chips so that there's a complete working spare if an upgrade is not completed.

They're just thinking ahead

[microbox]

If this culture develops in this industry, then it will be easy for big business to force customers to accept 'improvements' that they would rather be without.

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[timmy0tool]

I would like a mobile phone which is just a mobile phone, and maybe address book. No text, no games, no wap.

Maybe they will get the idea and make a basic device with add on (firmware?) products which can't break the core device by updating.

The alternative is security/safety updates for phones, microwaves etc, requiring more and more processing power and getting locked into an upgrade cycle, like people have been in with their PC's for decades.

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[microbox]

If software freedom starts to encomposs hardware design (but not manufactor), then we may have such a future. We'll also (probably) receive better quality products which are more focus on being sufficient for the purpose, and not a gold plated brick.

Perhaps the mobil device market is suffering the same problems that the early software market struggled with.

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[mgrassi99]

If not for upgradable firmware, when do you think products would be launched?

Likely never, as feature creep never stops, and if marketing guys didn't just "shoot the engineer" and start selling, engineers would never stop improving and tweaking the products until it's just so.

Gee, why don't we just not ever release another Linux kernel until it's absolutely flawless? Because even with its flaws (albeit few and far between) people want it NOW!

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[microbox]

Gee, why don't we just not ever release another Linux kernel until it's absolutely flawless? Because even with its flaws (albeit few and far between) people want it NOW!

There are still problems with stable releases, and in some projects are moved to 'stable' when the developers think they're ready for mass bug testing. All true.

In general, OS projects aren't released until they're ready, however. This has to do with the authors confidence in the code, not the marketing teams confidence in make a quick buck of it.

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[Anonymous Coward]

I would like a mobile phone which is just a mobile phone

My god, are you some sort of minimalist freak or something??

I can hardly wait to get my new mobile with HD TV, video camera, 5.1 channel surround sound, DVD player, karaoke and ballwasher. It will cost a fortune and work like crap and I'll probably never figure out how make a phone call with it, but it will be awesome and cost me a lot of money. And that's what really matters.

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[S.Lemmon]

Gee-willikers you're right! Why before flash memory became common no company ever released a product! That explains all those barren shelves I remember in the stores... :-)

Re:They're just thinking ahead

[pikkumyy]

Actually, no-one would want such a phone. Having all those extra pieces of software don't make the phone cost more, especially, if you'd be able to flash them into it if required. If the price-tag would be lower, paying say $10 for a phone with a calendar, wap, games and such would be such a deal, that no-one would buy the dumb, cheaper version.

IIRC, in the mid 90s Nokia made a "stupid" phone such as this with very limited capabilities. It was mostly a phone, model was Ringo or something like that. It was a huge flop and at the same time people were requesting for such a phone, just not buying it. At the same time phones with SMS, calendar, multiple ringtones and games such as Snake were a big hit.

firm or soft?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought firmware was supposed to be firm?

Re:firm or soft?

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought this comment was supposed to be funny?

Re:firm or soft?

[Aero Leviathan]

Firmware was thought to be halfway between 'soft'-ware and 'hard'-ware; hence its name. (...Get it?) It isn't meant to be installed and uninstalled as much as software, but it's not meant to be unchangeable either.

Sounds like extortion to me....

[TheLinuxSRC]

Some cell phone patches require a proprietary cable ($25) that will then wipe out your phone book.

So, you are sold something that does not work as advertised, and to get it to work as advertised you have to spend $25 on a $2 cable? Only to find out you just lost your address book? Hmmmphh.

Re:Sounds like extortion to me....

[Akai]

The thing is, outside the US (europe), mobile phone shops will do the upgrades for you. Inside the US it's harder to find a shop to do that in the US (I found a place in San Francisco that does it, but that's the exception).

That's probably one of the reasons why companies like Nokia and SonyEricsson release their phones in Asia and Europe before the US.

Re:Sounds like extortion to me....

[TheLinuxSRC]

That is a great point, and one I admit I hadn't considered. It still seems deceitful to me though. If I buy something for some feature, and then have to go to the shop to get the firmware updated to get that feature, as a luddite that implies to me that my phone was broken to begin with.

Re:Sounds like extortion to me....

[Rick the Red]

Sounds like vaporware has moved from the soft relm to the hard relm. If the missing "feature" was advertized then I think there's a case for a lawsuit. Then again, I bought my PDA partly on the strength of a feature that is missing -- with no firmware upgrade available. Unless there's a class action, I'm screwed and they know it. But unless there's a fix, I'll never buy their crap again. If what this article says is true, then it's a short-term trend that will get the companies long-term problems.

Re:Sounds like extortion to me....

[TheLinuxSRC]

Sounds like vaporware has moved from the soft relm to the hard relm.

That and beta testing as well. It seems that you are also correct here: " Unless there's a class action, I'm screwed and they know it." yet, I can only hope you are correct here: "If what this article says is true, then it's a short-term trend that will get the companies long-term problems."

Re:Sounds like extortion to me....

[Reece400]

That's interesting.. I live in Canada, and my cell phone service actually sent me a letter in the mail saying there was an important upgrade available (didn't say what it was, but phone was still working good..) and gave a list of it's stores that would upgrade it for me for free...

Reece,

I see a business emerging!

[Trigun]

Sure it's dangerous, sure it can screw up your brand new DVD Player or home theatre system, so why not take it to a professional? Competitive rates assured!

Or let the luddites live without the 'features'. Face it, that's why we became techies in the first place, to profit from everyone else's technophobia.

Re:I see a business emerging!

[geekoid]

"... to profit from everyone else's technophobia."

I take it you decided to get into technology during the bubble.

I, and many people I know, would be very happy if technology was easier to use for the average user.

Re:I see a business emerging!

[gl4ss]

new? it has been standard practice to take the phones to phone shops for flashing if wanting a new firmware(the cables are not usually available even through usual retail channels).

for 'normal people' it sometimes is also standard practice to haul the computer up to the computer shop for gfx card installation, or to get rid of those pesky popups that are making doing spreadsheets impossible.

Re:I see a business emerging!

[SirCrashALot]

I know it would save me an awful lot of time. Not that I mind helping out people out, but sometimes i feel its so simple they should just learn.

Slow down

[Anonymous Coward]

and maybe you would get it right without needing to "update/mess about with" every 3months

the consumer is not your beta tester

Re:Slow down

[happyfrogcow]

the consumer has always been a tester, maybe not the equivalent to a "beta tester" in computer terms, but a tester none the less. designs just don't improve by themselves, and designers aren't always the typical user of the end product (neither are "focus groups" nor hired testers even). customer feedback after release almost always contributes to the growth of a product. that being said, i still don't like the practice as it relates to most things (especially software, since that's my field) and I agree with you.

Re:Slow down

[innocent_white_lamb]

and maybe you would get it right without needing to "update/mess about with" every 3months

And meanwhile your competition brings Whiz-Bang Widget Mark II to the market and you're outta luck. And you're left with 100,000 Whiz-Bang Widgets in a rented warehouse with the landlord at your door....

Re:Slow down

[linkdead]

Actually, I only give a brand my faith until they screw up, then they are gone for good. So even if they come out first, they might get that one sale, but after that the other company that made the good product will have my buisiness, possibly many times.

Yes, I am anal about the stuff I buy...if a manufacturer gives me one lemon...they can be assured I won't buy form them anymore. i don't pay out my cash for a half-baked product, and am surprised anyone else would as well.

From what I just heard on the Lyra, RCA is now on my list of companies I wont buy from...doesnt matter if they got bought...they wont see a dime from me. If it's a mistkae, maybe a second time, but something as deliberate as that...first strike is out. Many name brands are on that list..too many of them that just don't think.

If the feature isn't ready, leave the feature off the unit until it is, then spin a nice revision on it and sell the new and improved model...just might make you some more money as well.

Re:Slow down

[srslif16]

As everyone who works in testing, for example in system test of telecom systems (me!), knows, no amount of testing will find all the bugs. In the system release, documents will tell what features work, and how far. The documentation will cover things that have been tested, and worked, only. That is one reason why the features of a delivered product might differ from the marketing hype. But there will still be areas which haven't been covered. Take long term stability. You have to settle for a limit on how long to perform a long-term stability test. It is not going to be 1 year, because of this first-to-market-takes-it-all. You can expect reasonable working features of a new product, and improvements in updates. Perfect adherance to initial market hype, you can never expect.

Bah ..

[Darken_Everseek]

"This raises concerns over alienating users that aren't tech-savvy and how this could affect perceptions of portable electronics as a whole."

Frankly, if I'm being forced to pay $25 for a cable to do necessary upgrades, you're going to alienate me whether I'm tech savvy or not. Especially if the 'unavailable' features were advertised as part of the item in question.

Re:Bah ..

[Eraser_]

That is grounds for return right there. If you paid for the item with your evil credit card, VISA (et al.) will back you up on this. No cell phone contract is valid if the phone they so intricatly tied into it does not meet the advertised specifications. $25 more so it can sync to (say) PalmOS, but the box had the Palm logo on it? Sorry, I will go elsewhere, and I won't be out dime one when I leave, save the gas to get to and from the store.

This brings me to another point. Do not ever purchase contracts for a cell phone or anything from those in mall third parties. That is trouble waiting to happen. Go to a retail store and make sure the contract you are signing is with Cingular/Verizon, etc, not "JoesCellphones for Verizon".

Re:Bah ..

[Darken_Everseek]

From the article, it looks like you can take the phone in, and have it upgraded for free; or pay the $25 to get the cable, and download the stuff yourself. Technically, since they're not -requiring- you to pay for an advertised feature, I don't think it'd void the contract. You probably would be out the money.

Either way though; if something is advertised on the box or in the specifications, and doesn't have that functionality the -first- time I try to go use it, I'm already alienated. If that same functionality requires a hassle to get working, I'm not just alienated, I'm pissed right off.

Re:Bah ..

[muckdog]

In my experience the offical stores are staffed by moron with the same level of knowledge as the JoeBob's cell phone shack workers.

Re:Bah ..

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. Fortunately, though, they're morons who are directly employed by said company, so you can hold the company accountable for their promises. The same doesn't apply to third party vendors.

Re:Bah ..

[shepd]

>The same doesn't apply to third party vendors.

Yeah, however third party vendors don't hire million dollar lawyers... :-)

Re:Bah ..

[madcow_ucsb]

Nah you wouldn't need lawyers. Just bitch a bit and usually they'll cave to shut you up. Find the company's executive office phone number and they'll usually hook you up if the customer service guys say it's "against policy".

That goes doubly when you pull out the phrase "false advertising" when you talk to them...

Remember: what costs them more? Letting you out of the deal or the time spent by their million dollar lawyers? Sometimes a business looking only at the bottom line works in your favor.

Re:Bah ..

[BitterOak]

Frankly, if I'm being forced to pay $25 for a cable to do necessary upgrades, you're going to alienate me whether I'm tech savvy or not.

The truly tech savvys will make their own cables.

Re:Bah ..

[CowboyNick]

Where are you going to get the proprietary connectors? There's more to a cable than just wires.

Re:Bah ..

[kruczkowski]

A true techie will reverse engeneer the firmware, update it and then flash it.

Re:Bah ..

[Eraser_]

It is false advertising to sell you a product which says it does X but does not. They don't require that you make phone calls either, but it is expected. This, in California, falls under the merchantability laws. Those statements in warranties that a product isn't useful for anything are completely bunk, and have been thrown out in many courts as utter garbage. If the phone isn't useful, it isn't merchantable, and for a company to sell a product as something which they know isn't useful for that specific purpose is illegal.

Kinda sad, really...

[cgranade]

I think that this is kind of sad... I like upgradable firmware- witness the iRiver line of products- and hate to see it misused to sell cables. If we could come up with a standard cable scheme for portable device to PC interfacing... oh, wait... it's called USB A to USB Mini-B. Now, if only more manufacturers would implement it.

Crap

[SteveXE]

This is just crap, if they wanna do this they should lower the retail price, then charge the difference by feature in the firmware upgrades. Who's to say they will ever release the features you already paid for...why should they since they have your money already?

Re:Crap

[mcpkaaos]

Who's to say they will ever release the features you already paid for...why should they since they have your money already?

Maybe because it would be the last time anyone, anywhere, ever bought a product from such a company.

A better idea is to provide enough real features to add credibility to the vapor in order to string the consumer along an endless line of upgrades and replacements. For a great example of this tactic, check out any company at all.

Re:Crap

[canajin56]

Exactly. When the first Creative Jukeboxes came out, before the iPod, a big selling point was that they were firmware upgradeable. Right on the box it promised that they would update it to play "all future digital music formats" but it still only plays MP3 and WMA files. If you ask them when they are coding firmware to play Ogg Vorbis files they say "We do not support other music formats." If you point out they promised to support all future formats, they say "I already said, we do not support other formats" and then stop responding.

I'll never buy a Creative product again, because they lied about their features in order to sell them.

Re:Crap

[srslif16]

That 'we will support all future format' is the kind of marketing hype you should never believe. Look at that combo: 'all' and 'future'. The future is infinite, so is 'all', and companies come and go within a finite time period. Thus, such a text should never appear on a product box, and if it does, you are well advised not to buy it.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Haven't had a problem with firmware updates yet.

[Sheetrock]

The secret is to read the instructions and only update when you really need to. A lot of people seem to feel that they should keep firmware up to date for the same reasons they keep updating their software, but in truth very few firmware updates are necessary because they fix problems most people don't experience.

I don't know why anybody would seek a non-upgradable piece of hardware over an upgradable piece of hardware. New features through firmware updates should be quite welcome to everybody who can follow the simple precautions necessary to update.

Router

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a Belkin Wireless 802.11g router that runs a nucleus plus based firmeware. I attempted to modify the firmware and reupload it. However, it went completely dead - not even the "bad firmware fix" thing works. Anyone know what type of flash memory these things include? Why can't they just use CF cards? That way, my free after rebate $10 CF reader could fix it in a flash (no pun intended)

Re:Router

[Anonymous Coward]

bootstrap it :: install linux :: play tux racer :: problem solved

Trust and the missing feature.

[Lemmy Caution]

I don't trust a feature not included with a shipping version to ever arrive. It's it not there when they ship it, I don't believe them when they say it'll be available in a "downloadable patch"; usually, it appears first in the next major version of software, for which you have to pay - which means that they have every incentive to not make it available for free, because that feature then becomes an upgrade-motivating differentiator.

Likewise with firmware in consumer goods. I don't trust them - if it's not there when I buy, I suspect they'll ship it in a "deluxe" version before they let me upgrade my DVD player/blender/mp3 player to get the same feature.

Same old, same old

[RetroGeek]

Some cell phone patches require a proprietary cable ($25) that will then wipe out your phone book

This could be applied to almost every s/w product:

Some <software name> patches require a proprietary <item, key, dongle> that will then wipe out your <information>.

It is getting better, but there is still a LOT of s/w that will simply overwrite your settings with a new "fresh" file. This is especially bad where the installation process is simply decompressing a distribution file.

As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[Cryptnotic]

You ship the product when marketing decides it needs to be shipped, not when it's done. You make all the required features exist so that the bullet points are covered in the specifications, even if they don't work right all the time. The fixes come later, in the order of the number of complalints.

It sucks, but that's the way it is. Your product is either first, or it needs to be 10 times better than the other guy's product.

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[Anonymous Coward]

So who do you work for?

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[buhatkj]

well, we should encourage the ten times better way then yknow? the ipod wasnt the first mp3 player, but it outshined others so well that it became the best-selling. as far as having upgradable firmware, well thats great, but it should be well tested, i would be ashamed to ship a product that wasnt "1.0", that is, all advertised features work, and it has exhibited acceptable stability. i think the damage to your company's reputation would be more damaging than missing the ideal time to market...

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[Eskarel]

You'd think that, but it's tragically not so. You get your product out at the right time, a lot of people will buy it, perhaps they won't be happy with it, but that doesn't terribly much matter since they're still sold.

You bring out the greatest product in the world in a bad time period, say right after christmas rather than before, then your target group has already spent their money and won't really be interested in any sort of mass spending for a while to come, by which point your product will be old and considered(whether it is or not) obsolete so you'll have to at the very least drop the price substantially to sell it.

On a slightly unrelated note, anyone notice this doesn't happen to computer software anymore. I'm not even talking about things like Diablo I which use a game of the year award to hang onto full price for something like 5 years, I'm talking about regular software, the discount stuff from earlier seasons I used to buy and enjoy when I was in high school has seemingly disappeared. Wonder what happened, do old games still sell well at that price?

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[Anonymous Coward]

I picked up Splinter Cell for about $20, CDN. Some games keep their prices high for ages, some drop like a stone. It all depends on what you're playing. I'd guess FPS games drop quicker, as they're released to take advantage of the 'latest' hardware, which becomes obsolete. Strategy games (Civ III, whatever) are more for the gameplay, so they'd hold their value.

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[Grishnakh]

As the previous poster said, you either try to be first, or your product needs to be 10 times better than the competition.

The problem is, not everyone can be great; most people are just average. Same goes for organizations; most are just going to be average (read: crappy), so they don't really have a hope of putting out a 10x better product. So instead they go for time-to-market and try to make more money that way.

The second part of the problem is with consumers: rather than wait around for the 10x better product, they line up to buy the first product out the gate, no matter how crappy it is. The companies with crappy products have figured this out, and now they're exploiting it.

What can we do about this? Almost nothing. Unless you can invent a mind-control device that telepathically reprograms everyone in society to be careful consumers who demand the highest in quality, we're pretty much stuck with our fellow citizens being shortsighted idiots. Individually, all we can do is learn from their mistakes, and be very careful about our purchases. Exercise caution and patience; don't buy anything on a whim, or without careful research for anything over $50 or $100. And don't become an "early adopter" of anything. By doing this, you'll end up saving yourself a lot of time and money in the long run.

Re:As an engineer in the electronics industry...

[liquidsin]

My company has invented the mind-control device. Unfortunately, due to marketing setting the ship date six weeks earlier than anticipated, the telepathic reprogrammer is still in beta. Hopefully we'll have it ready in a couple months and we can put out a firmware upgrade.

Simple Solution

[Srividya]

Is for someone to keep a good site with older versions that allows for reverse-engineering and selection of old and new features!

future upgrades?

[ejaw5]

this feature will be available in future upgrades

..right. If it's a feature you're gonna need TODAY, you're going to buy another device that features it when you buy it. Because how can you be sure the manufacturer will follow through the upgrade?

better than Non-Updatable embedded os's

[Anonymous Coward]

Like the HP Jornada 700 series.
IE has major issues with loching the OS just like a real pc and it's unfixable not only because there is no real support but because the os is hard embedded. I suppose a replacement chip could be mounted but they are not cheap. Also Linux for the Jornada 720 is not there yet as there is no Sleep or Power saving mode supported.

Re:better than Non-Updatable embedded os's

[Anonymous Coward]

IE has major issues with loching the OS

But not nessing?

Ahhh....

[SomeOtherGuy]

This generations "Feature Will Be Available in future firmware upgrades" is really starting to sound like last generations "The Check is in the mail".

Re:Ahhh....

[Anonymous Coward]

This generations "Feature Will Be Available in future firmware upgrades" is really starting to sound like last generations "The Check is in the mail".

The more modern version of that is "The next release of Windows will be really secure."

Not at all surprising.

[El Cubano]

Apparently the new Lyra A/V Jukebox will sometimes display a message stating that 'this feature will be available in future upgrades.'

I think that this is happening because vendors have determined it is better, from a marketing stand-point, to got a half-done product first to market and finish it later than it is to bring a complete product where the competition already has gained a user-base.

Thankfully, this is more difficult other industries, like automobiles. But as electronics take over more of our lives, I would not be at all surprised to see this happen in relatively strange places. I can see: "If you would like your SVT Mustang to travel over 50 MPH, please downlaod the latest firmware from ford.com."

Re:Not at all surprising.

[UserChrisCanter4]

Funny you should mention the SVT mustang.

Most people aren't aware, but a lot of components in cars change year-to-year, even on what is ostensibly the same "model". It isn't major stuff, but a fuel pump, for example, can be obtained from a different vendor for a lesser price, and that's just smart business.

Anyway, in the '98 or '99 model year (I can't remember which), the SVT mustang was "firmware updated", so to speak. A bunch of people who were buying them were noticing that the performance wasn't near what it was supposed to be. Dynos were showing a 280hp instead of 305 hp turnout. Ford took a bunch of them back from their owners and "updated" them to get them to the point they were supposed to be at, then promptly discontinued the model altogether for the year while they determined what had actually caused the cars to be underpowered.

I don't remember reading what it was, but it was a case of Ford not really knowing what had happened in the beginning, either. If I recall, the engineers whipped up a quick solution (probably some airbox replacement, or something) for the few "repairs" to get them to their rated number.

Re:Not at all surprising.

[Anonymous Coward]

IIRC, the problem was that the exhaust ports were not machined properly leaving a small lip of metal which restricted the exhaust flow that caused the power loss.

Re:Not at all surprising.

[All Names Have Been]

"If you would like your SVT Mustang to travel over 50 MPH, please downlaod the latest firmware from ford.com."

Actually, this already commonly happens. A couple of model years ago, Porsche had a problem with cars stalling out after idle with low throttle input. Dealers upgraded the firmware in the Bosch engine management unit with new stuff from the factory - presto! - problem solved. It's a mere matter of time before you can do this yourself at home. Probably with a $25 cable. Hell, some people already are doing this.

Re:Not at all surprising.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thankfully, this is more difficult other industries, like automobiles.

Amm... `this breaking feature will be available in future upgrades.'

Alienating Users?

[Zedek]

Meh, as user friendly as things are getting now-a-days, flashing is gonna be a matter of a message appearing on the screen that says "new bios downloaded, press yes to flash". Either that or just get your neighboorhood 8 year old to come and do it for you. Granted, this could open up a whole new can of worms for the industry as far as exploits/virii/trojans. I predict we will soon see Anti-Virus software for cellphones/pdas/ect at this rate.

Re:Alienating Users?

[dasmegabyte]

They already have it. anti-virus for PDAs, despite there being no really worthwhile vectors for viruses to spread over the PDA format. After all, you never really sync more than one PDA to the same computer (though you likely sync multiple computers to the same PDA).

I especially enjoy the sales verbage..."The importance of PDAs is growing every day and it is quite likely that these devices will soon become a target for new virus attacks." In other words, "there's currently nothing for the this product to do, but if it ever does become worthwhile, it'll do it after you download something else." Begs the question: why not wait until it becomes an issue, THEN download it? Seems you'd save some money that way, eh?

Oh, and the cost? $20 for a year of nothing. Tell you what, guys...if you're in the market for PDA antivirus protection, I'll beat that price. I'll do nothing for only $10 a year.

Re:Alienating Users?

[afidel]

I would think that MS PDA's would be just as vulnerable to macro viruses as their desktop cousins since they run essentially the same apps using mostly the same API.

Hold on a sec...

[Anonymous Coward]

They've decided to start charging in advance for vapour-ware?

Re:Hold on a sec...

[Anonymous Coward]

They've decided to start charging in advance for vapour-ware?

Isn't that what post-dated checks are for? You pretend to give me the goods and I'll pretend to pay you for them.

the average

[geekoid]

person will not tolerate it. If you advertise a feature, and it doesn't work, it's only a matter of time before you are sued.

many of us on /. come from a tme in the computer era where you had to 'fiddle' with stuff to get it to work, IRQ conflicts spring to mine.

When a feature in your blender won't work becasue of a bug, people will stop buying your blender. It should just work without the user knowing anything about the inner workings.

Re:the average

[Anonymous Coward]

The average person is a much bigger sucker these days. You can get away with a lot more. Politicians basically go up to them and say "I'll pay you to vote for me with pork!" and they "Great idea!" and the Politician says "give me your credit card so I can get it!" and that's fine with the suckers. When you look at the things people buy, sign, and support these days, there are just a lot more suckers.

The trick is not to get depressed about it, and look upon it as an opportunity.

Re:the average

[naarok]

I disagree. Think of the crappy quality consumers are prepared to put up with in computer software. I think that as things become more complicated (along with people being trained to expect the occaisional glitch in "computer" stuff). the average consumer will just accept it the same way they accept "Windows Update" (I'm not bashing Window's here (OK maybe I am), but the fact that people have been brainwashed to accept the sad state of the art)

Perhaps that fact people who are not technologically literate are willing to accept this is because they are afraid of revealing their illiteracy by complaining about something. Maybe all those flashing 12:00s are because someone doesn't want to ask their neighbour to fix it and therby show their own ignorance.

Re:the average

[Thomas Shaddack]

Some of those flashing 12:00 are because of getting fed up with setting it up after every blackout. Got one such VCR. Stopped setting it up after some time when I didn't use the timer recording anymore. Planned to add battery backup to the clock, but retired it because of worn heads before I got to actually implement it.

Reminds me I could take it apart and look how it works. Could be a nice weekend project.

Re:the average

[srslif16]

> it's only a matter of time before you are sued.

Really? I don't see Microsoft being sued for their non-working windows versions. Do you?

Also, many of us on ./ don't live in the USA; suing someone over non-included features in a product in, say, Sweden, isn't all that worthwhile.

Class action suit, anyone?

[psxotaku]

features listed on the box, that are not avilable for months later. I'd say that false advertising. Forced updates, wow, how much more wrong is that. I don't mind bug fixes for minor things, but don't test this stuff at all. So glad my pod has work perfect from day one... I'd flipout if a firmware update trashed it.

Missing step 3...

[Cryptnotic]

3. Make enough money on Product so that they can stay in businness and produce product "V2" that actually does have features X, Y, and Z (or maybe just X and Y).

Hopefully that staves off 4 for a while.

Worked for TiVo, sort of.

RTFA

[DaHat]

To quote the article: "But even if you register a product online, your chances of being notified of updates are slim, even though some fixes are crucial:"

Re:RTFA

[bsharitt]

lets just hope the updates are critical enough that they get on slashdot, that way we don't have to worry about registering.

Hi I am Troy McClure

[RedHatLinux]

You may remember me from such movies as Firmware1984 and I know where your firmware was last summer.

make firmware open source

[elinenbe]

If you want to see some incredible open firmware replacements that fix many if not all of the original shortcomings then check out rockbox at http://rockbox.haxx.se/ and avOS at http://avos.sourceforge.net/ -- These both have been created in an attempt to fix the god-awful archos firmware. Go on and check it out. Rockbox is amazing!

Re:make firmware open source

[dspyder]

Agreed entirely, but that does open some liabilities to the manufacturing company. Especially if idiots try to flash testing versions to their machines (did you see Dogger's chat log with that one clueless user?). As a company, I can easily see why I wouldn't want anything but my stuff out there. Because clueless users WILL call and they WILL blame me regardless.

Rockbox is beautiful because rather than saying users will want to see X this way, they make a lot of it configurable. The WhilePlayingScreen is a thing of beauty that should be copied in every device with an LCD!

--D

Re:make firmware open source

[Stevyn]

No.

Then their competitors copy it and release a dvd player or mp3 player at a cheaper cost because they didn't have to pay for developing the product.
Even if they gpl it, asian manufacterers would disregard that and sell cheap mp3 players and such.

I'm not saying this idea of requiring firmware upgrades to get the features you thought you already bought, but that doesn't mean that making the firmware open would change these business practices. This is about having respect for your customers and a knee jerk reaction of saying "make it open" isn't going to fix that. If anything, it'll give the manufacterers an excuse to care less about it cause they can just say "RTFM" to their customers if they have a problem cause it's open source.

Drooling Morons

[Anonymous Coward]

This raises concerns over alienating users that aren't tech-savvy

Call them drooling morons instead. There are instances where instructions are no good; there's a lot of vaporware; but above all it's the mentally lazy. They're in abundance like nowhere else in the US.

Re:Drooling Morons

[Anonymous Coward]

And are you a:

cooking drooling moron
fashion drooling moron
legal advice drooling moron
car repair drooling moron
house repair drooling moron
financial wizardry drooling moron

or are you an expert in everything and unworried that you look like a complete moron in a field outside your expertise?

Re:Drooling Morons

[Grishnakh]

I don't know about the previous guy, but I consider myself competent-to-very competent in most of the above, except cooking (which isn't really necessary anyway, as long as you can make yourself simple meals and such), and fashion (which isn't important if you're male).

The problem with most people is that, as the previous poster said, they're mentally lazy. They just learn enough to do their job (and usually only adequately then), and outside of that they don't want to learn anything at all. So when something goes wrong, they're completely helpless. The toilet breaks, and they have to call the plumber and pay $100. The car breaks, and they have to go to a mechanic and pay $1500 because he tells them they need all kinds of things replaced which don't really need to be, but they don't know any better. They don't know anything about finances, so they buy all kinds of crap with credit cards and pay huge interest fees, never save any cash, then lose their job and they're suddenly out on the street.

What people should try to do is become knowledgable, and hopefully competent, in most areas of life that they have to deal with (house repair, auto repair if you own a car, law, finances, etc.), so that they can take care of themselves instead of being helpless and easily duped.

Re:Drooling Morons

[MooseGuy529]

Call them drooling morons instead. There are instances where instructions are no good; there's a lot of vaporware; but above all it's the mentally lazy. They're in abundance like nowhere else in the US.

I hope you don't get modded Troll.

I live in the US, and I can attest to that. I don't have other countries to compare it to, but there are so many people I have met who want computer help but haven't taken the time to learn or figure out the basic principles behind a UI. I know people who still get jumpy when you maximize a window over their work, people who can't move a toolbar off a window's title bar to get to the close button, ... I could go on forever.

Technology is one of the most complicated things on the planet. By its very definition, it probably is. "Normal" people expect to be able to sit down and have the computer show just the options they need (by reading their mind) in an intuitive and easy-to-use manner, while geeks expect the computer to show all the options available in an efficient but not necessarily easy-to-use interface (take emacs or vi--whichever one you don't like--and look at the keyboard shortcuts... would it kill them to show a little "cheat sheet" in the status bar?) so they can get work done easily. Attempts to combine them (the auto-changing menus in Office) have failed, since geeks don't want to dig for stuff even once, and normal people don't want a program rearranging its interface.

I don't know what the solution is, but I have a few ideas. Don't ever dumb down interfaces. In general, show both the technical and user-friendly side of things. For example, when selecting a network interface in Linux for something, don't pick it for the user (unless there's only one), show just the technical name (lo, eth0, eth1, etc...), or give them English-looking but equally useless names (Ethernet Card 1 ...)--look up the name of the card and display that, along with the type of card and the name... so instead of "eth0" or "Ethernet Card #1", you would see "3Com Fast Ethernet Card (10/100 Ethernet network card on eth0)" which can be understood by anyone, since it explains what the hardware is, what /dev/* it is, and what type of card it is (so you can pick it if you don't know what kind of card you have).

Another idea: Make it impossible to overlap windows. I've never seen a useful purpose for covering part of one window up with another. Showing multiple windows on screen is essential, but I never cover them up with each other. There are two simple reasons why they shouldn't overlap: you almost never need to see part of a window--you either need to see the content, so you tile the windows, or you don't need to see the content, so you maximize the windows, and the second reason is that it's much easier to work with windows when you don't have to switch between them all the time, i.e. if they are tiled.

Ho hum. Someone needs to say "screw backwards compatibility" and rebuild the computer industry from the ground up with reverse polarity protection in hardware, DIP switches for hard drive setup, or better yet, automatic detection, an install and uninstall system that's intuitive and easy-to-use for a novice, but offers options for others (i.e. the usual "Typical" or "Custom" choice), and is powerful and robust behind-the scenes. I could go on for hours, but (like a typical American) I'm going to sit on my lazy ass and wait for someone else to do it ;-)

Research it.

[irokitt]

The lesson to all of us is to carefully research anything we buy to find out if we will need proprietary cables or if features aren't available 'yet'.

None of us are forced into these purchases, with the exception of gift items. And if you recieved a techie gift, do the research before opening the package-you can stil return it, and I just recently found myself wishing I had when I recieved an mp3 player for christmas.

Guffaws aside, companies should theoretically respect users more when people refuse to buy badly implemented products.

Re:Research it.

[anubi]

Oh, you know why retailers love Christmas so much.

This is when people have an onus to go out and buy some crap to give you, and you have the onus to do the same for them, before you can even visit for tea.

And, of course, the "present" is usually presented personally, and its kinda in bad taste to not open it up and fawn over it for a while. I mean, you don't really wanna hurt their feelings after they went through all that mad rush to get it for you do you? Its not like you personally have had to experience the same frustration yourself trying to hold up your end of the bargain. So, you open it and drool over it awhile so their feelings won't get hurt. Presto! Opened product!

Now, to add injury to it, if your donor finds out you returned the thing they so "carefully selected" for you, their feelings might be hurt. You wouldn't want that, would you?

Yep, a marketer's dream market.

Damm, I feel like Ebenezer Scrooge!

But before you bah-humbug me as such, I will say I think the holidays are for sharing as much time as you can with others, as our busy worklives, accounted for by the minute, doesn't leave much time for social interaction with loved ones. Its just the horning in of others with the fiduciary interest of milking this occasion for all its worth that irritates me so.

Car stereo

[DigiShaman]

The idea of being able to upgrade the firmware in my car stereo is something I look forward to. How hard can it be to implement a USB connection to the faceplate? Upgrading the unit this way would be a lot easer then ripping the whole unit out from my cars console.

Also, getting the whole stero replaced is NOT cheap. And I hate the idea of clipping wires in my car just to replace it.

Re:Car stereo

[anubi]

Yeh, but what they *won't* tell you up front is that the latest "upgrade" contains the latest DRM enforcement for all the workarounds you have been using in order to use the car stereo for its intended function in the first place.

Re:Car stereo

[Grishnakh]

3 points:

1) You don't need to clip wires in your car to replace the stereo. This hasn't been true for over 10 years. There are several manufacturers (such as Scrothe (sp?)) which sell pigtail connectors that plug into your factory stereo connector, and you can connect to the new stereo's included harness.

2) What stereo requires a firmware upgrade? I've NEVER heard of this. I can certainly see it coming, with all the MP3-playing units, etc. coming out now, but I haven't heard of any needing it yet.

3) One good way of avoiding this whole mess is to give up on aftermarket stereos altogether, and build yourself a CarPC. Then you can make it do whatever you want, and you don't have to put any DRM crap in in case the manufacturers start adding that too.

Re:release now, patch later...

[Frank T. Lofaro Jr.]

Like the wonderful quality control that went into Linux 2.4.20. Where it would not sync on umount when using ext3 with data=journal mode, and thus corrupting the filesystem. Ugh.

Further marketshare gains for Microsoft?

[G4from128k]

Something tells me these firmware fixes will soon become mandatory when lax manufacturers decide that it easier to require a firmware update than design the product correctly in the first place. But I wonder how many of these firmware updating utilties will be OS-agnostic? I'd bet most will require Windows to fix the broken firmware of many new products.

Soon a new microwave oven will require Windows and an Internet connection. ARGH!

Are there any OSS projects or standards creation efforts for universal, OS-independent, product firmware updaters?

Re:Further marketshare gains for Microsoft?

[PCM2]

Soon a new microwave oven will require Windows and an Internet connection. ARGH!

Not so! The manufacturer of my new microwave oven makes firmware upgrades available for download on their Web site. You grab the firmware and burn it to a standard ISO filesystem. Then you put the CD-R into the microwave and zap it for exactly three minutes. You can tell the upgrade is taking place because of the flashing lights. And then, voila! Your microwave is upgraded with new features. The latest patch for my model upgraded it with an unusual new odor, which I'm not sure I'm totally into, but I guess you can't halt the march of progress.

Re:Further marketshare gains for Microsoft?

[innocent_white_lamb]

Are there any OSS projects or standards creation efforts for universal, OS-independent, product firmware updaters?

A number of new motherboards come with firmware updating software on a freedos boot disk. That way, you just slam the disk into your floppy drive, boot and go.

Less for the chap who writes the firmware update to worry about because there's less there to go wrong at a critical moment during an update than requiring a full installation of Windows XP to be running while you're trying to update something.

And a gen-yoo-wine boot disk that you can actually give to your customers without having to cough up per-unit royalties!

Re:Further marketshare gains for Microsoft?

[toddestan]

Seriously, my roommate has a cheap Sanyo microwave, which comes with the standard compliment of buttons to do things like make popcorn and reheat leftovers. I have found that the "boil water" button will crash the microwave about 1/2 the time, leaving no other option than to reboot it by unplugging it and plugging it back in. Pretty annoying if you ask me.

Re:Haven't had a problem with firmware updates yet

[TheLinuxSRC]

New features through firmware updates should be quite welcome to everybody who can follow the simple precautions necessary to update.

Except that the customer has in most cases already paid for these features. At that point, who is to say these "features" won't turn into vaporware.

lovely.

[chrisopherpace]

all this means is that crappier, broken products can be shipped out on the market, resulting in a general loss of quality on the market. What will consumers do? Buy the products that *DONT* require you to flash the firmware in order to use the features on the box! Normally, flashes work as they are supposed to, but I've met a few firmware upgrades that didn't work, and ended up ordering an RMA for the device, only to be told that they don't support firmware upgrades, and damage caused because of them. What's a comsumer to do?

Re:lovely.

[demo9orgon]

"What's a comsumer to do?"

I believe they want us all to shut up and keep buying their crap. However, unless working at fast-food becomes a job synonymous with durable-goods manufacturer and fast-food employees unionize to get a better wage there's a good chance that only upper-middle-class and above families/single people are going to be buying their crap.

Of course, for every complainer to the phone-support techs in Bangelore with suspicously Caucasian names and Hindi accents, there's a legion of silent, passive sheeple graciously accepting of the violence visited upon them in an orgiastic fleecing frenzy.

Sounds like business as usual. Nothing new here.

mac support

[morcheeba]

It's interesting that the Player supports Macs yet the required firmware update doesn't. Theoretically, for this product, you don't even need a computer because it can read the Compact Flash card you use with your digital camera. Well, I guess file rename, create folder, thumbnail views, zoom, rotate & pan aren't thing you'd really need or expect anyway... oh wait, the spec sheet sepecifically said "zoom and rotate"!

Alien Nation of Non-Tech Savvy Users

[ackthpt]

Actually, I consider myself tech-savvy, but I've just got too damn many things I'm trying to remember how to use, let alone keep a calendar of upgrades and latest versions. Don't get me wrong, it's better to get a bug fix or upgrade (where reasonably necessary), but, like keeping plug-ins up to date (Adobe Acrobat, Real, Flash, to name a few) I'm generally disposed to keep plodding along with what I have until I reach the pain threshold (either it's unusable or the constant upgrading ticks me off and I cast it aside, like Real.)

Now I've found my telescope (Meade ETX-125AC) Autostar computer can be upgraded, but with a special cable for my purchasing pleasure. Hm.

Re:release now, patch later...

[codeonezero]

I had this same problem with a couple of games. Most notably, Ray Man 3 for the Mac.

I bought the game for about $50 for my brother. However, it mostly works, if you can deal with the problematic sound bug, which freezes everything at random, bad camera control using the mouse, and the inability to properly set custom keys to stick, among other things....and don't get me started with the Macally Shock II game pad I can't seem to configure to work right for me! (though I think that's Macally's fault)

I'm not very happy with feral (http://www.feral.co.uk)

Halo is another one, where if you use the 1.0 version for mac, and get the health pack, your screen goes completely black for like 10 seconds. Those could be the crucial 10 seconds in which you could just die if the Covenant is chasing after you, and you just stepped in their path because you couldnt see where you are going. I think this has been fixed now, but it was an annoying thing through the game.

Cro-Mag Rally (another mac game) had similar problems on Mac OS X. I even e-mailed the developer and didn't get a very encouraging response. Can't remember what it was or the exact tone...(kind of hard to note the tone through e-mail)

Maybe my problem is that I'm on the mac trying to play games, but from the article this seems to be the trend. I can't remember what other games I've had this problem with but I've gotten into the habit of looking for updates for games as soon as I get them. It fustrates me when it takes a long time for updates to come along.

This is specially fustrating when some games sell at a higher price for a Mac version versus the PC version...

Thank you for reading my rant :-)

It's crazy!

[Anonymous Coward]

Even my EEPROM burner needs a firmware upgrade!

Why is this a problem?

[26199]

There isn't a monopoly on portable devices -- consumers are free to vote with their wallets. And they will. Capitalism at work, isn't it great?

Re:Why is this a problem?

[Lattitude]

By the same token, devices that upgrade well will be noted by the buying public and purchased over devices that do not.

Although the article has a negative spin on the art of upgrading, I can see lots of positive aspects as well: new formats emerge could well be addressed with upgrades, security holes could be filled, etc. However, the device *must* do it well!

This trend started with wireless NICs

[Helevius]

Wireless vendors are constantly fixing bugs or adding features or trying to meet specs in flux. Developers struggle to code on this uneven terrain.

For example: I spent a day and a half trying to upgrade the firmware on an otherwise useless SMC "PCI" NIC, the SMC EZ Connect 802.11b 2602W v.1, not to be confused with the v.2 or v.3 models with completely different chipsets. I say "PCI" because the NIC is actually the 2632W v.1 PCMCIA NIC in a PLX "riser."

Thanks only to Jun Sun's mini-HOWTO and "unofficial" firmware caches on the Web, I was able to upgrade the station firmware. Unfortunately, this did not result in the features I needed.

If vendors begin requiring consumers to flash firmware regularly, it needs to come out of the "underground" and be explained by the vendors. I'd also like to see DOS boot-disk-based firmware upgrade tools, like Dell's BIOS flash disks. I didn't like turning to Windows to run SMC's update program. (Linux and DOS attempts failed with this particular NIC.)

Thanks to the openap-ct project's Linux floppy I was able to use prism2_srec to flash a different NIC, though.

Helevius

Download implies upload

[Smallpond]

Overlooked in this is that when you connect your product to the 'net to download new firmware, the product could have the ability to be able to upload as well. Who knows what the firmware in your stereo, or TV may report back about your use?

Re:Download implies upload

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why I wrap everything that can possible connect to the Internet in aluminum foil. Even my head! Yeah, you may think I'm paranoid, but when the government's mind control beacons start frying your brains, I'll be the sanest guy around. And if you wrap your house in foil, the black helicopters can't see it. I know it's true 'cause I heard it on Art Bell the other night.

This should be illegal!

[bluekanoodle]

Funny this should come up. I just spent the last day trying to wrestle with setting up a 54g bridge. If a promised feature doesn't work right out of the box, it should't be advertised on the box! First I went with d-link, because the box promised 108 mb speeds, using Super G. Only after I bought 2 of these bridges did I find on their Website in the small print that 108 speeds were not available until I downloaded the firmware upgrade, which was due out in the 3RD QUARTER of 2004!!! This seems like a pretty clear cut case of false advertising. I returned those items and bought 2 netgear 54g bridges, only to find out their was a flaw in the firmware and I needed to upgrade it. No problem, except that their upgrade utility for this bridge only works in Windows. This from a device that promises on the box thats it (and I quote) "works under any OS and any platform." I used one of my servers to run the upgrade and it fried the first one bridge. If this is the future of electronics, I'm very worried.

Re:This should be illegal!

[Bobdoer]

But you shouldn't be worried about your job...

Forbes Trolls

[happyfrogcow]

Everything I've ever read from Forbes linked here at Slashdot has only been a troll trying to bring in ad impressions. I refuse to go read this article as it will only help Forbes.

Thanks for your time.
:)frogmoo

Re:Forbes Trolls

[Anonymous Coward]

So you will refuse to buy your local newspaper beacuse the money will go to help your newspaper?

I don't get your logic.

Re:Forbes Trolls

[happyfrogcow]

i guess you don't understand the reasoning behind boycotting. i can boycott my local paper if they start printing articles bordering on flaimbait.

1. Forbes releases flaimbait
2. someone at Forbes notifies Slashdot via "submit story"
3. ???
4. profit.

I love getting new features via firmware upgrades

[Blinkslowly]

I love getting new features via a firmware upgrade. It makes me feel like I am getting something for free. And it makes me feel like people are continually trying to imporve the product I invested in. I think the marketing people are recognizing this excitement and are planning on monetizing it.

Firmware Updater Service

[kburkhardt]

Consider this: most items that require firmware updates attach in some way to a PC, and get those updates through the PC.

What if there were some kind of a standardized firmware upgrade protocol (kind of like the windows automatic updater service-thingy) that kept track of your devices, notified you when updates were available, and flashed the updates for you?

End user no longer has to be very savvy, but rather just has to have the firmware updater software installed. Updater reaches out to product web services (provided by manufacturers) for each product it is aware of, and checks for updates, and downloads 'em.

Network devices (such as wireless routers) could find their own manufacturer, and update themselves (or not, of course, depending on user prefs)

Re:Firmware Updater Service

[TheLinuxSRC]

This would be great if you could *trust* the manufacturer. I worry way too much about privacy issues for that though. I don't want spyware/DRMware/adware installed behind my back. How long do you think it would take before that sort of thing started happening? Now, if it simply said "XXX update is available for your Widget3000, would you like to install it?" at least I could research the aforementioned issues before installing.

Re:Firmware Updater Service

[Anonymous Coward]

"kind of like the windows automatic updater service-thingy"

horrible horrible horrible idea.. have you ever downloaded any drivers from windows update??

i pray for your soul! i didnt know it was possible to have a driver make my monitor break, requiring a new monitor to install old drivers. or that the "adaptec" 29160 scsi card drivers were actually some sort of microsoft knock off. Never got those ones working either and adaptec says i have the latest version. Its been my experience that those drivers on that windows update site are seriously flawed. I dont even mistrust micro$oft that much, but when it comes to firmware i dont want my scsi card getting devide by zero errors!

This happens with graphics cards too...

[SmackCrackandPot]

A couple of times in the past, I've bought graphics cards from leading chip makers only to find out that various features were missing eg. DVI out, TV out. This is even though the circuit boards had solder bumps for the components and the manuals/box said that option was present. So what happened. Surely a DVI/TV out connector couldn't be that expensive to add?

Re:This happens with graphics cards too...

[default luser]

A couple of times in the past, I've bought graphics cards from leading chip makers only to find out that various features were missing eg. DVI out, TV out. This is even though the circuit boards had solder bumps for the components and the manuals/box said that option was present.

Yeah, imagine that, manufacturers selling multiple products to varying price ranges, while avoiding the cost of designing new PCBs for every iteration. The NERVE of those manufacturers!

The features you see do exist, but you may not have seen the products with the features in question while shopping around, and you certainly didn't pay for the features.

Re:This happens with graphics cards too...

[afidel]

uhh, you bought the cheap model that didn't include those features. I see this all the time with motherboards. It's much cheaper to make one PCB and then leave out the components on the cheaper boards during assembly. If the box actually said it had the feature (not with an optional keyword) then you either got ripped or the wrong part was put in the wrong box.

Could be worse...

[Intocabile]

They could charge extra for updates.

RCA, makers of LYRA, has done worse though they advertised mp3Pro compatibility on their RD1080 but it did not use the psycoaudio data in playback (therefor using mp3Pro was useless). Close to a year later a firmware support the advertised fearture was released.

Another way to control the consumer

[wrmrxxx]

Although firmware upgrades could be a very positive thing for users, providing ways to customise and improve a device, they're also open to abuse. Apart from being a means to ship an inferior product earlier, this opens up an opportunity to control the consumer by messing with the normal product purchasing process. By doing this, the traditional rules of competition can be blurred enough for a company to succeed where it otherwise would not have.

The software industry has featured this idea for a while in a few forms: you buy the software, but then you don't really own it because you are just licenced to use it. Or you buy the software, but have to apply a critical update that comes with a licence change that changes it into something you wouldn't have purchased in the first place. Now, the hardware manufacturers can get in on the act, throwing the old rule book out the window. Companies will do anything to get ahead if they think they can get away with it. They're not people and have no sense of wrong or right - just a sense of profit or loss.

Firmware upgrades

[WorkEmail]

One of the things that people need to realize is that simple handheld pieces of electronics are getting more and more complex in their features and functions. And as they do this they will start to require just as much maintenance and patchwork as a regular desktop computer does. True, knowledge is power, and I watch all the time as my parents get frustrated with technology, but if you take it slow, read the help files and pay attention, people would be a lot better off. Things like AOL and Microsoft make people dumb, they need to realize that not all computer processes are automated and that sometimes things take some investigation. :)

BLUE BLUE GREEN RED BLUE YELLOW

[haystor]

The messiah has spoken, now we must follow.

Market for upgrade cable spec?

[Helevius]

Many people have posted that they require a proprietary cable to flash firmware. I have the same issue with my Motorola i90c phone, but bought the cable.

Is there a market for including a "universal" firmware upgrade access port, coupled with a cable that connects to a PC's serial port?

Some newer laptops lack serial ports, so maybe something like USB could be used?

Helevius

Re:Market for upgrade cable spec?

[ackthpt]

Many people have posted that they require a proprietary cable to flash firmware. I have the same issue with my Motorola i90c phone, but bought the cable.

Is there a market for including a "universal" firmware upgrade access port, coupled with a cable that connects to a PC's serial port?

Some newer laptops lack serial ports, so maybe something like USB could be used?

I did a quick look around and the cable for the 'scope (Meade #505) is $25 for the real deal and $20 for a 'compatible' cable.

If you've been into tech like I have for the past 20 years, you've got a box of cables, power supply blocks and odd bits most of which you're not sure what they go to, if you still have it and are afraid to throw them out. This box, above all my worldly things, will be my legacy.

Re:Market for upgrade cable spec?

[swb]

If you've been into tech like I have for the past 20 years, you've got a box of cables, power supply blocks and odd bits most of which you're not sure what they go to, if you still have it and are afraid to throw them out. This box, above all my worldly things, will be my legacy.

Yes! I have the same box; usually I can match up the PSU bricks with something that can use them by the power output ratings on them. Although I've been disturbed latetly by some newer electronics that don't list the input power specs on the device, nor do they list the output specs on the brick.

This, and a series of confusion with confusion with some serial cables and APC UPS control cables (which have some circuits buried in the ends) has led me to use one of those labeling machines you can buy at Office Depot. I put labels on the PSUs and devices and on the serial cables to denote usage, voltage, etc. It helps, but there's still a backlog of mystery junk.

Nokia did it to me

[dekker]

Whether it's necessary or not, the manufacturers should make it easier. I own a Nokia 3560 cell phone and have been having problems with it shutting down randomly on it's own.

After searching newsgroups and web sites, I came to find out that it's a somewhat common problem that may or may not be fixed with a firmware upgrade. I decided that I'd like to give it a try and prepared to backup my phone only to find that I couldn't get the upgrade anywhere on my own. A check on Nokia's site shows that I can either send it in to them at my own expense or call them and try to use a local authorized dealer. Not wanting to lose the phone for 10 days and pay shipping, I called and got two locations here in Austin. I called the first who informed me that they had the firmware, but didn't have the special cable required. The second told me flatly that they couldn't do it.

So, why are these two places listed with Nokia if they won't perform the service and what the hell is the deal with needing a special cable? Why can't I just transfer the firmware upgrade to my phone via IR or bluetooth, run it and have it restart and apply the upgrade?

After all this, I've decided to live with the problem. Not very satisfying at all.

Simple Concept: Be a *Late* Adopter

[gbulmash]

Every time I've rushed out to get the latest, coolest, neatest gadget, I've paid through the nose for something with a high learning curve and limited features.

• I bought a 4x DVD burner less than a year ago and had to firmware flash it. I can get an 8x now for less.
  
• Firmware flashing an 802.11g laptop wireless card went wrong and broke wireless networking on my laptop. As I hadn't set a system restore point, I had to re-install windows.
  
• I rushed out and bought SuSE Linux 9.0 for AMD64 as soon as it came out. Had to wait months for drivers to support my SATA drives and the onboard ALN on my MoBo.

I'm done.

Video jukeboxes... I'll wait until trailer-park mamas are trampling each other at Walmart to get the $35 Christmas special model made by Kwok-tek or some other manufacturer you never heard of before.

- Greg

If it doesn't immediately benifit the end user

[msimm]

its a flaw NOT a feature. User-hostile features like DRM and the miriad, complicated upgrade schemes, authentication and registration hurdles will either have to dramatically improve (ie benift the user directly) or go away.

Class Action Lawsuit.

[Moocowsia]

Its pretty simple. If they advertise stuff on their boxes that are false phone them up and threaten them saying your going to sue them for false advertising or that you are going to start up a class action lawsuit. The real question is why do these companies have so many marketers? If you took the money from marketing and put it into the development of the product you would have something that would pretty much sell itself.

a favorite Sony technique

[Sylvius]

This happened to me when I bought a Clie a few years ago. It was the first color model (N-710)and only supported 4096 colors. However, I bought it anyway because they promised a forthcoming upgrade to OS 4 that would support a more robust 65k colors.
Sure enough, a few weeks later the upgrade came out--in the form of a newer model (N-760). The upgraded OS was the only appreciable difference. A firmware update for the 710 never appeared. I will never again trust a promise of forthcoming features, at least not on some functionality I really want.

Not a path i like to see.

[miffo.swe]

This is hardware in software style and i dont like it, not one bit. Hardware have up until pretty recently been fairly free from these kinds of problems. If i buy a product i assume its tested and works. If it dont work i just return it and i wont spend any time fixing something that was broken when i bought it. I dont like to become an engineer on the behalf of the company that got my money.

Software has been sold with insane conditions that people take the responsibility off of the manufacturer but that is because software has been treated as art and not as real products. Hardware on the other hand do not have those conditions so when you buy something and it doesnt work, return it. The only way to remedy this problem is if enough people stay away from companies following the path of almost ready hardware. If its broke, they should fix it, not us.

It had to be done...

[Anonymous Coward]

In soviet russia firmware upgrade YOU!

When firmware updates don't won't...

[Supp0rtLinux]

Of course, there's also all those time where firmware updates won't work since the numbskulls that made the device were fresh out of college...

http://www.nccomp.com/sysadmin/verizon.html

The only thing necessary for Micro$oft to triumph is for a few good programmers to do nothing". North County Computers

patchlevel of your phone

[thehosh]

i wonder how those tech-non-savvy-users will manage it upgradeing all their embedded devices connected to internet to prevent hackers doing nasty things using the last security-holes.
are your sure your mobile, router, fridge, whatever is using an up to date version of linux? ;-)

OR an industry!

[bigattichouse]

Yes, little morlocks like me can make quite a living off the Eloi that can't quite figure out the technology. "yeesss... I would love to help you upgrade your cell phone", too bad I can only charge them money.

The R&D dept's are loosing their senses

[Anonymous Coward]

It's OK to use the microprocessor in order to produce high tech devices... but they must be simple enough to operate as a refrigerator: plug it in, and you have cold beer. When you add a bunch of useless features, you add a bunch of bugs... and the average customer don't want to buy something that needs constant attention in order to see if its working OK or if it needs some sort of upgrade. It'll just look for technical assistance if it stops working. I think that companies must focus in producing reliable and simple customer devices, even if they have some sort of high tech "brain". The cellphones are a bad example: all of them have software bugs... some of them even reduce the overall lifetime of the gadget, and this is just turning worse...

This allows binding agreements, and more

[rMortyH]

This is an interesting trend.

If you buy something at a store in cash, the can put those 'by opening this you agree' contracts on them, but those don't mean much and they still can't identify you.

By making you get an update they can collect information on you, which has dollar value, and more importantly, get you to click and EULA on the firmware which extends to other things as well as saying that it can be ammended at any time and remain binding.

This is creeping into everything. I just sent away for my credit reports today. If you get your credit report from a credit agency through the web, they make you click an agreement which covers all sorts of things in addition to making you waive certain rights under the FCRA in some cases, as well as asking for all sorts of information in order to give it to you which is not required. If you send for it by mail, you only have to give the information required by law and you waive no rights.

If you make enough noise, you can probably get them to send you the update in the mail, but you still must identify yourself to them and the effort is not worth it.

The article doesn't mention it, but it's not about time to market, or cutting corners or anything. They want to 1) identify the customer 2) get them to enter into some sort of agreement.

Beauty in design..

[msimm]

As a techy I agree with you in concept but no matter what we do we are NEVER going to change Joe Sixpack. This is where it falls on the software engineers and the hardware engineers to design better. As our technology becomes more complicated (and more heavily depended upon) it should become more transparent, not require more unnecessary technical reading for the user.

The true beauty of technology should be judged in its apparent simplicity.

Re:Beauty in design..

[WorkEmail]

I agree, more time should be spent on developing software that provides lots of functionality with ease of use. Not all people NEED to know everything about the technology that they use. Most people use computers at work and that is it. They see only one screen of one program, send a word document once in a while and that is it. The trick is trying to balance the software between making it easy for those people to use, and also in the process not making people like you and I feel frustrated about getting asked if we are sure 10 times before doing everything and listening to that liottle paper clip pop up. :) (yes I know you can turn him off easily, but still.) :)

Everybody's Everything

[Doc Ruby]

Where's my wearable / radio charged / poly-OLED display / universal antenna / FPGA "TotalConvergence(TM)" device? All I want is cheap TC in all my clothing, and a lifetime firmware upgrade subscription. Then I can stop reading Slashdot.

Re:Everybody's Everything

[SEWilco]

Here it is: The OmniBooster!

It may look like an ordinary battery, but it is the primary module for the OmniBooster System!

If you need a cellphone, just get the powerful 3 watt bagphone module!

For portable computing, an iThinkpaddle module does all you will do!

And we offer not an ordinary universal antenna, because ours is disposable! Simply unroll the proper amount of AlumiAntenna from the Global Antenna Module, wind it properly around your arm, and place the arm in the position which gives the best reception! (For safety, it is recommended that a square piece of AlumiAntenna be formed around the top of your head! Even more uses are possible!)

Re:Everybody's Everything

[Doc Ruby]

I'm waiting for a solarcharged version with the MotorCortex print driver.

Having no firmware upgrades...

[thrill12]

...for some devices is what makes me not buy those devices in the first place. Forget the less technical: they won't ask for the features most of us ask for (or when they do, they can find out about updating on the net).
The main type of devices I am unpleased about are the mainstream DVD-players. Lack of features, wrongly implemented features, plain old hangups.... Who ever invented a DVD-player that can't do MP3 in random order ? Why should I want to see a JPEG building up on the screen while you could double-buffer it ?
Sure, sometimes it's just lack of hardware support. But it's also just lazyness I guess.
I have a Yamada DV-6000 now (divx-capable), which has regular firmware updates. Simply burn a CD-Rom and stuff it in the drive. If you are careful (and don't go updating your drive in the middle of a lightning storm or anything) you will gain more functionality for the same price. Easy as that.

Big companies still have this lesson to learn.

Nuh-uh

[ackthpt]

No, that concept is called "vaporware," and in general, it's the company that pays the price.

1) Announce Product with features X, Y and Z
2) Ship Product with feature X
3) ???
4) Go bankrupt.

Nope. Look at this way. Product is loss leader, cable and other bits to upgrade are Profit.

Go on, doubt me, I dare you.

As a longtime consumer of electronics/computers...

[sprior]

Something I learned a long time ago. Don't EVER make a purchase you'd find useless if a promised future feature/accessory/upgrade doesn't actually happen! I've seen companies promise accessories down the road that don't actually happen. Features that should only require a firmware upgrade turn out not to be possible without a hardware change. My personal favorite for a while not has been HDTV upgradable TVs - a couple of years after you buy that new TV, are you SURE that company would be happy developing new accessories for "last years model" or do you think they'd MUCH
rather sell you this years model... Are you sure that new DRM standards aren't going to cripple the possibility of that future accessory upgrade you were promised?

Well..

[msimm]

Other then the idea of another appliaction *flashing* endlessly as my 248 little tech devices have new firmware become magically available, I like it. ;-)

Hiptop

[RzUpAnmsCwrds]

The Danger Hiptop (T-Mobile Sidekick) has a particularly good way of doing updates. Updates are downloaded over-the air (using the GPRS connection) in the background. Because the device is always-on, a 2 megabyte update can be recieved over an otherwise slow GPRS connection without disrupting the user. When the update is finished downloading, the user is prompted and can choose to apply the upgrade or wait until later. If they choose to install, the update is verified (signed hash) and installed, and the device reboots. All data is left intact.

Definition of evil

[Tony]

I guess it depends on how you define "Evil." If by evil you mean they are willing to screw many individuals for their own profit, then most corporations are indeed evil. If you mean they are willing to use superior market share to destroy competition (thus hurting "consumers," who are really just individuals), then some are evil (I'm not convinced most, just a fairly large number).

If by evil you mean allow others to die so they can profit, then a slightly smaller number are evil.

The point is, there is some definition of "evil" for which a lot (if not most) corporations are evil.

My definition is simple: if a corporation is willing to harm others in its pursuit of profit, it is evil. By this definition, quite a few are evil. Since this is condoned (and encouraged!) by our government, it seems to get worse.

Now, you can argue that corporations don't make these decisions, individuals do, but that is simply prevarication. Groups of people will do things indivduals will not; this makes the group culpable. (Now, defining the individuals within the group may be difficult.)

So how do you as an individual get around this? Easy, instead of rushing in to buy something and then whining about it later, read some objective reviews of the products you buy, talk to people (either in the real world or online) about them, and lastly take all the advertising you see with a grain of salt.

This is excellent advice, and I certainly agree with it; but that doesn't change the economic reality that sometimes, there is only Hobson's Choice, at best. In some areas, if you want phone service, you must use the single provider in your area. This is just one example among many.

Further, consider how people have been reduced to "consumers." Between that and, "worker," that is our role in society-- to work, and to consume. Who profits most from this? I'll bet you dollars to donuts (Mmmmm.... Krispie Kreme....) it isn't the individual.

I don't take exception to your arguments. I take exception to the reference to the "uninformed opinions" so popluar here on /.. Simply because someone holds an opinion different from yours does not make them wrong; nor does your naive analysis of the corporate economy of America make you wrong. (Our economy is Capitalist like the Soviet Union was Communist-- that is, in name only.)

Just because you are right about unthinking consumerism driving shoddy workmanship in the electronic gadgets sector does not negate the evil nature of many corporations. Enron did not happen in a void.

Re:Definition of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Who profits most from this? I'll bet you dollars to donuts <snip type="lame-ass-joke"/> it isn't the individual.

It certainly is individuals that profit from this. I know that slashbot groupthink precludes you from accepting that profit is a valid motivation to do something, but this is why you, and those like you, are precluded from participating in the larger world that controls you.

Simply because someone holds an opinion different from yours does not make them wrong

Quite the contrary, it often does... It is a load of new age bullshit that opinions have some intrinsic value. Some people are just moron assholes that contribute nothing. Why does their mangled thought process mean anything? Just because it is the opinion of the great smelly masses (which are not that great, and not that massive) that people who are successful in an economic fashion are somehow inhabiting the dark side, doesn't mean that it's true.

Call this a troll, call it flamebait, but it is merely unvarnished truth.

Re:Definition of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Fellow anonymous, consider that an opinion "often" being wrong is in no way "quite the contrary" to the statement that different opinions imply they are wrong.

Agreed that some people contribute nothing, though "moron assholes" is a bit juvenile. But how are you to determine what they contribute unless you evaluate their opinion?

Having an open mind isn't the same thing as skipping through the new age post-modernist field, valuing everything in sight as a "rich source of intellectual diversity". Some of us who are professional scientists still realize this.

Re:Definition of evil

[Tony]

Call this a troll, call it flamebait, but it is merely unvarnished truth.

See, this is exactly what I mean. You think you speak truth when in fact you are simply an idiot. Nothing I said was new-age. I merely pointed out that, in this case, both opinions might be right.

A lot of opinions do not have value-- for instance, the ones you express in your post.

Just because it is the opinion of the great smelly masses (which are not that great, and not that massive) that people who are successful in an economic fashion are somehow inhabiting the dark side, doesn't mean that it's true.

It isn't financial success I find vile-- it is the evil things that are often done to attain that success. Any time someone is willing to bring harm to another simply for personal profit, they are behaving in an evil fashion.

Do you defend those who will bring harm to others for profit?

Re:Definition of evil

[Anonymous Coward]

Enron did not happen in a void.

Correct. I think it happened in Houston.

Re:Definition of evil

[jsebrech]

I guess it depends on how you define "Evil."

Evil is being immoral. That is, doing a bad thing while you know it to be bad. Corporations are amoral, that is, when they do bad things, the corporation as a whole does not realise the badness of it, because it has no real mind or moral judgement. Certain officers may realise it though, which is why when corporations break the law, it's often the individuals responsible for making the corporation break the law that are punished. Humans are meant to keep the corporation from doing bad things.

However, the inherent problem is that corporations nowadays are considered persons. They have all the same rights and obligations. However, if you look at the behaviour of a corporation, it is psychotic. If a human being did the same things, he or she would be sent to the loonie bin. It's the ever expanding nature of what rights corporations have that is causing most problems. If corporations could be terminated or disabled when they cross the line between right and wrong, like human beings, there would be a lot less problems. However, corporations have all the rights of people, without having a lot of the responsibilities. In a sense, corporations are societally superior to humans. That's a breakdown of the capitalist economy, and sooner or later someone is going to have to fix that.

Re:Definition of evil

[Gadzinka]

Our economy is Capitalist like the Soviet Union was Communist-- that is, in name only

Yes! I had to wait couple of years to read some American saying on Slashdot that neither America is capitalist, nor Russia was communist country ;)

Indeed, American economy contains some elements of central, government planning and wide range of state interventionism, since pure capitalism tends to degenerate into monopoly/oligopoly extorting consumers forced to buy products they don't need or want.

And Russian, Chinese or (before 1989) Polish economies contained some elements of competetiveness, some more than others. It never was free market all the way, but all those countries could never exist more than couple of years without suplementing central planning with some forms of free market (oftentimes officaly prosecuted, but depended upon by governments).

There is no, and there never was any pure capitalism, communism, right, left etc. It is so, because there's no such animal as ``metric human''.

Robert

Anyone remember MP3.com's articles ...

[Anonymous Coward]

... about SDMI Phase 1 and Phase 2 (before one of the big record companies bought out MP3.com)?

Forced firmware upgrades were precisely the idea. SDMI Phase 1 compliant devices might play unrestricted MP3s (the better to get users to buy the hardware). They would also look for special watermarks in songs. Once a SDMI Phase 1 device saw a SDMI Phase 2 flag, it would prompt the user to upgrade the firmware.

Upgrade the firmware, and you might get all sorts of DRM restrictions, including possibly the loss of the ability to play existing MP3s. Refuse to 'upgrade', and the device would refuse to play any new music with the SDMI Phase 2 watermark.

This is BS

[Moraelin]

I don't think that the general public wants to be lied and cheated. They want features, yes, but they want to actually get those features. The current "it's normal and expected to get shafted" situation is not normal, and not what that public was asking for.

In fact, it's the textbook study of why society needs laws, and why they have to be applied. Because otherwise what happens is that the crooks create a pressure on everyone else to be a crook too.

E.g., if you let some merchants sell contraband or counterfeit goods, it will create a pressure on the other merchants to start selling contraband or counterfeit too. Otherwise their prices won't be competitive. So everyone starts trying to outdo the others in how much of their merchandise is from dubious sources.

The same happens here. Once a company is allowed to cut costs by shipping non-functional products, it just puts a pressure on everyone else to do the same thing. Because otherwise someone who actually spends the time to finish and thoroughly debug a product, can't compete with the snake oil peddlers on either price or time to market. So everyone starts trying to outdo the others on cutting down quality.

That kind of thing doesn't go away by itself. Never did, never will. You need a legal system to stop it.

And saying that everyone needs to waste countless hours of their life trying to avoid getting screwed is, if you'll pardon my saying so, completely idiotic. It's as idiotic as saying that your only recourse to spam should be sorting your mails yourself by hand.

There are laws and courts of law for this kind of thing. If I sell you a house which isn't even built yet, you'd sue the pants off me. If I sell you a car, except what I can give you is just two wheels and a spoiler, you'd sue the pants of me. No "EULA" will let me say it's OK to shaft you, in any other industry.

It's time the same applied to software too. (Yes, including firmware.)

Because this kind of generalized thievery and snake oil peddling is already too high a cost for society as a whole. Not only hundred billions of dollars per year are lost to basically legalized scamming in this industry. We're also talking billions of hours total shaved off people's lives, where they have to work around bugs or to read reviews to make sure their new product will even work at all.

Those hours by themselves are too high a cost.

A murderer can be put to death for... what? Shortening someone's life by, say, 20 years? That's approximately 20 * 365 * 24 = 175,200 hours.

Well, these scammers cost society as a whole a thousand times more hours off everyone's lives. Each year.

Now I'm not asking to actually give those marketroids a death by firing squad. But throwing some of them in state jails would be a damn good start.

Either way, again: history has shown again and again that this kind of thing needs laws. And it needs them actually applied.

Re:This is BS

[RTMFD]

PT Barnum: "There's a sucker born every minute."

You're one of them if you believe that more government can solve your problems. Just ask inner city blacks how well the "War on Poverty" has gone for them...

History does not show again and again that this kind of thing needs laws. Human nature is such that it is impossible to completely protect people from their own ignorance and/or laziness.

Re:This is BS

[Moraelin]

I know that this is /. and the fashionable stance to have is that governments are inherently evil, and and we'd all be better off without them. And I'll call that bullshit.

You mention inner city blacks. Well, how much better would they be _without_ government intervention? Would everyone spontaneously donate some of their money so that the less fortunate can get wellfare? Would everyone spontaneously donate some of their money for public schools? (However badly funded those schools may be, it's still better than nothing.) That's BS. Unless there was a government making you give up that money, noone would.

Without a government doing something about it, chances are those blacks would have been still held at gunpoint to work on plantations until after World War 1. (When eventually agriculture started to have too much manpower, instead of too little.)

No, the government isn't perfect. No, the politicians aren't up to date on all technical issues. No, they're not always honest either.

But history shows that it still works better than just waiting for the problems to go away on their own. Here are some random ideas for you:

- If today you don't get toxic waste dumped wholesale into rivers any more, it's precisely because the government has passed some laws about it. Otherwise the pressure effect I've described would have made everyone dump their toxic waste in rivers. Those trying to use filters couldn't have competed on price and profits with those who dump indiscriminately.

- Ditto about factories spewing crap into the _air_. If you waited for it to go away on its own, you'd still have cement factories without filters, spewing tens of tons of dust in the air. In the _city_. There's some government rules that made that stop.

- Dunno about where you are, but here we have some very strict laws on how much pollution can a car spew. And you know what? I very much enjoy being able to take a walk along a major street in rush hour and not start choking and coughing.

I also happen to know that it was the government that dragged the automobile industry, kicking and screaming, into having seatbelts, airbags, and do at least _some_ effort so you might survive an accident.

In both cases, without government intervention it wouldn't have happened. See the pressure mechanism I've described. Anyone trying to make a safe car couldn't have competed on price with those who sold a death trap on wheels. So you'd still be buying death traps on wheels, if there weren't some laws that changed the playing field.

Etc.

So let's drop the lemming attitude that "governments are inherently evil" and start thinking about how we can use them for our good.

Re:This is BS

[Ensign Grimes]

One problem with expecting laws to solve problems occurs when the corporation in question has more power than the government! Such as the United States vs M$...

Re:This is BS

[RTMFD]

You mention inner city blacks. Well, how much better would they be _without_ government intervention? Would everyone spontaneously donate some of their money so that the less fortunate can get wellfare? Would everyone spontaneously donate some of their money for public schools? (However badly funded those schools may be, it's still better than nothing.) That's BS. Unless there was a government making you give up that money, noone would.

The US has some of the most charitable citizens in the world. I worked with various charities in college and can confirm this anecdotally as well as statistically.

Without a government doing something about it, chances are those blacks would have been still held at gunpoint to work on plantations until after World War 1. (When eventually agriculture started to have too much manpower, instead of too little.)

Can you back this up with evidence?

No, the government isn't perfect. No, the politicians aren't up to date on all technical issues. No, they're not always honest either.

But history shows that it still works better than just waiting for the problems to go away on their own. ...

Wrong again, governments (with cooperation from various corporations and groups of individuals) around the world have perpetrated evil things such as the Final Solution, Stalin's Purges, the Terror of the French Revolution, etc.

See the pressure mechanism I've described. Anyone trying to make a safe car couldn't have competed on price with those who sold a death trap on wheels. So you'd still be buying death traps on wheels, if there weren't some laws that changed the playing field.

Yep, a nasceant technology (such as the automobile was in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s) takes a while to work out the bugs. But have you noticed how vehicles are marketed today? "5-star crash ratings, etc." Plus, the insurance industry puts the hurt on those of us who choose to drive unsafe cars. Therefore, it's not merely government bringing about change.

The seatbelt laws, airbags, etc. are all well and good but how many of our fellow citizens actually wear them? Not many. An airbag makes your car more dangerous if you choose not to wear your seatbelt.

How are you going to legislate/enforce all of this? The amount of redundant/unenforceable regulation already on the books is driving your average working family into the ground.

I agree with you that government is not inherently evil, nor is it inherently good. Before you spout _your_ lemming like mantra that the "government can solve all of mankind's problems, just give it more time and money," please think about the burden you are placing on this nation's working poor.

Mr. Cadaver, please upgrade you pacemaker...

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's see, you can upload your pacemaker info, so how long before HMO's cut corners and ask you to upgrade the firmware yourself?

Upgrade in progress...
Unrecoverable error: I am sorry, there was a CRC error in the firmware upgr...beeeeeeep

The brass ring of ignorance.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Let's start the discussion by raising the concern that if the majority of users aren't tech savvy and society is dominated by technology, doesn't this sound like a new dark age? History has shown that when the peasant mass is uneducated, the church and monarchy rule. "

I have little sympathy for the "masses". The masses not only have chosen to be nontech-savy, but they revel in their ignorance. There's nothing wrong with the tech-savy rising to their position. They made the investment and it has paid off.

Re:This should be illegal! (DLINK)

[Anonymous Coward]

You are lucky you dumped the DLink. I am the unfortunate owner of a DI-624 Wireless G Access Point/Router. It reboots itself about 10 times a day for no good reason(*). There are several forums on the net about it. Their support doesn't answer. And the firmware updates did nothing. Unfortunately it took quite a while for me to realise what was happening.

(*) The only reason I can find so far is that I am using it. When there is traffic it seems to reboot.

Exponential growing pains and convergence

[ready29003]

Technology is advancing exponentially. Cell phones, PDA's, MP3 and video jukeboxes, laptop computers, PC's, Televisions, VCR's, DVD players, Home Stereo, wireless networks, video surveillance, walkie Talkies... and more are all converging into new paradigm products. The bleeding edge is always bloody, messy, and made for us geeks and wannabe geeks. It is going to take a while for the market to figure out exactly what the average consumer wants in their easy to use, fool proof, idiot proof, gadgets. The Tivo is a great example. So is the Ipod. These are examples of refined technology made for a clearly defined purpose-and made as idiot proof and as user friendly as possible. And remember, Ipod dominates the market for the single reason you are all upset with unfinished products: The Ipod is a finished product. The companies that are going to grab market share and hold it, are the ones that finally do make their products finished, stable, easy to use, AND stylish.

Re:Exponential growing pains and convergence

[ready29003]

and I forgot to mention video game systems sigh.. Sony PSX on the way....

Re:Exponential growing pains and convergence

[Ensign Grimes]

Some how I recall hearing recently that the IPOD is limited in life to the lifespan of it's rechargable battery. Evidently as least some folk find this objectionable. But it is a nice feature for built in obsolesence. This is seeming to follow the current "pay me every month or else" approach to marketing. Software assurance anyone?

the old days

[Anonymous Coward]

There was a time when I could buy a motherboard, install it, and use it for its lifetime and I didn't even know I COULD upgrade its BIOS.

If the product is a self-contained device, there should be ZERO patching required.

Re:the old days

[Reece400]

In the old days,, you have to pull 2 chips off your motherboard, put them under UV, then use an external writer to write them :P, If this was still the case,, I don't think anyone would stand for the updates.. Personnally I don't mind updating my devices, except it's usually so damn hard to find the updates.. I just spend 2.5 hours finding the update for my pine MP3 player,, the US site didn't carry the correct version :S

Reece,

Soundblaster....

[thrill12]

Reading this I suddenly remember that very thing about my soundcard: Creative Soundblaster Live with the EMU-101. I specifically bought it for just the purpose of (later on) getting more value for my money. Creative marketed it with specifically telling the great things they could add with new software for the 101. So far the only new feature I have seen was some equalizer developed for it.
Best thing about that? It wasn't made by Creative.

Nokia did it to me-Burnin love.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually there's one channel for upgrades and it comes with every cellphone. No, not the plugin at the bottom, the antenna. Download to scratch memory, verify integrity, them burn to flash. And yes I own a Nokia 3360. Wish me luck on getting AT&T to give me the unlock codes.

Re:the average (person) Preview vs. Ship versions

[securitas]

After taking a hands-on look at the pre-release version, we were going to add a preview of the RCA Lyra Audio/Video Jukebox to our MP3 / Music section but decided against it.

Because it was a pre-release version we looked at it as an unfinished product, especially due to the number of menu items that came up with the "Feature will be available in future upgrades. Visit www.rca.com/lyra-avdownloads for details" message. After reading Stephen Manes' Forbes article, it might not be a bad idea to publish it just so people can see what they'll be getting.

I didn't think that RCA would ship the A/V Jukebox with those menus as they were. The RCA Lyra download site wasn't even working when we were examining the product.

Until this, most of the big criticisms have been about the size of portable media players.

I agree that a dedicated device like this should be fully functional out of the box, especially considering the price. A great user experience is part of what made the iPod such a massive success and more companies should take a lesson from Apple.

But we differ on one point. The average person WILL put up with a LOT of abuse and poor functionality when it comes to computer-related devices, and we've seen the proof with countless (nameless) hardware and software companies. Most of us use their products every day. The early-adopter consumer is the typical Slashdotter who is also the primary market for this type of product: someone who likes to fiddle with technology. The mass market version will probably / had better be a complete product.

The concept of "good enough" seems to be creeping further and further toward shipping de facto beta versions of everything. But there really isn't an excuse for shipping a dedicated device like this as a finished product, when in reality it is a beta.

Any of us who have worked in the technology industry know about the time pressures and the strong imperative to ship "good enough" versions of everything from software to hardware to services. That may fly in the enterprise space (even though it shouldn't) but to bring that approach to consumer electronics...? That attitude isn't good enough anymore.

Rio 500 lied about support for Audible.com files.

[superdude72]

When I bought my Rio 500 a few years ago, the packaging had an Audible.com logo on it, and the player came bundled with Audible.com software.

Did the player support Audible's file format? Um, no. But they said a firmware upgrade would add support.

It took more than 6 months for the upgrade to become available. I was not pleased.

Btw, this was immediately after I returned my Rio 300 because it short-circuited and caught on fire.

Another feature of the Rio 300 was that it could only take Duracell AA batteries. I don't believe that they had an arrangement with Duracell. It's just that their quality control was so terrible that the battery compartment was completely out of spec. They didn't offer a firmware upgrade to fix this.

Dude, where's my shares?-Privates

[Anonymous Coward]

"But if they don't pursue the most straightforward legal avenue to near-term profit, they will incur the wrath of shareholders and lose out to competitors"

The majority of the companies in the US, are private. The only "shareholders" are internal. You are correct about competition though.

Computer's are like cars.

[cryptyk]

People can use a computer to get from point A to point B. Same thing with a car. You don't need to know how to change your oil to simply drive to the store. When something goes wrong, in either case, the average person can't fix the problem. I don't know why people are willing to pay to have their cars fixed but expect their computers to be fixed for free. As for adding new features? Give me a break. If you bought the thing with a certain feature set installed, and then the manufacturer supplies a new flash that enables more features, its your problem if you can't install it. Be happy they are providing it for free.

Blaim the IT industry!

[fishbot]

It was often said that computers would not take off for the uneducated masses until they behave like consumer electronics.

Well, now they do. Just not how it was expected :)

Always dreaded firmware upgrades

[dschl]

I avoid firmware upgrades unless I really want the feature, or can add enough new functions to avoid buying more hardware. Last thing I want is turn a working digicam into a dead one. I wish manufacturers would follow a few simple rules, as I would be more willing to update firmware:

1. Always make the original firmware / bios available. Keep in in some form of ROM if possible.
2. Always permit a fallback to the original firmware / bios (because the original should be available, as noted above). You almost need a pin or switch to do it, similar to the dip switch on some motherboards which restored default settings. Ideally, it would be nice to see a firmware loader in ROM, which could then manage and select among different firmware versions on a device, accessed through some key sequence, available for a second or two on power-up.
3. No extra tools or hardware should be required. I don't even have a floppy drive hooked up anymore.
4. No special operating system should be required (Windows-only firmware upgrades, anyone?). For firmware upgrades to be robust enough to make me feel all warm and fuzzy, all that should matter is getting the new firmware file into the device, over an industry-standard protocol, and you then automatically load the new firmware the next time you boot (including a check for corruption in the firmware upgrade file).
5. User data and settings should be maintained through the upgrades. If new settings are available / old options are removed, then it is the manufacturers job to avoid screwing things up, not the device owners job to reset / reload everything.

Oughta cover it. In a perfect world.

seems ok to me

[Anonymous Coward]

just like they wrote the sw for the mars rover while it was enroute, you can do the same while they are mfg and shipping a cd player.
it takes time to get to the store from its manufacture location, they go stale on the shelf.

Pretty soon there'll be...

[DrewCapu]

...firmware upgrades for our brain also.

I think it would be best for the Wachowski brothers to apply for a patent now. I'm sure they could use that extra income after their 3rd DVD comes out.

This happens with graphics cards too...Clipon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmmm, I've always wondered if I could add the missing component(s) and get the missing feature(s)?

Re:This happens with graphics cards too...Clipon.

[SmackCrackandPot]

Hmmm, I've always wondered if I could add the missing component(s) and get the missing feature(s)?

It would be tricky but not impossible - modern circuit boards are surface mount. The components are soldered onto the circuit board using teeny-tiny balls of solder. Cutting a hole in the face plate would be fairly simple, assuming you could find a matching connector. Although you might need to add the other components such as resistors and capacitors.

Criminal Act?

[Sleetan]

Not if someone was just ignorant and thought "Oh that looks pretty, maybe it will work well".

However, advertising that a product does X Y and Z, when it only does X is a form of what we call "Fraud" specifically "False Advertising" that *is* a crime most places.

I do however agree that companies get blamed more than they should because more often than not problems people have with products are from assumptions they've made about the product without investigating to see if their assumptions prove true.

Tell me I didn't jus' heah yea say that!...

[Anonymous Coward]

5 time...5 time...5 time...5 time...5 time WCW champion!
SPINAROONIE!
Where is Stevie Ray?

RCA Lyra = A Joke

[Merlinium]

HA HA HA, I just started cracking up right at the start reading that article. Yes, I had 2 of those RCA Lyra's in my possession for evaluation for one of our projects, after an extreme ammount of time just getting it to connect to an older PC (USB 1), and then finding feature after feature "Soon to be available", my recommendation was that we do not use this item at all, and I also would recommend to everyone reading this to not even waste your time purchasing this device unless you really just want a MP3 player and are pretty tech savvy that you could muddle through the connection proceedures. I find that having to update firmware is a necessary thing if your using the latest in tech, of which I happen to deal with a lot (and I also enjoy playing with all the new tech items coming into the marketplace). FYI we ended up using a tablet style DVD player (w/a 7" screen) for the project that I was testing the Lyra (w/a 3.5" screen) for. (for those interested google Digix)

Hay it's just like EVERY OPENSOURCE PROJECT ever..

[greymond]

Feature will be available in future upgrades

Some things don't won't work when it first comes out and every one gets the release notes saying

"This features works, but you have to do this and this to get it to work. Our next update shoudl have this fixed"

"Currently this function is disabled. We plan to have it working in the next release"

The /. community should not be surprised by this at all, afterall your all working to make the Opensource community more popular and more influential. Sadly a lot of Opensourse projects go unfinished or stay in beta and alpha for very long times with promises of sugar plum fairys in every release note.

So now your surprised when someone else does this, and try to bash it?! /. = Hypo's at their best....

Basic Legal Theory: Are Corporations Evil?

[mikelieman]

For the most part, Yeah, Corporations ARE Pretty Much Evil.

Consider that a Corporation is an ARTIFICIAL CREATION. They are endowed by their Creator, (The People, via The State) with alienable priviledges. Since it is The People who allow the formation of a Corporation, any Corporation is obviously subordinate to any Natural Person.

A Corporation (despite some very sloppy legal reasoning based on pretty common false beliefs) doesn't have "Rights". Only actual "People" get "Rights". Corporations have Priviledges. Which can be, and are regulated.

Explicit requirements of being permitted to Incorporate and enjoy those privledges, are that the Corporation always act:

a) in good faith;

and

b) in the public interest.

A Corporation AGREES to "Go By All The Rules" when they they apply for incorporation to the Secretary of State's Office.

A Corporation is Evil if they ignore the duties required of them as a condition of Incorporating.

When a Corporation acts in Bad Faith, or Against the Public Interest, their Charter *should* be instantly revoked, and their assets liquidated.

(p.s.: Being Artificial, and not having the vote, Corporations don't have any voice in politics, right?)

Oh! *Maybe* THAT'S What's Wrong!

True Hacker's Paradise

[Adam Marquis]

Really great! I want to reprogram everything, with all those ARM lying arounds, sure it's possible!

Re:Haven't had a problem with firmware updates yet

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know why anybody would seek a non-upgradable piece of hardware over an upgradable piece of hardware.

Because a non-upgradable piece of hardware will be better tested? (because you can't just patch it).

ie: I've never had to `upgrade' my TV, or walkman. They just worked. But I've alredy upgraded my mp3 player 3 times (and everytime it was of a bug - like battery indicator not working properly, or the thing not going into sleep more properly, etc.).

Image vs Commodity

[gad_zuki!]

>Yes, the ignorant masses are being duped by the marketing dollars of large corporations.

I would not use the word duped. People want to buy image, they want to buy meaningless brands, either through peer-pressure (coercion) or as an attempt to look more fit (in the darwinian sense) to the opposite sex and to intimidating to the same sex.

There are also some of us who buy on commodity - we don't care about image or branding we want our bang for our buck. We read reviews, shop around, etc.

The real problem is where do you draw the advertising line? Many european countries limit advertising to children and have much stricter truth in advertising laws than the US. The US seems to be a playground of outright lies, branding, broken promises, vaporware, etc for this reason. Worse, investors buy this BS just as well as consumers, afterall they're consumers too and believe in the power of the brand. This makes for unhealthy market conditions and probably was one of the main factors in the burst tech bubble.

If anything, the US has to take a good look at its advertising practices and put serious limits on corporate speech and enforce these laws.

Lastly, I can't agree with the grandparent that technology will be our undoing, if anything its been shown to be extremely liberating when produced en masse and cheaply (or libre). There's no need to use technology to "enslave the masses," just keep them poor and make the rich even richer and you'll have conditions ripe for theocracies, monarchies, police states, etc.

Basic mobile phone with a few geeky goodies

[MsGeek]

Sony Ericsson r540m. It's an "Euro-only" phone but you can get it at eBay easily enough. I'm not sure if The Register's (of BOFH fame) store sells to the US but they currently have 'em on sale.

It's a bare-bones mobile phone which has two things geeks would love: a GPRS modem built in and Bluetooth. No color screen, minimal games, no camera, no BS. Yeah it does SMS (poorly) and WAP, but you can ignore that. It also uses standard SonyEricsson accessories and batteries which is a real plus.

It's also harder to lose than the average dinky Swiss Army Phone From Hell...a bit chunky and longish, sort of Nokia 51xx-ish. It's also made of really tough silvery plastic that would look outstanding with an Aluminum or Titanium PowerBook. Not very fashionable, but cool.

MY firmware had better just work.

[BillX]

I am currently a firmware writer for a company that specializes in bleeding-edge datalogging and sensor products for some very large clients in the US (including, you could say, THE largest). I can't give too many details about my latest project's internals, but this Thursday, the company I hack for shipped out a prototype of the product that will be rocked, jarred, tumbled, drenched and otherwise abused on the Atlantic for the next 8 months or so. This logger (including batteries) is a completely sealed unit that won't even be able to be opened until it's time to retrieve the data. Now, forget about those wireless-router wusses who can just publish a Web-based firmware update when they find out that their shit doesn't work. MY shit needs to WORK, and work correctly, when it hits the door, because there's no way we'll be able to push a fix-it patch later.

Call me oldfashioned, but I would hope that a product would ship actually having all the features advertised on its packaging. However, I do understand the importance of time-to-market, and the sad reality of getting trounced by the competition pushing out a half-working version of the product you're busy perfecting, promising they'll fix it "real soon now".

But all that's a minor annoyance in comparison with the following: What boils my blood is 'updates' that REMOVE features, or otherwise intentionally cripple a product. Either so as not to compete with an upcoming 'DeLuxe' model, or to avoid the possibility of legal uncertainties (e.g. at least one PVR manufacturer who disabled certain time-skipping [commercial-skipping] buttons post-sale), as a form of planned obsolescence, or whatever other reason. To me, such intentional crippling or other forms of 'self-help' amounts to no more than fraud.

C'mon, who is being fooled?

[keeboo]

Let's say you buy product X, advertised as something that does A, B and C.
And, indeed, product X *does* A, B and C.

Now, they offer a firmware upgrade to add a "D" functionality, or even a bugfix (for a bug you didn't even notice) for the "B"; feature.
Well, you upgrade it if you want.
For a never-upgraded-before device, as long as you have A, B and C as promised, soooorry, but you cannot complain. That's fair.

Consumer dependance or features you don't want??

[rickthewizkid]

Think about it... user buys product now, with a hot new feature promised within a short time via firmware download.

Now, three months later, the download that enables that feature comes out, but lo and behold - the download also includes a bunch of "features" you don't want - such as DRM or embedded advertising.

It's happened before... my sound card (A SB Audigy) has a digital 5.1 output ... but the software running on the computer can disable it, so you can't get a perfect digital copy of that music file you're playing.

Or, take the case of ReplayTV - most people don't know or realize this, but the OS in the ReplayTV can be set up to display advertising on the pause screen - it was only used once IIRC, but there's nothing saying that the owners of ReplayTV can't do it again. The ReplayTV is particularly nasty in this since the files that run the ReplayOS are in fact digitally signed so you can't "tinker" with the operating system.

What am I afraid of? The general public is getting used to paying monthly fees to have things that were previously "free" - Cable TV, for example. Radio will probably end up going the same route - check out XM and Sirius Radio. Now, imagine if you bought a hardware device - for example a PDA. Right now, I can go to Best Buy and drop a few dollars on a Palm Tungsten something-or-other... and it's _mine._ I don't have to pay Palm one red cent over that initial purchase I made if I don't want to.

Now imagine 10 years from now - you go to Best Buy to pick up that PDA. But now, instead of paying a few hundred dollars once for a Palm Pilot, you now have to pay to purchase the unit, PLUS subscribe to some sort of subscription service if you want your PDA to, for example, connect to your PC.

Already the world of personal gadgetry is heading this way. Check out the "Get it now!" service from everyone's favorite cellphone carrier. You have to pay to download a game, PLUS you have to pay a monthly fee (if the author of the game wants you to) - and many cell phones now have the ability for the carrier to "turn off" certain features on various cell phones.

The same thing goes for my ReplayTV - two exact same models hardware-wise - the exact same software inside! Yet, on the newer "5500" series units, two features (commecial skip and Internet Video Sharing) are disabled. One option bit in the internal "registry" turns these features off. Now, this was in response to a settlement with Hollywood, but what is to prevent hardware manufacturers from doing the same thing for profit? Or, charging you a monthly fee to enable certain features - if you don't pay, the features are disabled! It's not like a service is being provided, since all you are paying for is a little "command" to be echoed to your device to enable whatever it is you're doing - similar to cable boxes of old that could have their IR receivers disabled by the cable company if you weren't renting a remote from them - so you couldn't use any universal remotes for free.

The long and the short of it ... Whenever a company does something like this, dollars are involved....

Just my pissing-and-moaning-about-companies-trying-to-make -people-dependant-on-them's worth....
-RickTheWizKid ..."You can NOT leave the magic!"

the corrolary of Clarkes 3rd Law

[Anonymous Coward]

Arthur C. Clarke wrote "Any Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Magic." ... from which another writer(whom I wish was me!) observed that "Any Technology that is distinguishable from Magick is insufficiently advanced!"

Jailing a Corporation

[bill_mcgonigle]

There's also the issue of how to send a corporation to prison.

What's the point of jailing a person? To take him out of society for a period of time (the recidivism rate does not support the reform intent).

So, take the corporation out of society for a period of time. Revoke their charter for n number of years. Yeah, that sucks for the workers, but, hey, maybe that's incentive to not be complancent in fraudlent activities. It also sucks for the top brass because they're not likely to be quickly reemployeed by another coporation if they've let their company be jailed. A judge is going to rule on the penalty, so there will be checks and balances in the system to keep it fair.

If the offense is great enough, along the lines of what would get a person put on death row, permanently revoke the charter - corporate death penalty.

There would need to be some sort of legislation to prevent large corporations from forming startups for every project to get around this, but I'm sure the boys at the statehouse could figure it out.

Key difference

[Thomas Shaddack]

You don't get the source.

We've seen this before...

[zaunuz]

...in Windows 98. Remember that 'upgrade only-version' ?

You installed windows98 over another windows-installation, such as win95, win3.1 etc etc. Those who are not PC-gurus suffered just as much if something went wrong back then (which it did 30% of the time), as us less tech-skilled will with firmware upgrades.

Re:Haven't had a problem with firmware updates yet

[freeze128]

12 years ago, I was working for a small clone computer manufacturing company. The latest machines there were 386s that run at a whopping 33Mhz. At that time, I read an article in a trade mag about some motherboards having a flashable bios, and that soon, in the future, *ALL* motherboards would have a flashable bios. Well, at the time, there was only one way to overclock your CPU, and it was JUST the CPU: Replace the crystal! All other settings on the board were controlled by jumpers. After reading the article, I thought to myself "Why in the world would they make ALL the motherboards with flashable bios? It's a complete waste of time, nobody would need that!"

Apparently, the industry foresaw the future development of crappy hardware with a poorly written BIOS that would need updating.

Today, I'm asking the same question. "Why in the world would I need to upgrade the bios in my toaster, electric razor, hairdryer, electric toothbrush?"

How bad can they screw those things up?

Oh man, my cell-phone got Microsofted!

[caffeinefiend]

Boy oh boy, who didn't see this comming. It was only logical that consumer electronics would follow suit of software's "planned obsolescence". Cynic that I am, I see this being abused in the future : i.e. vaporware a la firmware. It stands to reason that a company could claim "compatibility" with a new feature, but not include actual functionality in the product, only the possibility. Possibilities are endless for this sort of shenanigan! One thing is for sure though, I bet Microsoft will begin manufacturing consumer electronics in the near future.

This is BS-Advertising.

[Anonymous Coward]

"I don't think that the general public wants to be lied and cheated."

----

"Buy our car and women will throw themselves at you."

"Buy our food, or try our diet and you will be thin witth little or no effort"

"Try our cooking appliance and you will be a master chef"

"Get rich quick. no money down. Many have succeeded. Apply now"

We may not want to be obviously lied to, but one has to wonder.

Alienating Users?-Cheap labour.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Oh, and the cost? $20 for a year of nothing. Tell you what, guys...if you're in the market for PDA antivirus protection, I'll beat that price. I'll do nothing for only $10 a year."

And your job still got outsourced.

Re:Alienating Users?-Cheap labour.

[dasmegabyte]

Of course it did. The Open Source community is willing to do nothing for free. I can't compete with that!

Which is why my target market those who are successful but uninformed and wish to be proactive (aka "fools with money.")

Re:Firmware Updater Service - Impossible!

[jaseuk]

There is no standard way to perform a firmware upgrade, as it varies depending on the device that your upgrading. There are a many hundreds (if not thousands) of flash controllers and memory devices that all upgrade in different ways.

Firmware upgrades over the internet would have to be designed into the product from the very beginning. As the product would have to be capable of overwriting its own operating code while using that same code to collect and run off the internet.

While many devices are getting alot more flexible about how they can be upgraded there are alot of legacy and CHEAP devices that do not support these features.

There is also the problem of getting these same people who are leaving out features in order to get the device to market spending a great deal of time on the firmware upgrade process.

No surprise

[pikkumyy]

How many of you that code for a living have had the same problem; Deadline is approaching, it was set by some consultant/marketer at the first place with a quick estimate of half of the features promised for the final product.

After realizing you'll never make the deadline, you have to compromise, becouse your company really needs to deliver the package. So you make it work quickly, abandoning the features not yet ready, ship it and do a bugfix that later will fix all those missing features.

This is everyday in software manufactuing. Now its becoming everyday with this sort of software too.

Wouldn't work.

[Aldric]

You really think that either the democrats or the republicans are going to destroy the source of income that keeps them in power? Get real. I'm sure the large companies would love to see something like this being used on small companies that can't afford large campaign contributions though.

Stop shipping incomplete products

[llzackll]

If the manufacturers would focus on shipping more complete products, instead of shipping buggy getting their product out as soon as possible to meet some deadline, and using the mass market as beta testers, then there would be no problem.

Bug fixes - full disclosure ?? - opinions ??

[rskrishnan]

Hello All, I've upgraded a few things every so often - usually because of some security alert/bug etc. Recently I went to upgrade my Koss dvd player (the cheap stuff) KS3112. The Koss website posts a link http://www.sonigem.com/uploaded_files/software_arc hive/KS3112-2.zip with instruction in a PDF within in the .zip file. The problem is that there no mention of WHY we need this upgrade, or what the problems are etc. Does Koss really expect me to "upgrade" without telling me what the problem is ?? What if they "disable" some features ?!? Am I just being paranoid ??