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Remarkable starts implementing subscription plans for its cloud features

schaefer 5y ago
I have a remarkable (1) tablet. It sits on my shelf, Haven’t even charged it in over a year. On the other hand, my iPad and Apple Pencil get used constantly. I run “write” by stylus labs. That combo of hardware and software provides the workflow I hoped the remarkable would (but didn’t). — True the remarkable is “more open” than the iPad… but not open enough to let me install software that matters to me. So it’s just more ewaste.
- cooperadymas 5y ago
  Not to be blithe, but this sounds like a you problem. Plenty of people have and use a Remarkable. You prefer something else? Fine. It doesn't have to sit on your shelf until you get around to throwing it away. Resell it. Give it to a friend. Donate it. You have many options besides your shelf.
lilboiluvr69 5y ago
If you are as upset as I am, I recommend you hit 'contact us' and voice your opinion. Let the company know they are making a mistake: https://support.remarkable.com/hc/en-us?return_to=%2Fhc%2Frequests https://support.remarkable.com/hc/en-us?return_to=%2Fhc%2Fre...
atc 5y ago
I will no longer recommend this device after this move
Aeolun 5y ago
I am not happy with this move. Before this step the Remarkable was an easy recommendation, but syncing a few gigabytes of files for every customer that paid you $600 dollars without an extra subscription seems reasonable. Hell, have me pay for the S3 storage I’m using, anything. But to start paying $8 per month just to access basic functionality feels silly to me. I love the device, but recommending it without the grandfathered benefits feels like a ripoff to me (even if I never use them).
8note 5y ago
Screen share requires you to share everything you write with Remarkable? I'd expect to be able to do that over USB, and all the data stays local
- kadoban 5y ago
  Thankfully since the device is hackable you can do that easily with third-party tools. But yeah it's lame that that's tied to the cloud account for the official stuff.
  - szszrk 5y ago
    Easily is an overstatement, given number of changes they did recently. I'm trying for over a year to find stable replacement for remarkable desktop app (which syncs all my data without my control) on a company computer for screen sharing. And have only just now found a way to do that in a stable way with the new "share" from RM and rmview 3 opensource app. Before that more things didn't work then did (various issues, crashes, incorrect screen sizes, all soft of things). But I'm certain this idiotic step by remarkable will push more and more devs and hackers to polish their tools create more and more full/complex environment without their cloud.
_rend 5y ago
Not sure how to feel about this. I will say that at least, as someone who already owns a reMarkable 2 who had access to these features already, I'll still have access to them: > If you bought your reMarkable before 12.10.21, we want to give you full access to Connect. If you have a reMarkable account, go to my.reMarkable.com and approve our new terms and conditions to get Connect. On the "Connect" section of my account: > As one of our valued early customers, you have full free access to Connect. This is our way to thank you for believing in us from the start. Your free plan includes all launch features, such as Google Drive and Dropbox integration and Screen Share. I don't use these features right now, but it'll be interesting to see how the plans expand in the future. As a recent-ish owner of the device, the update cadence has felt pretty good and the new features have been relatively impressive, but I hope we don't see more features eventually get locked behind monthly plans.
SommaRaikkonen 5y ago
Here's a video that brings more perspective from My Deep Guide who reviews quite a whole lot of e-ink devices (timestamped for relevant part): https://youtu.be/K79MPnPq4_M?t=508 https://youtu.be/K79MPnPq4_M?t=508 The thing that stood out for me is the way they push for a subscription as you purchase your device. The Marker Plus used to be $99, but they inflated the price to be $129 so that if you choose the Connect plan, it "slashes" the price back to $99 - how it originally cost before, according to the video.
- sundvor 5y ago
  IANAL but have been through the material in compliance training: I'm reasonably sure that this would be illegal according to Australian consumer laws. You can't advertise a price as having a discount if it was never sold at the higher price. Since you can technically buy it at the higher price now without the sub, perhaps they could argue that they increased the price of the pen, and introduced the discount in the same stroke, and maybe ACCC would let it slide - but they certainly wouldn't be amused. The pen pricing is even better in AUD, btw.. and that's WITH the "discounts". AUD170 for the eraser one.
  - chrismorgan 5y ago
    For reference: https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/displaying-prices#two-price-comparison-advertising https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/display... Mind you, those rules don’t stop such things from happening, even from purely Australian companies. I’ve tracked a Clevo-ODM laptop seller for years that’s perpetually at 25–40% discounts across all of their products (though they cycle through some of the specific components that are discounted), and I’ve been tracking one manufacturer’s only-sold-by-them 12V/100Ah LiFePO₄ battery for 15 months when they’ve had a $1,299 RRP marked down to $489–$469, with the alleged RRP recently reduced to $899. I’ve never complained to these companies or to the ACCC, but from other vaguely similar things that I have reported a couple of times I don’t expect much to happen.
davisr 5y ago
It's a great time to get off their cloud using libre third-party tools. https://github.com/rehackable/awesome-remarkable#gui-clients https://github.com/rehackable/awesome-remarkable#gui-clients
- infogulch 5y ago
  These are great, thanks for sharing! I don't see an integration into excalidraw yet, maybe that's my next project...
ocdtrekkie 5y ago
This is disappointing. My wife has one and loves it, and I was about to buy one my own. Now I don't know if I want to, knowing I'll get one intentionally crippled in comparison. The price hike on the Marker Plus to incentivize the subscription is a nasty choice too.
- kadoban 5y ago
  It's a great device (for certain use-cases). My advice would be to just avoid the cloud features anyway if you can. If some of them are important to you, and can't be replaced by third-party tools (many can), yeah maybe a different device is better for you. I never even created a cloud account, partly for privacy, partly to avoid crap like this.
  - ocdtrekkie 5y ago
    It's the double hit though... they're also jacking the Marker Plus price to try to force a subscription.
    - kadoban 5y ago
      Yeah that's a kick in the pants. Maybe just buy second-hand? Not sure.
- turtlebits 5y ago
  The cloud features were never promised, your wife is getting an early adopter bonus. It also doesn't preclude devs from developing 3rd party sync solutions.
Jedd 5y ago
I've been entertaining either a Remarkable2 or a Boox Note Air, but with remote-work over the last year it's been much less compelling. Plus here in Australia we pay a significant premium for these types of devices - f.e. they're advertising the remarkable2 with Connect for USD$299 - but for Australians it's AU$499 (~ US$366). On top of the death by a thousand cuts that is yet another subscription service, the AU version of that page indicates a subscription price of AUD$12.99 / month - compared to the USD$7.99 / month. USD$7.99 is around AUD$10.89. The AU page's FAQ retains the ".. bought your reMarkable before 12.10.21 .." qualifier, and I think that translates to 2021-12-10, which sounds like an encouragement to buy before December to get this offer grandfathered in, but 12.10.21 (if assuming dd.mm.yy) would make more sense given today is 2021-10-13. (This is why we have unambiguous, international standards.)
- dannyw 5y ago
  australia has 10% GST included in the price
  - sundvor 5y ago
    $776x1.1 (for my build, see sibling comment) is $853 - well short of the $956 charged.
- sundvor 5y ago
  $500... that was still of interest. Until I saw that the pen is not included in the price. And then the price of the pens -$170 for the version with an eraser (how could you use it without!?). I'm always adding a leather case to my devices too, and this didn't disappoint either - I'll never think my Kindle leather cases as expensive again. If ordered, a cool $956 delivered. So this isn't happening, what a rip off those extras etc are for us down under. (Switching to US Store: USD $570 = AUD $776, maybe add 4-5% sales tax?). PS agree completely about the date confusion. They should simply use 12-Oct-2021 or Oct-12-2021 to make it truly readable by as many as possible, as much as I like YYYYMMDD. Edit: An Intuos Pro pen is $100 AUD, by comparison. This has tilt and pressure, with eraser and extra buttons, and comes with a number of nibs - https://www.kayellaustralia.com.au/product/2681-wacom-intuos-4-5-pro-cintiq-gen-2-grip-pen?categoryId=978 https://www.kayellaustralia.com.au/product/2681-wacom-intuos...
minimalist 5y ago
A lot of comments talk aboue being disappointed and all, but id rather pay for cloud services than have my data sold to merchants and marketeers. Meanwhile, I have syncthing and gocryptfs installed on my remarkable 2 and have blocked all telemetry domains with the hosts file. If i wanted to, I could even disable xochotl completely (however you spell it). This is all good and shows that they respect their customers. We should praise this! Of course theyre not perfect--from what I understand the display driver is a big blob so its unlikely that well ever have a totally free OS running, but its way better than any of the chinese spy tablets that fill up the eink tablet space or American spy tablets sold by our favorite advertisement companies directly to our children's schools.
- fartcannon 5y ago
  What stops them from charging you and selling your data?
  - purplecats 5y ago
    misplaced faith in capitalism
    - dexterdog 5y ago
      And misplaced identification of this system as capitalism.
      - vunTofHueaFFrea 5y ago
        What would you call it?
        nemothekid 5y ago
        There is nothing stopping a company from both selling you a subscription and selling your data under a socialist organization of society. It only means the profits of said product would be more evenly distributed.
mdekkers 5y ago
Oh, wow. I had never heard of this device before, and looking at their website was an emotional rollercoaster. I went from “wow, I need this”, to “oh dear lord, absolutely not” several times, the whole connect thing, pricing around accessories, and lack of “formal” support for many cloud storage options leave me unimpressed. Their website makes a real spammy impression, and really doesn’t inspire confidence. I need to keep paying their subscription to have handwriting conversion - one of the key reasons I would buy this? What if they go out of business? I lose device functionality? What about iCloud or OneDrive integration? I need to use Chrome for some functionality? Nothing about this leaves a good taste in my mouth. It’s a real shame since I had my wallet ready, the device as such looks awesome, but the only hardware I want on a subscription is a new car.
- sofixa 5y ago
  There are alternative devices ( although the remarkables are considered to be among the best for note taking), each with their own drawbacks and advantages. For instance the Onyx Booxes come in different sizes, are full fledged Androids so you can install anything you want( so great for reading whatever), note taking is pretty good, but the company violates the GPL. The PineNote is open source and will run Linux, but development versions should come out later this year, so it's not exactly close to being ready. So if you look around you'll probably find a similar device with the tradeoffs you're willing to make.
chrisweekly 5y ago
I love my RM2. I don't have a problem w Remarkable wanting to charge for opt-in, value-add services. TLDR the hardware's great, the software's mediocre but steadily improving -- and extremely hackable -- and I'll continue to use and recommend it.
- lilboiluvr69 5y ago
  But these aren't additional services, they were services already provided. Screen sharing is not a cloud-based service. 8GB of cloud storage is not something I would expect to have to pay for.
  - chrisweekly 5y ago
    Fair point. (I remember playing w screensharing a few months ago but haven't needed it.)
minaguib 5y ago
I was days away from ordering a Remarkable 2, despite the high price. I could see it being amazing, with screen-share, in diagraming and sharing visually with webex/zoom colleagues. Now it looks like I'll need to pay them $7.99/month for the privilege ? Instant hell-no.
- auslegung 5y ago
  According to this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28847243 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28847243 if you buy before December 21 you get it free for lifetime
  - asdfaoeu 5y ago
    That date could be yesterday assuming it's DD.MM.YY.
    - InvertedRhodium 5y ago
      > Customers who bought their reMarkable paper tablet and registered a cloud account before 12 October 2021 get a free Yep. Yesterday.
  - donkarma 5y ago
    This is a Swedish company, it's DDMMYY
    - null_object 5y ago
      Norwegian
    - juahan 5y ago
      I think it is Norwegian company.
  - minaguib 5y ago
    I understand in theory they may grandfather me in if I act now on this limited-time offer. But screen-sharing, essentially what's on the table to an app on my Laptop, should not require cloud services nor a recurring monthly subscription. The coupling reeks and has really turned me off my decision to buy.
voltaireodactyl 5y ago
This feels like a huge boon for the PineNote team, given that their launch is just around the corner.
- weikju 5y ago
  their launch is not just around the corner -- unless you count a barely-functional developer device as launching, and a suitable replacement for the Remarkable 2. The PineNote in 2021 will NOT be a consumer device, it may or may never end up being one depending on what the community of developers manage to develop in the next few years...
lilboiluvr69 5y ago
Wow...I hope the hacking community can re-implement some of these features. I really can't believe they're doing this, the writing recognition sucks already, now they want new users to pay for it? I am speechless.
rvz 5y ago
Not even the 'Google Drive and Dropbox integration' is free, but instead is on the highest plan. So to make up for the under powering and non-upgradeable storage space on that tiny 8 GB reMarkable 2 tablet, they cleverly introduce a subscription plan only for you to get more storage space. I had high hopes about Remarkable and hoped it will improve its shortfalls after criticising them [0], but a subscription for even basic 'Google Drive and Dropbox integration' seems like a complete turn off compared with the PineNote. Not surprising that we now know why the device storage was so low after all. Maybe they don't have any plans of increasing the internal space you will likely be paying for their plan AND potentially the cloud storage of your choice if you run out of space. No thanks and no deal. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28190987 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28190987
- russh 5y ago
  It’s an interesting device and I am fond of e-paper so I was considering one as well. The expensive pen with an eraser was a strike against it. Requiring a subscription to use someone else’s cloud service and only in the top tier plan, that turns a strike into a complete pass.
eugeniub 5y ago
I'm not opposed to subscriptions but the terms here feel draconian. If you lose your reMarkable, your cloud backups give you access only to the files you used in the last 50 days? Am I reading this right?
- JonathonW 5y ago
  If I'm reading it right, if you subscribe, you get unlimited storage for cloud backups of your content. If you don't subscribe, you still get cloud backup, but it's limited to files you've used in the last 50 days (files will no longer sync if left unopened for 50 days).
ericd 5y ago
A bit annoying given that it's a pretty pricey device, but I only use the cloud stuff for transferring pdfs from my computer to the tablet, and I guess as some nominal backup of my notes on the device. There are other ways to achieve both. I'd still strongly recommend the tablet, it's amazing as a paper replacement.
zz865 5y ago
Every time I use an eInk device the novelty wears off quickly and I wish I just had an ipad.
phrz 5y ago
This is extremely disappointing. I've just left a complaint on this issue. They've clearly taken steps to avoid pulling the rug out from under preexisting users, but this practice is overall so scummy for such an expensive, single-purpose product that it is converting me from an evangelist of the product to a protester. I cannot, in good conscience, recommend this product to anyone anymore. I should've listened to my instincts about lock-in when I saw that everything passed through a proprietary cloud.
- playpause 5y ago
  > They've clearly taken steps to avoid pulling the rug out from under preexisting users, but this practice is overall so scummy Why is the practice scummy then? If they did a bait and switch for existing customers, I get that would be scummy. But what’s scummy about raising prices for future customers (who have a free and informed choice whether to actually become customers)? Genuine question, I might be missing what you’re getting at here.
laserbeam 5y ago
Having a subscription is fine. Having a garbage free tier is not. Basic things you can't do in free tier: - export your documents (email is the only high quality export, today, going through the app exports PNGs at half resolution) - have a warranty on your device (the ToS was changed to give warranty only to Connect customers) Sure. Let's say you can sell handwriting conversion and screenshare. Maybe. But ugh, they combined so many dick moves in 1... I doubt they'll get enough new customers anytime soon. I no longer recommend the platform, have told everyone considering to get one the news and my thoughts. They agree and immediately started looking at competitors.
- MaxikCZ 5y ago
  > the ToS was changed to give warranty only to Connect customers Is this even legal anywhere?
  - laserbeam 5y ago
    No idea. And I'm basing that claim on a youtube review of the recent changes, so I may be wrong...
adreamingsoul 5y ago
I always enjoy seeing Norwegian companies making headlines on HN.
ABS 5y ago
what's remarkable (sorry) is that I'm a customer but heard about this only here on HN...
- Sanguinaire 5y ago
  Likewise - incredibly disappointed. I don't even want to use their cloud storage; I'd much rather be syncing to a server I control. With the current pricing and the fact that I passed on my old rM1 to my wife when I got an rM2, we'd be looking at 2 subscriptions when we next upgrade devices - which pretty much rules it out.
rcarmo 5y ago
I understand the need to increase revenue, but to have basic functionally behind a paywall… no thanks. I will stick to standard tablets.
liendolucas 5y ago
Comment aside, I'd love to buy a Remarkable, but I'm not going to do so. The reason is that: "by default remarkable doesn't come with a marker". How can that even be possible? And I'm not sure if it's possible to use something else as a marker. The marker is just 59 euros. Of course I'd also like the cover, such an expensive device without a minimum protection is not a good idea. The cover costs 119 euros. That's a total of 178 euros for a device that costs 399. So that almost amounts to 45% of the cost of the device. Can anyone explain me why such a rip off? Even if I had a ton of money I wouldn't buy...
- xdfgh1112 5y ago
  People who really want it will pay for it, I know a few. There isn't really any competition.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  I never considered the cost of the device to be 400 euros. The price is around 600 euros all in. If I ever need to buy seperate accessories I can do so for 120 euro or 60 (for the pen).
ThinkBeat 5y ago
I wish the Google drive integration was available in the lite plan. The jump in features between lite and is huge: Handwriting (yeah good luck with mein), screen share, are all advanced features. I am too cheap to pay $8 per month for it. As more, and more and more software / products moves to the subscription model I have become extremely selective. $5 here $3 there $15 for that one etc it all ads up quick
rowanG077 5y ago
Damn. Was on the fence about this tablet for my masters. But I guess they took away any reservations I have. Anyone know any reasonable alternative?
- panda88888 5y ago
  If you do not absolutely need an eink tablet, iPad Air with apple pencil is arguably a much more versatile alternative for a similar price.
type0 5y ago
remarkable tactics, instantly a premium device becomes more premium

I have a remarkable (1) tablet. It sits on my shelf, Haven’t even charged it in over a year. On the other hand, my iPad and Apple Pencil get used constantly. I run “write” by stylus labs. That combo of hardware and software provides the workflow I hoped the remarkable would (but didn’t). — True the remarkable is “more open” than the iPad… but not open enough to let me install software that matters to me. So it’s just more ewaste.

cooperadymas 5y ago
Not to be blithe, but this sounds like a you problem. Plenty of people have and use a Remarkable. You prefer something else? Fine. It doesn't have to sit on your shelf until you get around to throwing it away. Resell it. Give it to a friend. Donate it. You have many options besides your shelf.

lilboiluvr69 5y ago

If you are as upset as I am, I recommend you hit 'contact us' and voice your opinion. Let the company know they are making a mistake: https://support.remarkable.com/hc/en-us?return_to=%2Fhc%2Frequests https://support.remarkable.com/hc/en-us?return_to=%2Fhc%2Fre...

atc 5y ago

I will no longer recommend this device after this move

Aeolun 5y ago

I am not happy with this move. Before this step the Remarkable was an easy recommendation, but syncing a few gigabytes of files for every customer that paid you $600 dollars without an extra subscription seems reasonable. Hell, have me pay for the S3 storage I’m using, anything. But to start paying $8 per month just to access basic functionality feels silly to me. I love the device, but recommending it without the grandfathered benefits feels like a ripoff to me (even if I never use them).

8note 5y ago

Screen share requires you to share everything you write with Remarkable? I'd expect to be able to do that over USB, and all the data stays local

kadoban 5y ago
Thankfully since the device is hackable you can do that easily with third-party tools. But yeah it's lame that that's tied to the cloud account for the official stuff.
- szszrk 5y ago
  Easily is an overstatement, given number of changes they did recently. I'm trying for over a year to find stable replacement for remarkable desktop app (which syncs all my data without my control) on a company computer for screen sharing. And have only just now found a way to do that in a stable way with the new "share" from RM and rmview 3 opensource app. Before that more things didn't work then did (various issues, crashes, incorrect screen sizes, all soft of things). But I'm certain this idiotic step by remarkable will push more and more devs and hackers to polish their tools create more and more full/complex environment without their cloud.

_rend 5y ago

Not sure how to feel about this. I will say that at least, as someone who already owns a reMarkable 2 who had access to these features already, I'll still have access to them: > If you bought your reMarkable before 12.10.21, we want to give you full access to Connect. If you have a reMarkable account, go to my.reMarkable.com and approve our new terms and conditions to get Connect. On the "Connect" section of my account: > As one of our valued early customers, you have full free access to Connect. This is our way to thank you for believing in us from the start. Your free plan includes all launch features, such as Google Drive and Dropbox integration and Screen Share. I don't use these features right now, but it'll be interesting to see how the plans expand in the future. As a recent-ish owner of the device, the update cadence has felt pretty good and the new features have been relatively impressive, but I hope we don't see more features eventually get locked behind monthly plans.

SommaRaikkonen 5y ago

Here's a video that brings more perspective from My Deep Guide who reviews quite a whole lot of e-ink devices (timestamped for relevant part): https://youtu.be/K79MPnPq4_M?t=508 https://youtu.be/K79MPnPq4_M?t=508 The thing that stood out for me is the way they push for a subscription as you purchase your device. The Marker Plus used to be $99, but they inflated the price to be $129 so that if you choose the Connect plan, it "slashes" the price back to $99 - how it originally cost before, according to the video.

sundvor 5y ago
IANAL but have been through the material in compliance training: I'm reasonably sure that this would be illegal according to Australian consumer laws. You can't advertise a price as having a discount if it was never sold at the higher price. Since you can technically buy it at the higher price now without the sub, perhaps they could argue that they increased the price of the pen, and introduced the discount in the same stroke, and maybe ACCC would let it slide - but they certainly wouldn't be amused. The pen pricing is even better in AUD, btw.. and that's WITH the "discounts". AUD170 for the eraser one.
- chrismorgan 5y ago
  For reference: https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/displaying-prices#two-price-comparison-advertising https://www.accc.gov.au/business/pricing-surcharging/display... Mind you, those rules don’t stop such things from happening, even from purely Australian companies. I’ve tracked a Clevo-ODM laptop seller for years that’s perpetually at 25–40% discounts across all of their products (though they cycle through some of the specific components that are discounted), and I’ve been tracking one manufacturer’s only-sold-by-them 12V/100Ah LiFePO₄ battery for 15 months when they’ve had a $1,299 RRP marked down to $489–$469, with the alleged RRP recently reduced to $899. I’ve never complained to these companies or to the ACCC, but from other vaguely similar things that I have reported a couple of times I don’t expect much to happen.

davisr 5y ago

It's a great time to get off their cloud using libre third-party tools. https://github.com/rehackable/awesome-remarkable#gui-clients https://github.com/rehackable/awesome-remarkable#gui-clients

infogulch 5y ago
These are great, thanks for sharing! I don't see an integration into excalidraw yet, maybe that's my next project...

ocdtrekkie 5y ago

This is disappointing. My wife has one and loves it, and I was about to buy one my own. Now I don't know if I want to, knowing I'll get one intentionally crippled in comparison. The price hike on the Marker Plus to incentivize the subscription is a nasty choice too.

kadoban 5y ago
It's a great device (for certain use-cases). My advice would be to just avoid the cloud features anyway if you can. If some of them are important to you, and can't be replaced by third-party tools (many can), yeah maybe a different device is better for you. I never even created a cloud account, partly for privacy, partly to avoid crap like this.
- ocdtrekkie 5y ago
  It's the double hit though... they're also jacking the Marker Plus price to try to force a subscription.
  - kadoban 5y ago
    Yeah that's a kick in the pants. Maybe just buy second-hand? Not sure.
turtlebits 5y ago
The cloud features were never promised, your wife is getting an early adopter bonus. It also doesn't preclude devs from developing 3rd party sync solutions.

Jedd 5y ago

I've been entertaining either a Remarkable2 or a Boox Note Air, but with remote-work over the last year it's been much less compelling. Plus here in Australia we pay a significant premium for these types of devices - f.e. they're advertising the remarkable2 with Connect for USD$299 - but for Australians it's AU$499 (~ US$366). On top of the death by a thousand cuts that is yet another subscription service, the AU version of that page indicates a subscription price of AUD$12.99 / month - compared to the USD$7.99 / month. USD$7.99 is around AUD$10.89. The AU page's FAQ retains the ".. bought your reMarkable before 12.10.21 .." qualifier, and I think that translates to 2021-12-10, which sounds like an encouragement to buy before December to get this offer grandfathered in, but 12.10.21 (if assuming dd.mm.yy) would make more sense given today is 2021-10-13. (This is why we have unambiguous, international standards.)

dannyw 5y ago
australia has 10% GST included in the price
- sundvor 5y ago
  $776x1.1 (for my build, see sibling comment) is $853 - well short of the $956 charged.
sundvor 5y ago
$500... that was still of interest. Until I saw that the pen is not included in the price. And then the price of the pens -$170 for the version with an eraser (how could you use it without!?). I'm always adding a leather case to my devices too, and this didn't disappoint either - I'll never think my Kindle leather cases as expensive again. If ordered, a cool $956 delivered. So this isn't happening, what a rip off those extras etc are for us down under. (Switching to US Store: USD $570 = AUD $776, maybe add 4-5% sales tax?). PS agree completely about the date confusion. They should simply use 12-Oct-2021 or Oct-12-2021 to make it truly readable by as many as possible, as much as I like YYYYMMDD. Edit: An Intuos Pro pen is $100 AUD, by comparison. This has tilt and pressure, with eraser and extra buttons, and comes with a number of nibs - https://www.kayellaustralia.com.au/product/2681-wacom-intuos-4-5-pro-cintiq-gen-2-grip-pen?categoryId=978 https://www.kayellaustralia.com.au/product/2681-wacom-intuos...

minimalist 5y ago

A lot of comments talk aboue being disappointed and all, but id rather pay for cloud services than have my data sold to merchants and marketeers. Meanwhile, I have syncthing and gocryptfs installed on my remarkable 2 and have blocked all telemetry domains with the hosts file. If i wanted to, I could even disable xochotl completely (however you spell it). This is all good and shows that they respect their customers. We should praise this! Of course theyre not perfect--from what I understand the display driver is a big blob so its unlikely that well ever have a totally free OS running, but its way better than any of the chinese spy tablets that fill up the eink tablet space or American spy tablets sold by our favorite advertisement companies directly to our children's schools.

fartcannon 5y ago
What stops them from charging you and selling your data?
- purplecats 5y ago
  misplaced faith in capitalism
  - dexterdog 5y ago
    And misplaced identification of this system as capitalism.
    - vunTofHueaFFrea 5y ago
      What would you call it?
      - nemothekid 5y ago
        There is nothing stopping a company from both selling you a subscription and selling your data under a socialist organization of society. It only means the profits of said product would be more evenly distributed.

mdekkers 5y ago

Oh, wow. I had never heard of this device before, and looking at their website was an emotional rollercoaster. I went from “wow, I need this”, to “oh dear lord, absolutely not” several times, the whole connect thing, pricing around accessories, and lack of “formal” support for many cloud storage options leave me unimpressed. Their website makes a real spammy impression, and really doesn’t inspire confidence. I need to keep paying their subscription to have handwriting conversion - one of the key reasons I would buy this? What if they go out of business? I lose device functionality? What about iCloud or OneDrive integration? I need to use Chrome for some functionality? Nothing about this leaves a good taste in my mouth. It’s a real shame since I had my wallet ready, the device as such looks awesome, but the only hardware I want on a subscription is a new car.

sofixa 5y ago
There are alternative devices ( although the remarkables are considered to be among the best for note taking), each with their own drawbacks and advantages. For instance the Onyx Booxes come in different sizes, are full fledged Androids so you can install anything you want( so great for reading whatever), note taking is pretty good, but the company violates the GPL. The PineNote is open source and will run Linux, but development versions should come out later this year, so it's not exactly close to being ready. So if you look around you'll probably find a similar device with the tradeoffs you're willing to make.

chrisweekly 5y ago

I love my RM2. I don't have a problem w Remarkable wanting to charge for opt-in, value-add services. TLDR the hardware's great, the software's mediocre but steadily improving -- and extremely hackable -- and I'll continue to use and recommend it.

lilboiluvr69 5y ago
But these aren't additional services, they were services already provided. Screen sharing is not a cloud-based service. 8GB of cloud storage is not something I would expect to have to pay for.
- chrisweekly 5y ago
  Fair point. (I remember playing w screensharing a few months ago but haven't needed it.)

minaguib 5y ago

I was days away from ordering a Remarkable 2, despite the high price. I could see it being amazing, with screen-share, in diagraming and sharing visually with webex/zoom colleagues. Now it looks like I'll need to pay them $7.99/month for the privilege ? Instant hell-no.

auslegung 5y ago
According to this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28847243 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28847243 if you buy before December 21 you get it free for lifetime
- asdfaoeu 5y ago
  That date could be yesterday assuming it's DD.MM.YY.
  - InvertedRhodium 5y ago
    > Customers who bought their reMarkable paper tablet and registered a cloud account before 12 October 2021 get a free Yep. Yesterday.
- donkarma 5y ago
  This is a Swedish company, it's DDMMYY
  - null_object 5y ago
    Norwegian
  - juahan 5y ago
    I think it is Norwegian company.
- minaguib 5y ago
  I understand in theory they may grandfather me in if I act now on this limited-time offer. But screen-sharing, essentially what's on the table to an app on my Laptop, should not require cloud services nor a recurring monthly subscription. The coupling reeks and has really turned me off my decision to buy.

voltaireodactyl 5y ago

This feels like a huge boon for the PineNote team, given that their launch is just around the corner.

weikju 5y ago
their launch is not just around the corner -- unless you count a barely-functional developer device as launching, and a suitable replacement for the Remarkable 2. The PineNote in 2021 will NOT be a consumer device, it may or may never end up being one depending on what the community of developers manage to develop in the next few years...

lilboiluvr69 5y ago

Wow...I hope the hacking community can re-implement some of these features. I really can't believe they're doing this, the writing recognition sucks already, now they want new users to pay for it? I am speechless.

rvz 5y ago

Not even the 'Google Drive and Dropbox integration' is free, but instead is on the highest plan. So to make up for the under powering and non-upgradeable storage space on that tiny 8 GB reMarkable 2 tablet, they cleverly introduce a subscription plan only for you to get more storage space. I had high hopes about Remarkable and hoped it will improve its shortfalls after criticising them [0], but a subscription for even basic 'Google Drive and Dropbox integration' seems like a complete turn off compared with the PineNote. Not surprising that we now know why the device storage was so low after all. Maybe they don't have any plans of increasing the internal space you will likely be paying for their plan AND potentially the cloud storage of your choice if you run out of space. No thanks and no deal. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28190987 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28190987

russh 5y ago
It’s an interesting device and I am fond of e-paper so I was considering one as well. The expensive pen with an eraser was a strike against it. Requiring a subscription to use someone else’s cloud service and only in the top tier plan, that turns a strike into a complete pass.

eugeniub 5y ago

I'm not opposed to subscriptions but the terms here feel draconian. If you lose your reMarkable, your cloud backups give you access only to the files you used in the last 50 days? Am I reading this right?

JonathonW 5y ago
If I'm reading it right, if you subscribe, you get unlimited storage for cloud backups of your content. If you don't subscribe, you still get cloud backup, but it's limited to files you've used in the last 50 days (files will no longer sync if left unopened for 50 days).

ericd 5y ago

A bit annoying given that it's a pretty pricey device, but I only use the cloud stuff for transferring pdfs from my computer to the tablet, and I guess as some nominal backup of my notes on the device. There are other ways to achieve both. I'd still strongly recommend the tablet, it's amazing as a paper replacement.

zz865 5y ago

Every time I use an eInk device the novelty wears off quickly and I wish I just had an ipad.

phrz 5y ago

This is extremely disappointing. I've just left a complaint on this issue. They've clearly taken steps to avoid pulling the rug out from under preexisting users, but this practice is overall so scummy for such an expensive, single-purpose product that it is converting me from an evangelist of the product to a protester. I cannot, in good conscience, recommend this product to anyone anymore. I should've listened to my instincts about lock-in when I saw that everything passed through a proprietary cloud.

playpause 5y ago
> They've clearly taken steps to avoid pulling the rug out from under preexisting users, but this practice is overall so scummy Why is the practice scummy then? If they did a bait and switch for existing customers, I get that would be scummy. But what’s scummy about raising prices for future customers (who have a free and informed choice whether to actually become customers)? Genuine question, I might be missing what you’re getting at here.

laserbeam 5y ago

Having a subscription is fine. Having a garbage free tier is not. Basic things you can't do in free tier: - export your documents (email is the only high quality export, today, going through the app exports PNGs at half resolution) - have a warranty on your device (the ToS was changed to give warranty only to Connect customers) Sure. Let's say you can sell handwriting conversion and screenshare. Maybe. But ugh, they combined so many dick moves in 1... I doubt they'll get enough new customers anytime soon. I no longer recommend the platform, have told everyone considering to get one the news and my thoughts. They agree and immediately started looking at competitors.

MaxikCZ 5y ago
> the ToS was changed to give warranty only to Connect customers Is this even legal anywhere?
- laserbeam 5y ago
  No idea. And I'm basing that claim on a youtube review of the recent changes, so I may be wrong...

adreamingsoul 5y ago

I always enjoy seeing Norwegian companies making headlines on HN.

ABS 5y ago

what's remarkable (sorry) is that I'm a customer but heard about this only here on HN...

Sanguinaire 5y ago
Likewise - incredibly disappointed. I don't even want to use their cloud storage; I'd much rather be syncing to a server I control. With the current pricing and the fact that I passed on my old rM1 to my wife when I got an rM2, we'd be looking at 2 subscriptions when we next upgrade devices - which pretty much rules it out.

rcarmo 5y ago

I understand the need to increase revenue, but to have basic functionally behind a paywall… no thanks. I will stick to standard tablets.

liendolucas 5y ago

Comment aside, I'd love to buy a Remarkable, but I'm not going to do so. The reason is that: "by default remarkable doesn't come with a marker". How can that even be possible? And I'm not sure if it's possible to use something else as a marker. The marker is just 59 euros. Of course I'd also like the cover, such an expensive device without a minimum protection is not a good idea. The cover costs 119 euros. That's a total of 178 euros for a device that costs 399. So that almost amounts to 45% of the cost of the device. Can anyone explain me why such a rip off? Even if I had a ton of money I wouldn't buy...

xdfgh1112 5y ago
People who really want it will pay for it, I know a few. There isn't really any competition.
Aeolun 5y ago
I never considered the cost of the device to be 400 euros. The price is around 600 euros all in. If I ever need to buy seperate accessories I can do so for 120 euro or 60 (for the pen).

ThinkBeat 5y ago

I wish the Google drive integration was available in the lite plan. The jump in features between lite and is huge: Handwriting (yeah good luck with mein), screen share, are all advanced features. I am too cheap to pay $8 per month for it. As more, and more and more software / products moves to the subscription model I have become extremely selective. $5 here $3 there $15 for that one etc it all ads up quick

rowanG077 5y ago

Damn. Was on the fence about this tablet for my masters. But I guess they took away any reservations I have. Anyone know any reasonable alternative?

panda88888 5y ago
If you do not absolutely need an eink tablet, iPad Air with apple pencil is arguably a much more versatile alternative for a similar price.

type0 5y ago

remarkable tactics, instantly a premium device becomes more premium