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Lightbulb DRM: Philips Locks Purchasers Out of 3rd-Party Bulbs With New Firmware (techdirt.com)
sandbagger writes: Purchasers of the Philips Hue 'smart' ambient lighting system are finding out that the new firmware pushed out by the manufacturer has cut off access to previously-supported lightbulbs. Philips contends that this move will help their customers. A statement from the company reads in part: "While the Philips Hue system is based on open technologies we are not able to ensure all products from other brands are tested and fully interoperable with all of our software updates. For guaranteed compatibility you need to use Philips Hue or certified Friends of Hue products."
Keurig tried this crap and it didn't work out well for them.
Intron: the portion of DNA which expresses nothing useful.
So basically they want to be Keurig 2.0 and hit the same shitstorm that the coffee cup people did with their ridiculous "buy ours only" scheme. Printers, Coffee Makers, now light bulbs. I guess these guys don't learn from history, huh?
.
My first CD player (purchased in 1985) was a Philps (with a Magnavox nameplate). I've also purchased other Philips products since then.
I will no longer buy Philips products so long as they are aggressively DRM-happy.
Phillips have a very long history if making things as difficult as possible for everyone else. Going right back to their early TVs and radios.
I think Philips forgot the cardinal rule of technological trojan horses: make sure people are actually using your product BEFORE the dick lock-in moves.
Have gnu, will travel.
Sounds like they're aiming to screw themselves out of the market entirely. Strip it all out of your house and send it back for a refund, buy products from a responsible company that isn't out to screw over their customer base.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
We can't guarantee other vendors' bulbs will work so we'll cut the users' suspense and make sure they wont.
Does this really surprise anyone? This is one of the primary features of most IoT type setups - you dont own what you have bought, you are just using a service, and therefore of course they feel free to redefine that service as they wish.
They here of course is not limited to Phillips, but people will continue to be surprised by this.
Until we see some (haha! yeah right) legislation that makes it illegal for terms, level, or functionality of service to not be reduced or removed without agreement from BOTH parties, this is what we will have.
Consumers were enough for a while, but the hunger has increased, and you only paid once then! It is immoral for the middle class to be allowed to save, so more ways must be invented to empty there wallets weekly to fund the top (rulers) and the bottom (troublemakers who must be paid to stay in check)... Welcome to the machine.
Guess I can scratch them off my list.
Don't step on the baby.
You could...just not buy a DRMed lightbulb. I know I didn't.
Let the damn thing fail due to no sales.
Say goodbye to standard battery sizes like AA or AAA or D or even the rectangular 9v. In the future, everything will have a custom made battery, that you have to replace regularly, and will only be available from the original supplier.
Until they obsolete them, at which point your device is useless and you will have to buy the newest one.
Please note, I am probably *not* giving anyone any ideas here... this is already happening with consumer electronics like phones, it probably won't be long before it applies to everything.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
The Phillips Hue Lighting service - all updates are forced and you pay a subscription fee to turn electricity to light. And you'll have to watch a 30 second add before you get to turn the light on or off.
Left MS Windows for Linux Mint and never looked back!
Vote for Bernie in 2016!
Let's hurry up and apply onerous DRM to our already-overpriced new product!
Hue bulbs seem like an interesting idea, but the price was already more than I'm willing to pay - so I hadn't bought into this system. Now Philips has seen to it that I never will.
#DeleteChrome
That was Bush you idiot. And incandescent vs LED vs CFL has nothing to do with this.
but without the internet connectivity how will i ever be able to turn on the lights.
This reminds me of the Sony PS3 case, where you could originally install Linux on it (in fact the USAF did just that to create a cheap computational cluster using over a thousand PS3s), but then Sony changed the firmware to prevent it.
In cases like these, are there any laws allowing you to return the product for a full refund? After all you may have bought it under the premise that it could do something. Then the manufacturer altered the product post-purchase to prevent it from doing those things.
If there isn't such a law, it's high time we passed one. I don't own any Phillips Hue lights, but it was on my short list (not anymore). I would imagine anyone who's bought them to use with non-Phillips bulbs will be pissed. This defeats the whole purpose of using a standardized light socket.
From the HUE developer program web site:
http://www.developers.meethue.com/documentation/friends-hue-update
“There is no change to Philips’ commitment towards an open system and ZigBee Light Link as the best standard for residential lighting control. Our lights continue to be fully standards compatible with differentiated features built on top of the standard and exposed via our bridge.”
“Yes, we will continue to allow other applications to work with Philips Hue without certification”
While the Philips Hue system is based on open technologies we are not able to ensure all products from other brands are tested and fully interoperable with all of our software updates
Now they are able to ensure that all products from other brands are completely non-interoperable.
I'm starting to suspect that "Hue" actually has nothing to do with light and everything to do with the STNG character "Hue", the Borg that was captured and adopted by the crew. The name was supposed to be a play on words, one Picard, who had been rescued from the Borg, found particularly distasteful.
Remember: Resistance is futile.
*** *** You're just jealous 'cause the voices talk to me... ***
remember the Clintons.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
Whatever the joke, now you need a couple more, to break the DRM scheme.
When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
new firmware pushed out by the manufacturer
The fuck?
I've been buying lightbulbs for well over 5 decades and have never once needed my lightbulb to have "firmware". My computer, sure. My lightbulbs, not so much. Everything seems to have been alright thus far.
What is this about? Why would I ever want firmware in my lightbulbs, let alone anything internet connected?
Seriously....this should surprise no one.
That's what "interoperability" means to these fuckers: It'll interoperate with our stuff, not anyone else's.
Besides, only terrorists want interoperability, citizen! You only want interoperability if you have something to hide, everyone knows that! Just like with using encryption!
Now think of the children (and our corporate profits) and move along, consumer!
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Seriously, the toaster emailing you when the toast is done was a joke, not a prognostication. Will the next big thing be underpants that text you when you've farted?
Guess who won't be buying them? That's right, me.
Thanks Phillips, for screwing it all up so blatantly before I spent a dime on your jackass proprietary crap.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Soon light bulbs will not be replaceable. You'll have to buy another house.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
That's a great answer. The only problem is, this is a change to existing installed systems. Not acceptable. And I'm going to consider anyone who considers it acceptable either an idiot or a shill...or possibly the kind of economic fundamentalist who combines the two characteristics.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
As with K-cups 2.0, is the solution in a pair of wire cutters?
figure out why anyone would put up with wireless control of their lights AT ALL - I really don't feel like having my evenings interrupted by the neighborhood a-hole teens turning my living room into strobe-central.
A thousand pounds of wood moving at 300 feet per minute. Don't get in the way.
It's pretty crappy that ZigBee allows this kind of behavior while Philips still has the ZigBee label on their boxes.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
explain this? The summary doesn't make it clear what Philips is blocking and the site's /.ed.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Doesn't this constitute a breach of contract? If not, why not? Legally, at what point is it no longer legal to make changes like this?
Nobody has examined the source code, so one can't be sure, but many people appear to have reported that their non-Phillips bulbs suddenly stopped working. That's not just a maybe. You can argue about what the reason is, and perhaps the change *is* standards compliant. But that's not the way to bet, and even if it's true it looks as if they intentionally changed the specs to disable competitors.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
From the HUE developer program web site:
http://www.developers.meethue.com/documentation/friends-hue-update
“There is no change to Philips’ commitment towards an open system and ZigBee Light Link as the best standard for residential lighting control. Our lights continue to be fully standards compatible with differentiated features built on top of the standard and exposed via our bridge.”
“Yes, we will continue to allow other applications to work with Philips Hue without certification”
* Until we feel such applications are cutting into our profit margins, or the CEO needs a bump in his stock dividends before cashing in his golden parachute.
Looking for something I could give my sister, so what is the best no-hack, off-the-shelf solution?
Philips was also one of the creators of the Phoebus Cartel, so this isn't exactly untrod ground for them.
I can hate Phillips as much as I hate Apple. Fuck Phillips
Great. All we need is for enough things like this to encourage more people NOT to update their IoT. Fannnntastic.
I have a Hue set I won as a door prize. I was ambivalent to smart bulbs but happy they were open standards. The rest of my HA gear is zwave. Now I will treat these as just another proprietary widget not to be implemented.
I've been on slashdot so long I'm starting to get out of touch with the cool stuff if it ain't on slashdot.
Send a packet to your Roomba to roll over to the wall and turn on the light.
My LED bulbs all put out nice, pleasant light. The old ones cost $1 to buy and $20 to operate for the year they operated. The new ones (not Hue) cost $5 to buy but last 5 times as long and use only $1 of electricity per year. The new ones screwed into standard sockets, the new ones do too. I use the same dimmer switches and regular switches, no new rules to learn. None of mine need software but you are welcome to buy some that do. Now head back outside and tell the kids to stay off your lawn.
You don't increase your market share by trying to keep your customers from buying from other suppliers. That's just how you piss them off.
Ferret
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
Oh for mod points. But mod points wouldn't really work in this case because I'd mod you +1 informative, +1 funny, even though they don't have it, +1 Zing!
Pairing non-Hue Zigbee bulbs generally isn't for non-techies, they often don't work quite right, and Philips is still supporting some of them.
Philips has a fairly good statement about the situation and what they are doing at http://www.developers.meethue....
Folks, take a couple of minutes and add a review of the Hue products you own on Amazon. A naive buyer will think that he/she can use it with the LED lights from Cree, for example, because there are websites showing this pairing -- we need to inform buyers that this will not work.
It's a service we owe other consumers.
Hue hubs currently enjoy an average of approximately 4 stars. That number seems overly high.
I was previously interested in Hue lights, fortunately I haven't bought them yet. Fuck you.
Sounds like they're aiming to screw themselves out of the market entirely. Strip it all out of your house and send it back for a refund...
Sears, Roebuck was selling gas light fixtures as late as 1910.
Why?
Because lighting affects your choice of color, patterns and textures in flooring, wall coverings, window dressings, furniture and upholstery. It is an expensive business transitioning from one form of natural or artificial lighting to another --- and once you make the commitment, there is no turning back.
I'm glad that worked for you. I found the Philips brand dimmer bulbs I bought for $5 each last month have two defects. They do not have anywhere near the dimming profile of incandescents (the dimmer range is now only half used before they go out and their dimmest setting is about what I would get when I had the dimmer knob halfway with incandescents). I suppose I could generate pointless e-waste and throw away the 30 year old dimmer switch that was works fine otherwise, replacing it with an LED friendly unit.
I also used those same bulbs on a 10 year old neutral free (ie: Hot power stealing) motion sensing light switch. Guess what, they never turn off now, though they do get just as dim as the ones above that perform poorly.
These are the ones that suck, current tech from a company that should know better:
http://www.philips.ca/c-p/046677433192/led-slimstyle-a-shape
I also bought a pair of LED bulbs 6 years ago for $25 each that flickered terribly from day one. Though they did at least put out a good hue of light. In fact, that's what I have found LED bulbs to be best at, the hue you choose is rather accurate. Those were a bit more no-name so my expectations were low. They're still working, so that's pretty nice. I'm guessing based on the 60 Hz flicker they're just inserting a diode and resistor in series with the LED. Ugh. Next time I've got my oscilloscope and a photodiode I'll test and figure out the flicker rate. Hopefully they at least put in a full wave bridge.
And, shortly after that (sucker for punishment I am) I bought 4 more LED bulbs. They performed ok although unfortunately they are much dimmer than what they replaced (Since they were pot light bulbs normally you can only buy them in just a 50 watt halogen size. Apparently these put out light equivalent to 35 watts. Mea culpa for not more closely reading the packaging, though this is abnormal as the 4 pot light LEDs I bought this year perform well... but again, dimming performance is just as poor as my other bulbs. The dimmer on this circuit is an older rotary design, but still was purchased only 5 years ago.)
All the other LED bulbs I've bought (about a dozen others) that were not used in dimmers have worked admirably and anyone looking at them would be hard pressed to recognize that they're not incandescents (so long as the shape of the bulb is hidden).
Could you point me to the LED bulbs you've had good luck with on dimmers? As you can see, that's where most of my issue is. In my home theatre I want 400 (equivalent) watts of light when I'm cleaning, and about 10 watts of light when I'm not. I could get that range with incandescent bulbs (though it took a little fiddling with the knob). I can't seem to do better than 1/4 light output, or 100 watts equivalent with any LED bulbs I've tested. I suppose I could create tons of e-waste by just testing every single bulb in the store, but I'd rather just find out exactly what I'm doing wrong and fix it (again, preferably without the e-waste, as that really makes the upgrade completely pointless). You know, that point where your incadescent bulbs just barely glow a dim reddish orange. I want an LED bulb that can do this for me (bonus if it stays the same colour rather than the ugly red tinge old bulbs had, natch).
Cree bulbs and modern dimmers, not that hard.
Hue exposes a REST API, you can talk to it yourself in whatever way you want.
Hey, Hue! You stupid sonofabitch! Turn my fucking lights on!!!!
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
That's "cue" not "queue". If you learn the difference, then next time you won't look so ignorant.
On the 8th day, God, once again said "Let there be light", and Phillips said "F*ck you .. We didn't make those lights!".
Thus it was that Phillips joined the Dark Side.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
For anybody with older ("3rd party") bulbs, Phillips has, essentially bricked their controllers.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
Just wait for the apple car all service dealership only at apple prices and while there at it an DRM filling hole for windshield washer fluid, drm on the lights, apple only changing cables / converters, maybe even ATT only cell plans with big roaming fees.
All that's needed is a disclaimer stating that functionality is only guaranteed with certified accessories. Perhaps pop it up when associating uncertified products.
The name sounds like something out of Lensmen, and so does the grubby little conspiracy! I wonder how much of the business and crime practices of the day inspired it?
Zigbee interoperability is a bloody mess, with lots of devices and hubs not talking to each other or not implementing all functions correctly. That's why companies restrict the set of devices that they work with to devices they have tested. It sucks, but it's really Zigbee's fault. Z-Wave has somewhat better interoperability, but is more proprietary and restrictive.
Now head back outside and tell the kids to stay off your lawn.
I would, but it's dark outside and my old $1 lightbulb isn't bright enough to see the kids.
I could probably buy a higher Watt $1 lightbulb, but that would burn the grass off my lawn.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
When did "open" become "you need to be certified"?
I did what I had to and chucked it away!
Let's see how long it takes before we best this DRM...
It must be what they want right? Why else put it in something as benign as a light?
Philips contends that this move will help their customers.
how does this help me as a customer? If I already own such lights which worked perfectly well with the previous firmware, but won't work anymore if I ever have to reset the device..
So how in the hell does that help me........ If the lightbulb isn't recognised by the device and the lightbulb claims it's compatible with the device, then I'll first contact te seller of the lamp..
So yet again, how does it help me?
They should remove the block with a new firmware as it only helps them maybe sell more lightbulbs which have a aproval stamp on them.. But it sure will make me think again when buying a new hue device, like, I won't buy a philips anymore...
Replace? Are you kidding? The batteries of the future are, of course, not replaceable and booby trapped. When they run out, it's time to replace the device.
Nah, Bernie will tax the rich and give the bulbs out to the poor. Those will be given out to lower energy costs as they last longer and use less energy. The bonus is they'll take up less space in landfills. That will be known as the BernieBulb and everyone will hate it because "socialism."
Oddly, I've got a few dollars accumulated and I'm a Bernie supporter. Even stranger, I'm a Libertarian. To be a bit more clear, I'm not a Randian. Ayn Rand was an idiot. I'm best referred to as a Classical Libertarian or, perhaps, a Socialist Libertarian. I'm not overly fond of the title of the latter but it's actually fairly close to my ideals but I've reached those conclusions for different reasons than most. I'd elaborate but you won't read it.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
Many older dimmers need the wattage pull of incandescents to work properly. and there is nothing a bulb can do about that short of including a heater. That is probably the source of both your threshold effect and the flicker.
It is not the led bulbs that need any special magic, just engineering tradeoffs based on assumptions about operating parameters that simply do not hold up any more.
Before anyone acts surprised, understand that the light bulb manufacturers were one of the most comprehensive, archetypal cartels: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
It's a perfect, comprehensive example of such behavior: controlled pricing, customers, regions, planned obsolescence (and agreed-upon 'freeze' on tech development) and even penalty payments for violation of the agreement.
Nothing really changes. The moment they sense they can get away with something, they will.
-Styopa
1) There is no provision in any of the light bulbs out there (regardless of make and protocol, this includes Cree, Phillips, Osram, Lifx, etc.) to update firmware. Old modes of operation are just that. A change in firmware would be required to fully lock out non-Hue bulbs as they conform to the ZigBee Light-Link application profile in full. A change to lock out all Light-Link bulbs except those "certified" by Phillips would require a firmware change on the bulbs themselves.
2) There are two application profiles that directly involve lighting provided by the ZigBee consortium. One is Home Automation, the other Light-Link.
3) Home Automation has security modes available but are typically not used, using the fallback security key because there was no automatic handling of security. Light-Link, on the other hand, has such simple authentication control so that you can screw in a new light bulb and expect the new IoT cluster to be "secure" (I consider this debatable, but that's not part of this discussion...)
4) Many of the ZigBee devices out there meet conformance, but they're HA profile only. Either because they're earlier on devices or because the vendor was being cheap. It costs additional money to implement a Light-Link device. Each SKU involved has their own private key, issued to the vendor from the ZigBee consortium. A LL key requires the following: Membership in the Consortium ($3500), conformance testing for the device (varies, usually something on the order of $5-10k), and a $1000 license fee paid to the consortium that is paid out before they hand you the magic token to have it "just simply work". With HA, you don't need anything other than knowing the ZCL protocols for HA profile and implementing them precisely.
5) Conformance to LL, requires that a controller and any repeaters support an HA device in failback mode and all end nodes must be able to work with a compliant HA controller node (gateway). Likely to have happened is that they took the HA fallback mode out of the gateway and it's corresponding controller or they block anything with a non-supported manufacturer ID. That'd be the only way they could "enforce" this under the facts that they're a ZigBee system. If they're blocking by manufacturer ID, I wish them the best of luck there- down that path is a path of pain. They *WILL* be broken upon the wheel there. If they've changed it so that only LL mode is supported, that has other, equally dire consequences.
6) In any event, you can use *any* ZigBee capable bulbs, GE, Osram, Phillips, Cree, etc. with a Wink bridge which is currently unlikely to change since it's not in GE's interests to play this game for what they're trying to do. Osram has some color and color temperature changing bulbs in their Lightify lineup. I'm suspecting GE's got similar plans. Moreover, if you have one of the IoT gateway devices similar to GE's that try to handle Z-Wave, ZigBee, and a few others, they'll drive the Hue and other bulbs correctly.
DRM? Hardly. Just an uppity vendor thinking they have a handle on things when they don't in the slightest. If you can't find any other color shifting bulbs, just buy the bulbs, their "gateway" is a middleman that's in the way if you've got anyone else's more capable gateway. You don't need their bullshit. You don't need most of the other player's rubbish. Just get an Wink (Maybe IRIS...I haven't evaluated their stuff...) gateway if you can't find or justify the expense of some of the others. The lights will just simply work and you can do more than just lights. You don't need/want the other vendor's supplied gateway which only does lighting control without adding nifty things like touch panel controls that make the lighting work mostly like the traditional way, with a bit more fine-grained control over it all.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
True, but it would seem to me that the bridge is no longer ZLL compatible in any real sense, but it is Hue only bridge now.
Bwahaha serves the idiot DRM-purchasers right!
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
PS: And yet they still advertise it as "Zigbee Light link protocol 1.0 certified". Either one or the other must be wrong.
This has been explained by Phillips :
- From now on, only "Friends of Hue" certified products can be added to the network.
- Already connected uncertified products shouldn't stop working, but Phillips makes no guarantees.
- They still follow the ZigBee standard. You can still use their light bulbs and any others with another controller.
- In theory, the "Friends of Hue" certification is open to third parties.
Although this latest complication is a Bad Thing, it's not actually going to affect many people (these are toys, after all, not principal sources of light) and compatibility of bulbs is frankly something we remember from the past, it really isn't an accurate description of the present situation.
I tried a few "Connected by TCP" lights (actually made by Greenwave IIRC) and had them working well with my Vera.
A firmware update for the controller rendered them unusable with anything but Greenwave's own app.
So I bought a few Cree smartbulbs to replace them and use with my Hue system - they have been working great for over a year.
Now Philips is going to block these perfectly-functioning lights? FU Philips. The only reason I use your products is that they integrated well into my home system. If you force me to use your products separately from the rest of my home control systems - you'll force me to ditch your products.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
It won't be Phillips then!
if "Faith" could be proved with facts - would it still be faith? So why does "Faith" try to present beliefs as fact? -
"While the Philips Hue system is based on open technologies we are not able to ensure all products from other brands are tested and fully interoperable with all of our software updates."
Philips will make damn sure that other products won't work.
Apparently Philips is unclear about the concept of open tech.
Don't buy from Philips. They've warned you they'll screw you in the socket.
There were reports in the comments following the article, and I believe the article itself contained second-hand reports. Naturally this hasn't been confirmed by Phillips, but so far I also haven't heard them explicitly deny it.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Cree LED bulbs, both the original design and the newer 4Flow, work well on dimmers. I have three chandelier fixtures with dimmers; I did the first two with the earlier Cree bulbs, but the third had to wait for the 4FLow because the thick collars of the older bulbs wouldn't fit into the glass shades.
They don't get as dim as incandescent bulbs but they get dim enough for me. There is no visible flicker when dimmed and multiple bulbs track correctly (that is, they all dim the same amount); both of those things were problems with dimmable CFLs.
The Philips Slimstyle is not a good choice for use with a dimmer; problems with visible flicker have been reported. They're fine for non-dimmer installations where the bulb will be hidden; the odd shape and imperfect light distribution make them less than perfect for installations where the bulb will be visible.
You can no longer link 3rd party bulbs, even using the API. The bridge does not expose them.
No, seriously; tell me what you really think.
Funny that you have said "You're viewing the world through the gun-slit experience of your personal experience" and used yourself as an example!
I'm describing a trend.
Just like what we saw with fax machines.
"Didn't you get the memo" - oh that's right you did not - you got an email instead of something on paper!
Be honest, are you really printing as much as a couple of years ago? If you don't know ask the person that approves the budget for the consumables.