> That would serve to both insure that the servers remained up by making them economically viable for the vendor and preserve the utility of the devices This s

> That would serve to both insure that the servers remained up by making them economically viable for the vendor and preserve the utility of the devices This seems naïve: "Yes, it's making money, but it isn't making enough money" is the phrase on the tombstone of a lot of goods, services, and come down to it, countries through history. Being a customer is no guarantee you get to keep being a customer. > and drive manufacturers to make locally-controllable devices to appeal to price-sensitive consumers. "Special Deal: Comes With Free Six-Month Subscription With Purchase!" because six months is how long they intend to support the device, after which they turn off the service and brick all of them, and of course you can't opt out of the special deal because they don't get any of your data from a device that isn't slaved to their servers.