A class action lawsuit argues that marketing materials promise reliable performance and ongoing improvements through updates that actually ruined consumers' TVs.
  • BucketBong@p.hobo.socialEnglish
    7 hours

    It’s fine when they brick our property, but its a crime when we brick their property.

    • nyan@lemmy.cafeEnglish
      40 minutes

      That becomes a problem when we’re talking about the 1% of updates that are sent to prevent your smart TV from becoming part of a distributed botnet, though. Some people might even complain about the 9% of updates intended to keep up with churn in the APIs of 3rd-party services that are part of the functionality the device was purchased for.

      What we need is something that restricts forced updates to those categories. That requires regulation, which likely means starting in the EU, since that’s the only major jurisdiction that’s (sometimes) pro-consumer. We also need regulations on labeling that force the manufacturer to indicate on the outside of the packaging in big letters exactly what advertised functionality of a device will break if it’s kept off the internet.