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After Outrage, Logitech Gives Free Upgrade To Owners of Soon To Be Obsolete Device (gizmodo.com)
It looks like Logitech didn't anticipate the barrage of criticism it received after announcing this week that it would be intentionally bricking its Harmony Link hub next March. The company is now reversing course. Its Harmony Link will still die next summer, but if you own one, the company is happy to give you a free upgrade to the more recent Harmony Hub model. From a report: Originally, Logitech planned to only offer Harmony Link owners with active warranties free upgrades to its new Harmony Hub devices. But for people out of warranty -- possibly the majority of Harmony Link users, as the devices were last sold in 2015 -- they would just get a one-time, 35 percent discount on a new $100 Harmony Hub. However, after customer outrage, Logitech revised it plans and announced that the company will give every Harmony Link owner a new Hub for free. Additionally, users who had already used the coupon to purchase a new Hub will also be able to contact Logitech in order to obtain a refund for the difference in price. However, Logitech is still not planning to extend support for the Harmony Link. The company says, "We made the business decision to end the support and services of the Harmony Link when the encryption certificate expires in the spring of 2018 -- we would be acting irresponsibly by continuing the service knowing its potential/future vulnerability."
With all the drama that's happening with it, I find it funny that Logitech called the product "Harmony".
#DeleteFacebook
Their security claim is bullshit, you can't tell me they shipped a device without a way to upgrade firmware.
Bricking a product should be illegal. I'm talking to you DJI!
Not only is it possible to have non upgradable firmware, it is possible to do so as a security decision.
I certainly cannot confirm Logitech is hindered by anything other than their own cheapness, but it is possible they made a decision to deliberately keep their systems from being at risk by preventing alteration. It is also possible there is some unconsidered technical limitation, like with open firmware that doesn't work on all devices or the issues with the blockchain on bitcoin.
History is full of such examples. So yes, I can, stop being foolish and ignoring history.
So all they would have to do is renew an SSL certificate and have it provisioned...? Cool.
Here's a coupon to buy the new model.
Sure hope we don't brick the new one too.
Why are they building a non-renewable expiration date into a hardware product? And perhaps more importantly, what is the expiration date of the new hardware product? Do they even tell the users what that expiration date is when they purchase it?
I don't know why, but I never forget companies that pull these kinds of stunts. And remember to never buy anything from them again.
We made the business decision to end the support and services of the Harmony Link when the encryption certificate expires in the spring of 2018 -- we would be acting irresponsibly by continuing the service knowing its potential/future vulnerability.
How is it legal to make a "business decision" to brick a customers device without telling them in advance that it has a predefined end of life? Where I'm from Logitech would be liable under the consumer guarantees act to replace the device or provide a refund if it stopped working within a reasonable period of expected lifespan, regardless of any advertised warranty, unless they explicitly specify and end of life date before the purchase.
Logitech has been the King of Mediocre for years. Average products that, with a bit of effort, could be quality work. For example, wrist pads instead of some products that don't force the wrist to bend back. They destroyed the Squeezebox system by Slim Devices. (When they bought the company, I knew the days it would work were numbered.)
The only reason to buy from them is not doing enough research to find who has a better product that's not necessarily as visible in the marketplace. I won't touch their products anymore.
Yeah, keep writing those great headlines. A two year old TV remote is not an "obsolete device."
And this is why I don't trust companies with "smart" things. If it's going to be smart, it had better connect to my smarts, not some remote server. Amazon and Google have "smart" speakers that can't even find DLNA audio on your home network. How smart is that?
that is Are Money, or Harm On You?
idontgetit.
So, I actually bought a Harmony Hub and Smart Remote and decided against setting it up until I could figure out how to use it locally without the cloud (it's a fucking remote). Nowhere on the box does this remote say it requires the internet. I feel like this is false advertising and a bait and switch. It's a remote control that tethers a giant fucking box to the device it controls and uses IR. Why the fuck would that need the internet? It doesn't; they just want to enable new, ahem business models, like forcing you to buy a new one when they arbitrarily sunset what you paid for. We need strict penalties for this type of misleading behavior.
Nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky,....
The dangerous thing here is that this company didn't say - it is bad to intentionally brick the fully functional (non-subscription) product after the warranty expired - they fully maintain their current position. They just shut up critics by sending them a new product (that they will brick soon anyway). After few "responsible" shut downs it will become a norm.
Are you looking forward to your car being bricked because some company just made "the business decision" [sic] that you need to buy another one?
Well, I've got to get back to work. When I stop rowing, the slave ship just goes in circles.
We made the business decision to end the support and services of the Harmony Link when the encryption certificate expires in the spring of 2018
So they want us to think this "Business decision" was basically a cost saving exercise?
Let's think for a moment, what saves a company more money ? Is it A: Renewing an encryption certificate or B: Not renewing it, and then giving away your new product for free to existing customers.
Or is it C: Intentionally brick your 2 year old product in a half-arsed effort to force customers to your new product. Even with a 35% discount they'll still be making a profit on them.
For some reason Logitech thought their customers would roll over and take it, and seem very suprised by the backlash.
Ho hum, another company to add to my shitlist.
"OK, we can't support this thing forever, here's all the source code and protocol manuals so you can set up your own servers to make it do whatever you want"
Read Only Memory. Look it up.
The reason there's so much outrage over a glorified TV remote control system is the principle of the whole thing. It reminds people that no matter how much you spend on an electronic gadget, if it relies on a "cloud based" back-end in some manner, you don't *really* own or control it. You just paid to use the thing for as long as the manufacturer deems it worthy of continuing to allow it to operate for you.
Perhaps the most extreme example of this today is the Tesla Motors electric car? You can spend 6 figures on the performance version of a Model S and yet it's still subject to firmware updates Tesla pushes out to it. Not only can they cap and uncap your driving range at will, but they routinely make use of a feature that locks you out of all remote control to your vehicle (commonly done when a Tesla service place has the car overnight for maintenance). The reasoning is sound enough; they don't want you trying to manipulate things like the power windows or horn or lights while it's being worked on. But it still proves they have the "master switch" to turn your ability on and off to communicate with your vehicle that you paid for.
And here's an example of them turning off the "emergency braking" feature on the Model 3's for owners:
https://jalopnik.com/tesla-tem...
I've been saying for years that companies are being "penny wise, pound foolish" trying so hard to "cloudify" their operations. There are things that lend themselves well to being cloud-hosted, like email. (Whether you run your own mail server or not, you're still pushing and pulling everybody's content over the Internet, through other email servers that you don't control at all. And typically, the amount of time your in house I.T. staff will have to spend to address Exchange server related issues doesn't make good economic sense vs. outsourcing all of those issues up to the chain and paying for the mail hosting.) But typically, you're giving too much control and trusting too much security to 3rd. parties. Where I work, we have a DropBox business subscription. Great product and solves a lot of issues for us, but they just did a price increase that will cost us thousands more per year. It was already a pretty hefty expense that keeps going up as the company adds contractors or freelancers who need to share team folders with our employees. Before long, it'll reach a point where it's financially more sensible to host the content ourselves with a "private cloud". Except now, it's a MASSIVE hassle to retrain everyone on a new product and migrate all the data to a different platform. Could have all been avoided if we just tried to do this ourselves from the start, rather than being tempted by the instant gratification of DropBox.
Pray we don't alter it any further.
Will consumers STILL get a new one?
This 'service slavery' for devices is a business model that needs to die by fire.
I bet your fun at partys.
If there weren't a large pot of gold at the end of this horse shit rainbow!
They are closing down the old system because they discovered a way to profit in a significantly greater fashion.
This is what would motivate a company to commit Hara Kari like this.
I completely agree it was a total dick move by Logitech to brick the devices, and they should have seen the backlash coming a mile away. The problem is that there really aren't any other alternatives to the Harmony unless you're willing to pay a couple hundred dollars more. Universal remotes are a dime a dozen, but none of those remotes allow you to control multiple devices simultaneously like with the Harmony. So, as much as I would love to give someone else my business because Logitech software is a total shitshow, or do it on principle because they're bricking a perfectly functional device for no legitimate reason, there is no one else that offers a comparable product to the Harmony at comparable prices.
Soon to be lots of these things around to be had for little or nothing. Recycle, Reuse, Re-purpose? I don't know much about it so I can't suggest smart ideas; but here goes:
Weather station.
Thermostat w/ remote relay.
WIFI, IR, etc sniffer/bug.
and when your tired of hacking it:
Hockey Puck!
Wish I had one to play with. But with this return I guess they might take them all back? I should read the story.
Well I kind of agree with your point, the thing is unless the device has the ability to store every single device combination/serial/IR codes in existence a
AND knows which inputs you've got them plugged into, it needs a connection to the interwebs.
These companies are assholes.Anything cloud based is a ticking time bomb. WTF would you tolerate a house infrastructure product that only has 2 year lifespan? eg Wemo anything, apple homekit, google home, alexa etc. Garbage. Provide a minimum 10 year guarantee or don't even start your sales pitch.
If you lose internet connection your house dies and goes into a horrible fallback situation. I have a Wemo light for the front door. The silly thing goes into panic mode when it loses internet. Then it broadcasts itself on Wifi. Then it ignores commands from my phone app. I literally got it as an experiment to have a light that turns on after sunset and off at sunrise. All this while I have a working wifi that my phone could use to talk to the wemo link and light. The internet connection is so its "cloud compliant". Epic failure.
Rules of using IoT:
The developers of these products are NOT engineers. They do NOT understand the phrase "graceful failure" or "reliability". These products are NOT tested. They are perpetually BETA. Firmware updates WILL vanish well before the hardware dies. These products are ALWAYS remotely killswitch compliant. They ALWAYS have crappy security.
In short, you are better off building something yourself. Look at Raspberry PI / Arduino. If you can't update the firmware using a reasonable Linux then its "instajunk".
(Yeah I like caps, but unfortunately because you are likely using IoT your gadget to stop me has already been bricked due to business synergy and end of quarter "reasons")
These companies are assholes.Anything cloud based is a ticking time bomb. WTF would you tolerate a house infrastructure product that only has 2 year lifespan? eg Wemo anything, apple homekit, google home, alexa etc. Garbage. Provide a minimum 10 year guarantee or don't even start your sales pitch.
If you lose internet connection your house dies and goes into a horrible fallback situation. I have a Wemo light for the front door. The silly thing goes into panic mode when it loses internet. Then it broadcasts itself on Wifi. Then it ignores commands from my phone app. I literally got it as an experiment to have a light that turns on after sunset and off at sunrise. All this while I have a working wifi that my phone could use to talk to the wemo link and light. The internet connection is so its "cloud compliant". Epic failure.
Rules of using IoT:
The developers of these products are NOT engineers. They do NOT understand or care about the phrase "graceful failure" or "reliability". These products are NOT tested. They are perpetually BETA. Firmware updates WILL vanish well before the hardware dies. These products are ALWAYS remotely killswitch compliant. They ALWAYS have crappy security. 2 years is "lifetime".
In short, you are better off building something yourself. Look at Raspberry PI / Arduino.
(Yeah I like caps, but unfortunately because you are likely using IoT your gadget to stop me has already been bricked due to business synergy and end of quarter "reasons")
Called it.