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One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and funct

One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and functional. Security updates are essential. Not only is a device full of unpatched vulnerabilities dangerous to use, but as we saw with the recent Western Digital scandal, is a serious risk to the continued functionality of the device. Because the Shield is a streaming device, interoperability with streaming services is required for continued functionality. The set of useful streaming services changes over time and existing streaming services change their APIs. Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Is funding continued updates with ads such a bad thing?

gmfawcett 5y ago
> Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Personally, I'd rather that consumers didn't buy into false dichotomies such as this one. You should expect more from your vendors.
pdimitar 5y ago
Yes, it is a bad thing. I paid fair and square for the device. I expect the vendor to have factored in all costs beforehand for the expected lifetime of the device. If it physically lasts 10 years then bill me all your expenses for those 10 years. Don't bill me for 3-4 years and then go "Oops, you still have that device, huh? Take those ads because we can't finance support for 6-7 more years out of all our billions. No really, we promise that we can't". Additionally, I expect a corporation like NVIDIA or Google to have amortized the costs of supporting several ecosystems by the mere virtue of having engineers on them on a constant payroll -- those costs are not increasing, they remain the same for long periods of time -- plus to finance the support by other venues if need be. Brand loyalty and stuff? This penny pinching by billionaire conglomerates leaves a sour taste in my mouth and it makes it all the more likely for me to invest in several specialized PCs, a home video / streaming player included. They'll never stop being shady, it seems, so we have to take things in our own hands, apparently.
- 8note 5y ago
  You own the device, sure, but you don't own the content that's playing on it, nor the servers delivering it. These are profit oriented institutions. Once they've saturated the market, their only way to increase profits is to increase their per user profits. The economy is designed to have your TV start showing ads.
  - pdimitar 5y ago
    Well, I wish them luck. Practically every family knows one "IT person" and when we all collectively get fed up, come and watch how quickly do we drain the second-hand market of $200 laptops that we will repurpose as complete private home content consumption solutions. I get how the business model of those services works btw -- but it's flawed from the beginning because it relies on keeping the users hostage. The corps really underestimate the passive resistance they will meet. They think people will go to court and challenge their unbeatable lawyers there. No, nobody is going to do that. People will just work around those corporations (neighborhood private networks with NAS-es, old-school sharing of movies on DVDs or USB drives etc.; there are many ways).
TeMPOraL 5y ago
> One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and functional. No, they don't need it. They get them, because they can. This allows the vendors to: - Sell buggy, half-baked alpha versions to customers as finished products; - Turn a product into a service, to seek subscription rent from users, under the guise of "security"; - Justify the need for persistent Internet access, providing plausible deniability for data collection (if anyone asks, it's to support "security" and "improving the product"). Don't fall for this. The hardware and software we buy doesn't need to be like this. The vendors push it, because it's locally optimal for them, and it's self-supporting through competitive pressure ("because my competitors do it, I have to do it too").

gmfawcett 5y ago

> Most hardware devices these days get a fairly short software update window and then the device is useless. Would you rather Nvidia/Google abandoned your device? Personally, I'd rather that consumers didn't buy into false dichotomies such as this one. You should expect more from your vendors.

pdimitar 5y ago

Yes, it is a bad thing. I paid fair and square for the device. I expect the vendor to have factored in all costs beforehand for the expected lifetime of the device. If it physically lasts 10 years then bill me all your expenses for those 10 years. Don't bill me for 3-4 years and then go "Oops, you still have that device, huh? Take those ads because we can't finance support for 6-7 more years out of all our billions. No really, we promise that we can't". Additionally, I expect a corporation like NVIDIA or Google to have amortized the costs of supporting several ecosystems by the mere virtue of having engineers on them on a constant payroll -- those costs are not increasing, they remain the same for long periods of time -- plus to finance the support by other venues if need be. Brand loyalty and stuff? This penny pinching by billionaire conglomerates leaves a sour taste in my mouth and it makes it all the more likely for me to invest in several specialized PCs, a home video / streaming player included. They'll never stop being shady, it seems, so we have to take things in our own hands, apparently.

8note 5y ago
You own the device, sure, but you don't own the content that's playing on it, nor the servers delivering it. These are profit oriented institutions. Once they've saturated the market, their only way to increase profits is to increase their per user profits. The economy is designed to have your TV start showing ads.
- pdimitar 5y ago
  Well, I wish them luck. Practically every family knows one "IT person" and when we all collectively get fed up, come and watch how quickly do we drain the second-hand market of $200 laptops that we will repurpose as complete private home content consumption solutions. I get how the business model of those services works btw -- but it's flawed from the beginning because it relies on keeping the users hostage. The corps really underestimate the passive resistance they will meet. They think people will go to court and challenge their unbeatable lawyers there. No, nobody is going to do that. People will just work around those corporations (neighborhood private networks with NAS-es, old-school sharing of movies on DVDs or USB drives etc.; there are many ways).

TeMPOraL 5y ago

> One aspect of modern hardware products which contain a lot of software is that they need a steady stream of software updates in order to remain useful and functional. No, they don't need it. They get them, because they can. This allows the vendors to: - Sell buggy, half-baked alpha versions to customers as finished products; - Turn a product into a service, to seek subscription rent from users, under the guise of "security"; - Justify the need for persistent Internet access, providing plausible deniability for data collection (if anyone asks, it's to support "security" and "improving the product"). Don't fall for this. The hardware and software we buy doesn't need to be like this. The vendors push it, because it's locally optimal for them, and it's self-supporting through competitive pressure ("because my competitors do it, I have to do it too").