Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
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Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#2The world could seriously use some legislation for hardware devices tied to online (dis)services.
Maybe if you can't guarantee that your service stays alive for the lifespan of your hardware product, your product shouldn't have existed in the first place.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#3This is exactly the reason why the Twitter account "internet of shit" was created. Yes I know it's vulgar.
https://twitter.com/internetofshit?lang=en
But it's worth scrolling through the previous posts by that account to see a myriad of similar "your expensive internet-dependent thing is now useless" scenarios.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#4This is abominable, there's literally no reason other than "It costs money to maintain this, and we'd rather make money selling new stuff than support what we already made". I have a v2 bridge, but back when I bought it about 3 1/2 years back, I payed a lot of money for it. It's not an expensive product to manufacture, so I expected that money to go towards supporting it long term. So much for that.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#5This forced obsolescence is beginning to get out of hand.
I completely understand that running the online portion of this costs money, but that needs factoring in to the business model from the start. I imagine that they didn't think about this when the product first launched in 2012.
I do wonder if a u-turn (similar to the one Sonos has just done) will follow after bad media coverage.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#6Well - they've done a pretty good job of ensuring that if I get smart lights again, I'm definitely not buying Philips.
This change breaks all the digital assistant integrations ("Hey Google, turn on the lights"), which is pretty much the only reason to have smart lights in the first place. If you can't use voice commands, you might as well just use the wall switches. Who wants to pull out their phone and switch the lights on and off with an app?
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#7Stop buying smart home shit.
People warned of exactly this when they started.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#8Well - they've done a pretty good job of ensuring that if I get smart lights again, I'm definitely not buying Philips. This change breaks all the digital assistant integrations ("Hey Google, turn on the lights"), which is pretty much the only reason to have smart lights in the first place. If you can't use voice commands, you might as well just use the wall switches. Who wants to pull out their phone and switch the l…
>> this change breaks all the digital assistant integrations
Don't know about Google but this is not true for Siri/HomeKit integration, which doesn't use any of the Hue online services.
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#9Well - they've done a pretty good job of ensuring that if I get smart lights again, I'm definitely not buying Philips. This change breaks all the digital assistant integrations ("Hey Google, turn on the lights"), which is pretty much the only reason to have smart lights in the first place. If you can't use voice commands, you might as well just use the wall switches. Who wants to pull out their phone and switch the l…
You can also get the dimmer switches / remotes, I thought about getting some next to my bed because Google Home doesn't seem to work with my (Philips Hue) lights anymore.
I don't think this is related - it just stopped working a few days ago. Not sure why
I'll keep them though as I do have some automation setup - lights turn themselves on and off automatically
Re: Philips Hue Bridge v1 online services will be shut off after April 2020
#10This forced obsolescence is beginning to get out of hand. I completely understand that running the online portion of this costs money, but that needs factoring in to the business model from the start. I imagine that they didn't think about this when the product first launched in 2012. I do wonder if a u-turn (similar to the one Sonos has just done) will follow after bad media coverage.
Or maybe they factored in 8 years worth of service?