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Forced to upgrade

herman.bearblog.dev

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Re: Forced to upgrade

#11

Post by Dalewyn »

nextlevelwizard wrote: post #6
Hard_Space wrote: post #4

This also counts for desktop Macs. Twice in the last 20 years I have had to explain to my elderly Dad that even though his expensive Mac could last another thirty years, it's now a paperweight, or something to be 'repurposed'. I have wondered sometimes if hardware manufacturers actively seek out significant road-mapped hardware changes (such as Intel>ARM, etc., in case of Apple) in order to keep sales rolling in and…

You have to be quite cynical if you see Apple's transition to ARM only as a ploy to get people to replace their Intel based machines. I am sure it is a nice bonus, but performance and efficiency just went through the roof. With yearly iPhone releases it is harder to justify upgrades. Like for author - upgrading from working phone to newer model while not gaining anything significant is stupid.

>With yearly iPhone releases it is harder to justify upgrades.

It might be helpful to think of them like cars: New models every year, but customers only "upgrade" every 10 to 20 years.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#12

Post by derbOac »

Hard_Space wrote: post #4

This also counts for desktop Macs. Twice in the last 20 years I have had to explain to my elderly Dad that even though his expensive Mac could last another thirty years, it's now a paperweight, or something to be 'repurposed'. I have wondered sometimes if hardware manufacturers actively seek out significant road-mapped hardware changes (such as Intel>ARM, etc., in case of Apple) in order to keep sales rolling in and…

The blog post reminded me of my last laptop upgrade (Macbook Air) as well. I was perfectly happy with the old laptop, nothing wrong with the hardware for me, but software releases started depending on new OSes and then I couldn't install those any longer. No "graceful degradation", and as far as I could tell the limitation was just the size of the storage drive for the OS in particular — not the nature of the chip itself or drivers or anything like that.

I don't necessarily attribute anything nefarious to anything, but collectively the whole thing seems like madness to me. What's ironic is I bet if I put linux on that machine, it (a) would be totally feasible to install recent versions, and (b) all the latest versions of the software I needed would be there for those versions. It seems like there needs to be some principled way of maintaining installs on older hardware... or I guess I just have to weigh this issue more heavily in my decision making about OSes in the future.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#13

Post by michaelsshaw »

dataflow wrote: post #8

When you make the decision to not support older hardware (whether directly or indirectly), you're making a decision that the maintenance burden you're trying to avoid is more important than the environmental impact of users disposing of & buying hardware. Which... maybe it is; who am I to suggest different priorities for other people. But it would be nice for engineers and businesses to at least think about this and…

>Which... maybe it is; who am I to suggest different priorities for other people

I mean, I get the sentiment. But I live in this world too, and the E-Waste and forced obsolescence(or whatever you'd call it in this particular instance) does have an effect on me, personally. So yes, we should absolutely have a say, despite the fact that at this time we actively do not. In the US, our environmental policy is laughably inadequate, and with what happened in the election, we're about to be on a path of complete self-annihilation, environmentally speaking.

It's a bit of a long-winded way of explaining myself here, but we definitely shouldn't refrain from serious issues because you feel you may be stepping on others' toes.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#14

Post by koliber »

I feel the same as the author. I also can’t come up with any satisfying solution. I empathize with apple and don’t expect them to support old hardware forever. The only solution I can think of is allowing people to support older hardware themselves. This is one of the strongest arguments for loosening the walled garden for older devices.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#15

Post by michaelsshaw »

koliber wrote: post #14

I feel the same as the author. I also can’t come up with any satisfying solution. I empathize with apple and don’t expect them to support old hardware forever. The only solution I can think of is allowing people to support older hardware themselves. This is one of the strongest arguments for loosening the walled garden for older devices.

It's completely ridiculous that these phones are as non-hackable as they are. When maintaining the illusion they sell of their stuff being "magic" (so therefore you can't hack on it) over the seriously big fucking issue of pollution and E-waste, I'd go a bit further than saying it's annoying. It's deeply immoral.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#17

Post by persnickety »

dataflow wrote: post #8

When you make the decision to not support older hardware (whether directly or indirectly), you're making a decision that the maintenance burden you're trying to avoid is more important than the environmental impact of users disposing of & buying hardware. Which... maybe it is; who am I to suggest different priorities for other people. But it would be nice for engineers and businesses to at least think about this and…

The environmental impact grows a lot more with the number of sold product than the maintenance burden.

For a business that sold a thousand units with a handful remaining, the calculation is going to be a lot less dominated by impact than for a giant who sold millions and has thousands still in use.

And if there's a giant in this industry, that's Apple.

Re: Forced to upgrade

#19

Post by grishka »

Android phones are kinda better in this regard because if you really insist, you can take matters into your own hands and install a custom ROM. Especially now that GSIs (generic system images) are a thing.

Really though, why do we keep updating OSes? I understand security updates, but why do these major yearly releases have to keep happening? What do they solve? Why can't we for once just settle for something in this cursed industry? Why can't we release finished products?

Re: Forced to upgrade

#20

Post by Dalewyn »

michaelsshaw wrote: post #13
dataflow wrote: post #8

When you make the decision to not support older hardware (whether directly or indirectly), you're making a decision that the maintenance burden you're trying to avoid is more important than the environmental impact of users disposing of & buying hardware. Which... maybe it is; who am I to suggest different priorities for other people. But it would be nice for engineers and businesses to at least think about this and…

>Which... maybe it is; who am I to suggest different priorities for other people I mean, I get the sentiment. But I live in this world too, and the E-Waste and forced obsolescence(or whatever you'd call it in this particular instance) does have an effect on me, personally. So yes, we should absolutely have a say, despite the fact that at this time we actively do not. In the US, our environmental policy is laughably i…

Let's be real here: Most of us detest forced upgrades because it is Fucking Inconvenient(tm). We don't want to move away from Space Bar Heating[1] once we've gotten established, and screw everyone who tries taking it away.

I'm sure a small minority might also have an environmental beef, but arguing green isn't going to grab peoples' hearts.

[1]: https://xkcd.com/1172/

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