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| ▲ | Hendrikto an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | Vendors do not have to support their product indefinitely. They have to design their products in a way that they do not become useless after support ends. E.g. by opening up the bootloader and letting users install custom software. | |
| ▲ | NL807 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | >I don’t see how they can realistically keep older devices supported indefinitely. They don't have to. Open up the platform for linux and custom OS. | |
| ▲ | seemaze an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | unlock old hardware and let the community support | | |
| ▲ | 6510 an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | Government could hold the keys. Sufficient weird behavior should also trigger release. | |
| ▲ | vv_ an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | It is not always possible to provide the required support. First, it is expensive, as someone needs to prepare all the materials and resources the community would need to continue supporting the product after official support ends. Second, there are legal restrictions, for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware. Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual property publicly available. You could make the argument that manufacturers only need to provide the means for the community to support the device, rather than extensive documentation. However, these communities are often so small that this would never be a priority for most companies. Combined with the IP-related issues, I don't think this is really feasible. | | |
| ▲ | xxs a minute ago | parent | next [-] | | The intellectual property is not some god given right unlike air and water. There is little need not to support a decade old hardware and effectively turning the said hardware to a door stop, or a landfill. Btw, it's difficult to believe the post is a good faith argument. | |
| ▲ | realusername an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > Finally, most companies simply do not want to make their intellectual property publicly available. You can just stop to the last reason, they don't want to give up ownership back to you. They would prefer you to throw the device in the bin and buy a new one, preferably from them again. | | |
| ▲ | vv_ an hour ago | parent [-] | | > they don't want to give up ownership back to you No, it's simply that your demand is completely unreasonable. You are essentially asking them to adopt an open-source model. That can mean giving up control over its intellectual property and potentially exposing proprietary technology to competitors, especially when some products are valuable precisely because of the software that runs on them. Edit: I don't know why it is not allowing me to reply to you. > No, I'm asking these devices to work like normal computers What exactly is a "normal computer," and what specific behavior are you expecting? Can you freely tinker with your motherboard's firmware? Can you modify the Bluetooth or Wi-Fi firmware on your motherboard? Can you modify and independently update the internals of Windows itself? These are all examples of components that are proprietary and subject to limitations, even on what we would consider a "normal computer." There may be some exceptions to the above, but the same generally applies to mass-produced, commercially distributed devices. They are often locked down for technical, legal, and security reasons, and "unlocking" them is simply not a reasonable expectation in many cases. | | |
| ▲ | realusername 43 minutes ago | parent [-] | | No, I'm asking these devices to work like normal computers, because that's what they are. Also I doubt that there's anything left on 2015 era hardware that will grant you an edge on current age competitors To give a reply: > Can you freely tinker with your motherboard's firmware? Can you modify the Bluetooth or Wi-Fi firmware on your motherboard? Can you modify and independently update the internals of Windows itself? These are all examples of components that are proprietary and subject to limitations, even on what we would consider a "normal computer." Yes I expect do be able to do all of those things if I want to, it's my computer and I should be free to do whatever I want on it. Including modifying firmware, modifying the OS and modifying anything else you can think of. Do I want to do all of these? Probably not but the freedom for me to do it should be there if I change my mind. And no, it's a reasonable expectation. |
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| ▲ | thefz 38 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > It is not always possible to provide the required support. First, it is expensive By not doing it you are basically outsourcing this cost to the environment. | |
| ▲ | troupo an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | You've just made an argument for a bunch of regulation to force opening up and removing obstacles. E.g.: "for example, you may not be allowed to provide access to the radio firmware." Given that everything has a radio these days (everything is wifi- and/or bluetooth- enabled), this is just stupid. Why is firmware for basically essential infra not legally available? Same goes for many, many, many other things. | | |
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| ▲ | fhackenberger an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Well I'm quite sure the advances in LLMs abilities are going to be quite a nice change in this regard. If vendors would be required to release all firmware source code or at least full specs after devices drop out of support, it would be fairly simple and cheap now to port drivers to new kernel release or different OSs. | |
| ▲ | troupo an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | They don't have to support it indefinitely. Allowing users install what they want on it would be the best case scenario. Instead we have bullshit like "your TV is three years old? No updates for you": https://developer.samsung.com/smarttv/develop/specifications... | | |
| ▲ | vv_ an hour ago | parent [-] | | Your link doesn't say that the device isn't getting any updates. It only says that, if I understood it correctly, pre-2023 devices don't receive OS updates. They still get guaranteed security updates for five years. > They don't have to support it indefinitely. How long should support for devices last in that case? And what should be supported? | | |
| ▲ | troupo 41 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > if I understood it correctly, pre-2023 devices don't receive OS updates. Indeed. An ancient 3-year-old device isn't receiving any OS updates. Which means it doesn't get features, its core software isn't updated inculding such minor things as the browser (most apps on TVs are browser apps), store etc. Eventually its certificates will expire and it won't be able to connect to most things > How long should support for devices last in that case? And what should be supported? Depends on device. People don't buy TVs every year. So a 10-year support isn't out of the question. That said, 10 years should probably be minimum for almost all hardware. E.g. Microsoft supports Windows for ~10 years, and for a much wider array of hardware. After that: open up, and let people do whatever they want with it. |
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