That the hardware was rented makes the practice feel less egregious to me. You are after all essentially paying for a service when renting. But paying someone

That the hardware was rented makes the practice feel less egregious to me. You are after all essentially paying for a service when renting. But paying someone to unlock physical functionality of a device which you own… that feels like crossing the line toed by IBM's practice (and that of others mentioned in comments such as Intel).