
IoT garage door opener maker disables customer’s service after bad review - dmitrygr
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/04/iot-garage-door-opener-maker-bricks-customers-product-after-bad-review
======
dawnerd
Previously:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14029572](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14029572)

------
protomyth
Grisak'a response in the article is fairly arrogant particularly with the Musk
tweet thrown in. If you sell B2B then, by all means, fire customers, but if
you sell on Amazon to consumers then you need to deal with them civilly
regardless if you feel insulted.

I get the feeling a lawyer told him to explicitly state it wasn't about the
review because there is a new federal law that protects reviewers. That
statement doesn't jive with his previous posts.

~~~
tyingq
I think it's okay to fire B2C customers, but refund them before you fire them.
Even if you suspect they won't return the physical part of the product.

And do it with less snark. Just state it seems clear you won't ever see eye to
eye, and give the money back.

~~~
s_kilk
> I think it's okay to fire B2C customers

This "firing customers" terminology shows how deep in the Late Capitalism
nightmare we really are.

~~~
ams6110
Some customers are a net negative, or even deliberately abusive. "Firing
customers" simply means chosing to not do business with them any more. It
doesn't imply that the customer didn't get what they paid for.

That said, there seems to be this attitude among some tech companies that they
can do whatever they want, and treat customers/users like crap, regardless of
regulations, or just what is usual and customary. I think it's a side-effect
of people who have no prior business background getting a ton of investor
money (i.e. not earning it from business with customers).

~~~
s_kilk
> It doesn't imply that the customer didn't get what they paid for.

But in this case we are talking about bricking hardware remotely in
retribution for a negative review. And we have people using the "Firing
customers" rhetoric to insinuate that the needs of the corporation are more
important than the needs of the human.

[I think we're basically in agreement, just expanding on my point]

~~~
TeMPOraL
In this particular case I'd say the company behaved very badly. But in
general, about "firing customers" in B2C - when you work for customer service
for anything mass-market-facing, you quickly learn that among all your
customers, there are some that are just utter idiots, there are some who are
entitled assholes, and then there are those who want to defraud you. This is a
fact of life. Such "problem people" are a big drain on both the company and
(implicitly) on the regular customers. Cutting business off with those people
is a win for company _and_ customers alike.

------
bhhaskin
That's a real the danger of IoT devices. What happens​ if the company goes out
of business, Or the company decides to terminate support? Cloud services
should be additives not necessities.

~~~
Cerium
What happens when your nuclear reactor supplier goes out of business? What
happens to your handle when your razor blade supplier goes out of business?

~~~
mikeash
The former likely involves long-term support contracts, and the latter is
often solved with third parties manufacturing replaceable items.

~~~
hkmurakami
Sometimes you also buy large stakes in critical suppliers.

------
walrus01
It's almost as if people are intentionally expending additional effort to
prove that
[https://twitter.com/internetofshit](https://twitter.com/internetofshit) is
correct.

~~~
terminado
It's the right idea to consider the concept of IoT as an Internet of Shit
because, even if the devices function flawlessly, device functionality is not
always crafted in the best interests of the end-user.

Even if the device is well-designed and doesn't malfunction, a device might
function all-too-well, and act against the consumer who owns the object.

When you have a smart device that's smart enough to be too smart to let you
freely benefit from it, everything becomes a rental at best.

If we let this happen, it could very well be a step backward from the status
quo of planned obsolescence. (planned obsolescence is also a bad thing, just
in case anyone needs that spelled out)

~~~
donkeyd
> When you have a smart device that's smart enough to be too smart to let you
> freely benefit from it

What does this mean?

~~~
Houshalter
An internet connected device can spy on you and sell your data. It can show
you ads. It can have much more sophisticated DRM. It can stop functioning at a
random time while it goes through an unnecessary update. It can be bricked
remotely if you try to hack it.

Consider game consoles. The original xbox would just boot up the game that was
in the drive and that was it. The newer ones will go to a home screen full of
ads. You have to create a microsoft account to start playing. The game will
take several hours to update before you can start (and because of this games
are now released in an unfinished state because they count on customers
updating.) And it was going to be so that you have to have the internet on all
the time so it can check if your game is used or not (fortunately they
disabled that after overwhelming protest.)

------
justin66
The interesting thing to me is that the level of anger involved in the
customer interaction here barely even moved the meter and the support person -
who is apparently also the owner and developer - went nuclear. Support
professionals are used to dealing with people who are angry at _them
personally_ and in this case, the guy was only expressing anger at the
product. This should have been a low-stress response addressing the problem
itself.

This story brought back memories. I supported software shortly after
graduation and the lead developer once joked with me about how we ought to
just give people their money back if they couldn't make it work after a
certain period of time. Nobody ever let him near customers without
supervision. But even he, when confronted with customers disparaging his work,
could cope by hand-holding the customer or asking them how they thought the
program ought to work instead.

Garadget will fail.

------
bigbugbag
So how did the developer knew it was a toxic individual ? his account has
exactly 1 post on the forum which is the one that got him banned.

~~~
kikimaru
"Toxic" is the new safe-word for millenials. Don't like a person? Must be
"toxic"! Best keep away.

~~~
slfnflctd
I've heard the term used at least as far back as the 90s. The phrase "cut the
toxic people out of your life" comes up a lot. I suspect it originated with
either 12-step programs or psychologists.

Seems like good advice, except for the part where it's basically running from
interpersonal conflict instead of dealing with it. In some situations with
really unbalanced people it's the best option, though.

~~~
wccrawford
He's not saying it's a new term. He's saying that it's being applied when it
doesn't really apply in order to just brush people under the rug.

------
lazaroclapp
I guess it is a good thing this is not a 'smart pacemaker' manufacturer or
similar...

But in all seriousness, I wonder at which point the decision to rescind an IoT
'service' becomes unacceptable. Obviously doing so with a medical device or a
moving vehicle during operation would be criminal. But how about a smart home
lock? A security camera / alarm system?

~~~
bigbugbag
There's a few million cars around with remote kill switch technology on board.

    
    
      "We can disable the ignition but not while you're 
      driving," Melanie Boudreau, a spokesperson at IMETRIK, a 
      Canadian maker of starter interrupt devices that run 
      around $100 each, told Fortune. "We don't want to kill 
      you."
    

Maybe in a not so distant future or political regime, this stance on not
killing people may change. Remote kill switch are not limited to ignition,
there's a moving vehicle version intended for police use to stop a car
chase[1] so there's that, we can expect this[2] to be done on moving vehicle
in the wild at some point[3].

[1]:
[http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Autos/story?id=3706113&page=1](http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Autos/story?id=3706113&page=1)
[2]:
[https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/03/disabling_car...](https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2010/03/disabling_cars.html)
[3]: [https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-
hig...](https://www.wired.com/2015/07/hackers-remotely-kill-jeep-highway/)

~~~
jessaustin
With "self-driving" cars, the next logical customer termination technique will
be speeding up to 100mph and then steering into a bridge abutment. I think
I'll keep my bicycle.

~~~
adrianN
Nearby auto-cars will start chasing you.

~~~
ddalex
Welcome to real life: [https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/putin-
driver...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/putin-driver-
chauffeur-moscow-car-crash-killed-kremlin-bmw-mercedes-a7230211.html)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmJPncqoPvE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmJPncqoPvE)

------
linsomniac
A lot of responses seem to be along the lines of: When doing support you need
to put up with being abused.

Seriously?

I think the support guy/founder should have taken the high road, for reasons
that are all too obvious based on the number of HN stories I've seen about
this.

But, if my kids ever spoke to a stranger like this, I'd make them go clean up
dog poop in this person's yard and apologize. "C'mon, we're getting on a
plane!"

And further, if your opinion of a product is that it is a "piece of shit", why
would you get mad when the product is disabled and you are offered a refund?
Are you expecting them to turn a piece of shit into a unicorn? If it's a piece
of shit, a refund is exactly what you wan't, isn't it?

------
anjc
When people with no social skills run companies.

------
voycey
He could at least have gone for the "It was for security purposes to ensure
that no-one could intercept your return and get into your garage"

Amateur

------
WalterBright
I can't imagine why I'd want to connect my garage door opener up to the
hackers on the internet.

------
miloshadzic
If only someone warned us about shit like this... Some guy was jabbering about
it all the time but I don't remember his name. I think he wrote a text editor
or something...

------
basicplus2
The rule of thumb that I have found.. you spend 90% of your time on less than
10% of your clients... so just price yourself out of their market.

~~~
GavinMcG
Why would you think the 10% that's a pain to deal with is the 10% at the
bottom economically?

~~~
basicplus2
I don't think they are at the bottom economically, I am saying I will charge a
rediculously large fee.

------
mnglkhn2
The customer gets to get a refund for the product. This way it is not bricking
per-se but refusal of service. My understanding of bricking is that you have a
dead device and no recourse in getting a replacement or a refund.

The interesting question to me is what exactly you buy for $99: just the
device ? Is the cloud-based service included in the price also? Especially
since the developer can only make an assumption as to how long (in years) a
customer will be using the service.

~~~
ouid
Surely whether a customer has a right to review a product and some recourse in
the event of retaliation qualifies as an interesting question, as well though,
right?

~~~
protomyth
as pointed out on Amazon this might run afoul of
[https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/hr5111](https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/hr5111)
H.R. 5111 (114th): Consumer Review Fairness Act of 2016

