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Whenever I read articles like this I wonder about the economics of behavior like this. Are the profits gained by these kinds if behaviors enough to offset the l

Whenever I read articles like this I wonder about the economics of behavior like this. Are the profits gained by these kinds if behaviors enough to offset the loss of customers, either directly by people swearing to never buy HP products again, or indirectly by bad word of mouth or by articles like this warning potential customers of HP's bad behavior. Hewlett-Packard used to be a trusted brand. The HP brand seems to be losing more trust with every action like this that they take.

brlewis 6y ago
Hypothesis: The average printer buyer is not reading eff.org or having conversations with friends about friends' printer experiences. They go to a store and buy what the salesperson recommends. After purchase, they think of the restrictions as an annoyance, not a freedom issue to talk with their friends about.
- TheRealDunkirk 6y ago
  As someone who just had his 4th, fancy HP inkjet printer kick the bucket, vowed to never spend another dime with HP, and brought a Brother laser jet, I think at least part of the problem is: what's the alternative? Kodak promised a printer that was going to solve the ink price problem, but that never materialized. One would think there was a golden opportunity to disrupt this ridiculous market, but color ink is apparently the most expensive resource on planet earth. It hardly matters which piece of crap printer I buy. It's going to cost $100 to refill, and it will break in less than 2 years. I mean, next, someone's going to tell me there's been collusion in this market for 30 years, and I'd be all like, pfft, come on. Really?
- secabeen 6y ago
  Also, from HPs perspective, people buy a printer, use it, but then they use up the initial ink, and buy cheap knock-off ink. It's not as good, it gets clogged in the heads, or people don't want to waste ink running the cleaning, etc, so then people hate on the printer and HP. Instant ink charges you by page, so you can run cleaning cycles as much as you want, do everything you need to do that maintains a good experience, and people just pay for what they actually use in output. I see the appeal.
snvzz 6y ago
>Whenever I read articles like this I wonder about the economics of behavior like this. These practices are unfortunately widespread among printer makers. They can get away with it because and only because there's a huge void in the field of OSHW printers. I imagine a decent effort to make an OSHW laser printer would gather a lot of interest. Even if the first printer were to be slow, expensive and had poor resolution. I'd easily recommend such a printer to everybody. It'd be a really easy sell. Everybody hates dealing with printers. If you need a printer now, by all means, avoid the bad brands, and go for a laser, preferably monochrome, with an ethernet port, postscript support and IPP support.

brlewis 6y ago

Hypothesis: The average printer buyer is not reading eff.org or having conversations with friends about friends' printer experiences. They go to a store and buy what the salesperson recommends. After purchase, they think of the restrictions as an annoyance, not a freedom issue to talk with their friends about.

TheRealDunkirk 6y ago
As someone who just had his 4th, fancy HP inkjet printer kick the bucket, vowed to never spend another dime with HP, and brought a Brother laser jet, I think at least part of the problem is: what's the alternative? Kodak promised a printer that was going to solve the ink price problem, but that never materialized. One would think there was a golden opportunity to disrupt this ridiculous market, but color ink is apparently the most expensive resource on planet earth. It hardly matters which piece of crap printer I buy. It's going to cost $100 to refill, and it will break in less than 2 years. I mean, next, someone's going to tell me there's been collusion in this market for 30 years, and I'd be all like, pfft, come on. Really?
secabeen 6y ago
Also, from HPs perspective, people buy a printer, use it, but then they use up the initial ink, and buy cheap knock-off ink. It's not as good, it gets clogged in the heads, or people don't want to waste ink running the cleaning, etc, so then people hate on the printer and HP. Instant ink charges you by page, so you can run cleaning cycles as much as you want, do everything you need to do that maintains a good experience, and people just pay for what they actually use in output. I see the appeal.

snvzz 6y ago

>Whenever I read articles like this I wonder about the economics of behavior like this. These practices are unfortunately widespread among printer makers. They can get away with it because and only because there's a huge void in the field of OSHW printers. I imagine a decent effort to make an OSHW laser printer would gather a lot of interest. Even if the first printer were to be slow, expensive and had poor resolution. I'd easily recommend such a printer to everybody. It'd be a really easy sell. Everybody hates dealing with printers. If you need a printer now, by all means, avoid the bad brands, and go for a laser, preferably monochrome, with an ethernet port, postscript support and IPP support.