The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.”
He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.”
“I think otherwise,” the door said. “Look in the purchase contract you signed when you bought this conapt.”
In his desk drawer he found the contract; since signing it he had found it necessary to refer to the document many times. Sure enough; payment to his door for opening and shutting constituted a mandatory fee. Not a tip.
“You discover I’m right,” the door said. It sounded smug.
From the drawer beside the sink Joe Chip got a stainless steel knife; with it he began systematically to unscrew the bolt assembly of his apt’s money-gulping door.
“I’ll sue you,” the door said as the first screw fell out.
Joe Chip said, “I’ve never been sued by a door. But I guess I can live through it.
This made me laugh. Until it didn't. Great satire is biting and just a bit too close to reality.
Not too long ago I wanted to just setup a Bluetooth speaker for my mom. It wasn't possible before I not downloaded the vendor's app, setup WLAN, accepted the data "privacy" rules everything including accounts of services used will be sent to the vendor) and then setup the connections to every device in the app (not sure about the last step).
Nothing about any of this was described on the packaging or explained up front by the shop.
Yeah, that's not the use case for Sonos. It's not a Bluetooth speaker. They are designed to have a dozen of them and you can combine into different zones and have different music playing in different zones. It's supposed to be complicated, it's a far more advanced system than just a Bluetooth speaker.
You wanted a spoon and bought a steamshovel. There's nothing wrong with the steamshovel, you just bought the wrong thing.
Victim blaming? Who is a victim? You? Because you expect the world to spoon-feed you everything you need to know? Return the fuckin thing and get something else. Maybe you could write the better business bureau a letter about how your speaker isn't perfect for you.
FYI there's this package called Snapcast which will do something very similar to Sonos. Runs great on a pi. I love the idea of Sonos but after the stunts they pulled sunsetting their expensive hardware plus the data collection, I will never purchase.
This way, you own the hardware, freely pick your own DAC of any calibur, repairability is great, and you can hook it up to any audio source you want. No data collection.
I know how you feel, but I don't see how Sonos in particular is to blame. This kind of bullshit has become so widespread you could already call it an "industry best practice".
Sonos is also not really a bluetooth speaker. If you want that, you should spend much less on a UE Boom.
Sonos has also starting putting Bluetooth LE into all their new hardware, so that they don't have to do a Wifi scan to find new devices. WiFi scan requires location permission on mobile (because you can ID your location if you know the BSSID of nearby APs), and it was confusing. If should be better soonish.
I bought a set of Sonos speakers for Christmas one year. They went back on Boxing Day because they were completely useless as they'd only play music via some bizarre app that couldn't read the formats and you couldn't just use Bluetooth so you're SOL if the place you get your media from hasn't "partnered" with Sonos.
There's no reason one speaker can't act as a standard Bluetooth audio sink and then convert that to its proprietary wireless protocol & distribute it to the rest of the speakers.
Yeah there is, there's a framework built behind it. That would require building a completely different system for something it isn't really designed to do. I think a large portion of their customers probably prefer that isn't a feature as it's frequently used in business and they want to specifically control speakers to serve different audio and don't want people tampering with it.
There are far cheaper Bluetooth speakers with better audio quality. When you buy Sonos stuff, the whole idea is having multiple/many of them. That's the entire point of the product.
It’s a shame you picked Sonos as your example because they’re one of the few use cases where such a setup procedure has some justification.
They also have a really top quality product that’s sadly now under attack from jealous larger companies who are trying to erode their market share / FMA by limiting compatibility and features (see, for example, the degradation of Sonos app on iOS over last few OS releases)
Well. I bought the comparable Bose speaker. It can be used as dumb but-speaker as well as integrated into a system (if I remember correctly - not a feature my mom was looking for).
Easy setup. Great sound. Just works and I could walk her through setup from 600km distance.
This is why I run away from any "smart home" stuff. "Smart" light switch? No thanks, I'll walk up to the wall and flip a switch. Works every time, no apps, no login, no updates.
I thought electrical receptacles with built-in USB charging slots were a bad idea, and with stuff now moving to USB-C I'm afraid I was right.
I really don't want the wiring in my house going obsolete after a few years.
I don't like home automation either, but it's not really rewiring to swap a faceplate. Just annoying and a little wasteful of what is probably still a functional device. My single one it kitchen isn't obsolete yet: it's kind of outclassed by more recent fast-chargers for some phones, but all chargers I have that have a removable cable are still USB-A at the power socket end.
This reminded me of the HP instant ink [1] printer I once-upon-a-time bought. They would entice you with a 'free ink' service, where they sent you some ink on a regular basis. But woe betide you try to supplement the free ink with some shop-bought ink, as the printer monitors how much you use and will automatically order the amount consumed from HP. There's no point buying any cheaper third party ink - you'll always pay for the equivalent HP ink as well.
1. The Zune is a better deal unless you live for 200 years or plan to bequeath the music files to your descendants.
2. Apple Music is now a subscription service.
3. Steve Jobs knew everyone circa 2000 had a stash of unlicensed MP3 files that they paid $0 for but needed a handy way to play on the go.
Nonetheless I agree with you - not because subscriptions are necessarily a bad value in terms of money (though they often are) but because managing dozens of subscriptions takes time and attention that I'd rather not spend, and the feeling that money is continuously draining out of my wallet just to keep some lousy app working is unpleasant.
Apple Music was always a subscription service, that’s what Apple Music launched as. The iTunes Store is still around and works the same as always, and the app still lets you rip CDs and sync those. Apple Music hasn’t replaced anything.
Moreover, the iPod was a very popular device from 2001 for a decade or more. I think you’re overestimating how much of people’s music collections came from Napster rather than CDs and the iTunes Store.
Yes, that is indeed correct – and the "now" is technically correct as well, if perhaps redundant (and you can probably understand what I was getting at.) But let me elaborate a bit, since I think you will appreciate it:
Apple's Music app on iOS is currently tightly integrated with the Apple Music service, and Apple enthusiastically advertises the service in OS (much to my dismay since I think ads do not belong in OS onboarding, notifications, or preferences.)
Apple actually got rid of iTunes on macOS and replaced it with the (rather awful, imho) macOS incarnation of the Music app from iOS.
As I understand it, the iTunes Store didn't arrive until 2003, although iTunes could rip CDs beforehand and the Rip/Mix/Burn ad campaign was from 2001.
