It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription • Hacker News Board

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#171

Post by AnthonBerg » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 6:56 AM UTC

nwallin wrote: post #164

dsr_ wrote: post #16

Printers. Yeah. Herewith, my standard advice. Buy a Brother monochrome laser with duplex, an ethernet port, and BRScript/3 (their PostScript clone). Even if you're sure you will never need one or more of those features, get them all. Wifi and Bluetooth and NFC are strictly optional, and probably not worthwhile. If you need color printing, send it to a printing company. There might even be a local one. It will be done…

++ I have a Brother printer without duplex printing. I kick myself basically every time I need to print because I almost always need to manually flip/reinsert. I dream of the day that my printer will die and I can buy a new Brother monochrome laser printer with duplex, but it's been over a decade and I'm pretty sure this motherfucker will outlive me. (it's also USB only, no ethernet/wifi/bluetooth and ... I dunno wha…

Please forgive me for the brash and commanding tone of the unsolicited advice, but: Sell it!! Get one that has duplex. Someone else will love your non-duplex printer just like it is. Duplex is so absolutely and completely worth having if one is so inclined.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#172

Post by chana_masala » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 6:59 AM UTC

AnthonBerg wrote: post #170

dsr_ wrote: post #16

Printers. Yeah. Herewith, my standard advice. Buy a Brother monochrome laser with duplex, an ethernet port, and BRScript/3 (their PostScript clone). Even if you're sure you will never need one or more of those features, get them all. Wifi and Bluetooth and NFC are strictly optional, and probably not worthwhile. If you need color printing, send it to a printing company. There might even be a local one. It will be done…

Same, except: Get a HP color laser printer that does duplex printing. (“Duplex”. Funny word. It seems to be latin for “can slurp the paper back into itself to flip it and print on both sides of the page”.) In all earnestness, I am 100% convinced that yours is the best possible printer advice for many people! Maybe the majority? People like me might have the competitive disadvantage of lower reading speed of black-and…

I agree, I read a lot more papers when I print them off. Thanks for the advice about the color printer - I also find my comprehension better that way. I've saved your recommendation for when I next am looking to buy a new printer.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#173

Post by gpt5 » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:06 AM UTC

alien_ wrote: post #144

"The average user prints exactly one colour page during the lifetime of their colour printer. It is usually the test page." So true!

Unless that user has young kids

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#174

Post by dijit » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:07 AM UTC

paranoidrobot wrote: post #125

NortySpock wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great advice, and I echo 95% of it. My observation is that I have found Wifi useful when I need the printer in an odd location in the house, and color is useful for non-professional usage like "the kids need to print out their report for school" and "the med school student needs anatomy diagrams in color" My trusty color Brother laser HL-3170CDW cost ~$300 at the time and has been trucking along for 7+ years now with…

Modern Powerline Ethernet adapters are really decent these days, and can even come with Wifi bridges/repeaters built in that can either replace, or 'mesh' with your router's wifi. I re-did the home network at a relative's place early this year when also replacing the laptop. Zero regrets. All the fixed devices now have either an eithernet port right near them, or good wifi signal. The devices that had flaky wifi were…

Powerline ethernet adapters have always depended very heavily on how the power is laid out in your home (and things like "noise") They can't, for example, jump breakers well.

So YMMV, but in my experience they haven't improved much if at all, the only thing that could have changed is your placement, the noise on the lines or your home.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#175

Post by moss2 » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:08 AM UTC

This was a great read, but even better was the link to an article by Nicholas Lovell at the end. I love reading thoughtful analysis of the video game industry. What a goldmine!

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#176

Post by greggman3 » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:20 AM UTC

SavantIdiot wrote: post #58

He mentions "Smart TVs". I always thought you could just buy a SmartTV and not connect the internet and have a dumb TV. Nope. HDMI changed that. I bought a TV a few months ago and it started showing adverts because it was connected to the internet through my ROKU via HDMI. That's right, you can't even have a dumb TV anymore. Someone needs to make an HDMI internet filter, stat. But Adobe? That smells like extortion.

TVs, I'm crossing my fingers my new Sony (android) delivered soon lets me turn off all the ads. My old Sony (also android) did. You have to turn off notifications for every app. and, given android's tons of little applets it can take a while to turn them all off manually with the remote. Maybe someone who knows android better can tell me some magic shell script that will turn them all off.

I could also replace the home screen/launcher with another. I tried it and got it to work, forgot why I stopped using it though.

As for Adobe, there are plenty of apps that will open adobe formats. Certainly Photoshop and Illustrator. It's possible you'll lose access to some features though. I agree, it feels like extortion.

They used to have to create features I want to entice me to upgrade. I upgraded photoshop about once every 4 years for $200. Now it's $120 a year so more then 4x the cost and I haven't seen a feature I cared about in over a decade at least except (1) updating to new OS versions and (2) HEIC support, which under the old plan I would have happily paid for the upgrade. It's not a tool I use daily though. If it was might feel less bad. My artists friends all seem to be fine with the price tho.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#177

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:22 AM UTC

zizee wrote: post #41

ludocode wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even for those non-professional uses it's probably better to put the PDF on a flash drive, walk into Staples and print it on their machines. For anyone who hasn't done it, it's incredibly streamlined. You don't have to talk to anyone and you don't have to wait in line. You just walk up to one of the many printers, put in your flash drive, tap your credit card and collect your printouts. I'm just not convinced that ha…

> Even for those non-professional uses it's probably better to put the PDF on a flash drive, walk into Staples and print it on their machines I'm not trying to be argumentative, and what I'm going to say might be a "well obviously, duh" comment: This advice is really only applicable to those who have convenient access to a "staples", which is probably only 20% of us here. It is also only convienient if you don't have…

Even the article fell into this trap. There's a good reason to own at least a B&W printer even if there's a Staples downstairs: your home printing needs will predominantly fall outside the business hours. After all, during business hours you are most likely at work.

The need to print something is usually a result of some chain of actions. You noticed an interesting paper. You have a stack of documents to sign. Your kid just realized, at 22:00 sharp, that they need some printout for school tomorrow. These are things that, for most working adults, tend to happen during evenings and on weekends - because that's the only time they have to deal with personal stuff. Not having a printer available at a moment's notice tends to be a huge blocker.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#178

Post by greggman3 » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:24 AM UTC

Ballu wrote: post #99

When I moved to US in late '90s, my mentor told the Milk distribution story/change (NY/NJ). During his grandfather times (I am sure around 1950/60s, Milkman used to enter the home and check how much milk is needed and change the bottle. With time, few crimes and privacy concepts started coming into picture, the milks bottles were left outside. And now Amazon wants to enterr your home to do exactly what milkman used t…

speaking of coming into your house (and completely off topic), TIFU by using a KeyMe kiosk. I needed a copy of a key. I expected it was a mechanical copier which I'd seen before. Instead it's some kind of digital kiosk that scans the key and then, sends the info to their servers and they mail you a key.

In other words, they have a database of people's keys and the address those keys belong too. I feel so stupid. Time to change my locks.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#179

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:26 AM UTC

matkoniecz wrote: post #168

derefr wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which is probably only 20% of us here Uh. Shops offering printing-as-a-service are one of the most common things found in every small town, all over the world. They're one of the first entrepreneurialist ventures to be developed in developing countries after electrification (just buy a printer and a computer, and charge $1 to print a page.) Every Internet cafe offers printing. Every parcel shipping store (UPS, FedE…

> They're one of the first entrepreneurialist ventures to be developed in developing countries That does not mean that they survive. > Okay, you might live in a cabin 200 miles away from the nearest town. In Poland such places are mostly gone (some survive near universities) as nearly everyone has printer accessible at home or at work. Some are at places where people need printing (government offices) but charge mass…

Exactly this. Also:

>> Every parcel shipping store (UPS, FedEx, etc.) offers printing

> No such thing in Poland and closest equivalent does not offer printing as service (exceptions may apply).

While there are "parcel points" in Poland, I've never seen them advertising a document printing service, and they're also being rapidly displaced by the spread of Paczkomaty - automated self-service parcel collection and sending booths.

Re: It looks like a product but is secretly a subscription

#180

Post by microtonal » Tue, Aug 03, 2021, 7:29 AM UTC

ludocode wrote: post #29

NortySpock wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great advice, and I echo 95% of it. My observation is that I have found Wifi useful when I need the printer in an odd location in the house, and color is useful for non-professional usage like "the kids need to print out their report for school" and "the med school student needs anatomy diagrams in color" My trusty color Brother laser HL-3170CDW cost ~$300 at the time and has been trucking along for 7+ years now with…

Even for those non-professional uses it's probably better to put the PDF on a flash drive, walk into Staples and print it on their machines. For anyone who hasn't done it, it's incredibly streamlined. You don't have to talk to anyone and you don't have to wait in line. You just walk up to one of the many printers, put in your flash drive, tap your credit card and collect your printouts. I'm just not convinced that ha…

Even for those non-professional uses it's probably better to put the PDF on a flash drive, walk into Staples and print it on their machines. [...] I'm just not convinced that having the ability to print in color at home is worth the huge expense in ink cartridges or in a color laser printer.

Depends on how much you value your time. I would happily pay a bit more if it saves me 100+ trips to a copy shop over the lifetime of a printer.

Besides that, ink tank printers like Epson EcoTank printers are really cheap per print because they do not use cartridges. E.g., an EcoTank all-color refill is 40 Euro and prints up to 4000 black & white and 7500 color pages.