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Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

defcon.social

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Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#291

Post by jorvi »

mirekrusin wrote: post #285
jorvi wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sonos are also agressively pushing out app updates that sunset older models of their speakers Sonos has a ~10 year support timeline on their speakers. That's longer than even Apple supports any of their devices, and they're often considered the gold standard of long support of tech products. I hate being made to defend Sonos twice as it makes me feel like a shill, but it is truly how it is.

Man, it's a speaker. Get Bose or something similar - they'll just keep working without strings attached/tracking/on-the-road/etc forever. ps. I'm happily using 10y+ old iMac 27" with popOS - works great.

Sonos doesn’t have tracking. That’s my entire point. And it’s extremely ironic you call Bose “no strings attached”, that’s what Sonos is about in the most literal sense.

You pay a huge premium in trade for less wires, great multi-room audio, decent sound and a long support timeline.

I will say that I hope Sonos and Google bury the axe at some point, and the Cast (or at least DIAL) protocol gets added.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#292

Post by TRiG_Ireland »

ipython wrote: post #246
nrvn wrote: post #237

The older I get the more I de-value "smart" things. I love dumb things. Lightbulb must be dumb. Incandescent lightbulbs were a direct evolution of candles and gas lamps leveraging on simple physical laws and principles. They were not very effective turning most of the energy into heat and LED light bulbs must have been great. But they bring electronics and multiply complexity. I already cannot just simply get a light…

I tend to agree but there are use cases where the smart bulbs have been great for us. 1. Next to our bed we have reading lamp sconces. The sconces we picked out do not have light switches (oops). It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as now the reading lamps automatically switch on in the evening before we come upstairs to bed, then turn off as part of the “good night” scene (which also alarms the security syste…

How or why is it helpful for the lights to switch on in an empty room just so you don't have half a second of darkness when you walk in there twenty minutes later?

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#293

Post by ipython »

TRiG_Ireland wrote: post #292
ipython wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree but there are use cases where the smart bulbs have been great for us. 1. Next to our bed we have reading lamp sconces. The sconces we picked out do not have light switches (oops). It turned out to be a blessing in disguise as now the reading lamps automatically switch on in the evening before we come upstairs to bed, then turn off as part of the “good night” scene (which also alarms the security syste…

How or why is it helpful for the lights to switch on in an empty room just so you don't have half a second of darkness when you walk in there twenty minutes later?

You sound irrationally angry but I’ll bite anyway.

1. At night we are turning all of the other lights off. Our bedroom door is open, so the light dimly illuminates the way to our room without having to turn on hallway lights.

2. When we aren’t home it still happens giving an impression someone is home.

3. It looks nice when you walk in.

4. The convenience is worth the $0.00036 in electric cost per day. (Approx 6w * 0.12/kwh * 30 minutes). That works out to be 13 cents per year. The benefit of 1, 2 and 3 above divided by 13 cents per year gives quite the positive ROI.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#294

Post by TRiG_Ireland »

ipython wrote: post #293
TRiG_Ireland wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How or why is it helpful for the lights to switch on in an empty room just so you don't have half a second of darkness when you walk in there twenty minutes later?

You sound irrationally angry but I’ll bite anyway. 1. At night we are turning all of the other lights off. Our bedroom door is open, so the light dimly illuminates the way to our room without having to turn on hallway lights. 2. When we aren’t home it still happens giving an impression someone is home. 3. It looks nice when you walk in. 4. The convenience is worth the $0.00036 in electric cost per day. (Approx 6w * 0…

I often come across (in writing, at least) as far more irritable than I actually am. It's something I'm working on.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#295

Post by vardump »

ascagnel_ wrote: post #241
WaitWaitWha wrote: post #216

Mitigation: If using Zigbee bulbs, 1. get rid of the Philips app (not the bulbs). 2. Replace the Philips Hue bridge (hub) with a RasPi or NUC computer. 3. Connect a Zigbee/Z-Wave combo USB radio dongle. 4. Load Home Assistant OS. This solution not only replaces the Philips locked system, but it can replace (or take over) Amazon, Google, Apple, Ikea and more, simultaneously . About 2551 more. Home Assistant is not per…

> 3. Connect a Zigbee/Z-Wave combo USB radio dongle. Can you recommend a dongle?

Conbee 2 works great, much better range than what the other dongles have. The software bundled with it is also decent and quick to get started with. It got REST API too for external integration.

Of course you're free to use any software with it.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#296

Post by heyoni »

basisword wrote: post #109

For iOS/Apple users just use the bulbs through the Home app. I don’t think I’ve used the Hue app in at least a couple of years since configuring that. Fuck Phillips. Won’t be buying any more of their products.

Do we know for a fact that it'll keep working after the change? Are there any homekit devices that require you to log in to a separate app? If so, then the change doesn't affect me very much.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#297

Post by regularjack »

ta8645 wrote: post #234
gumballindie wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not about the value you get, it’s about the value they get. How is this even legal is beyond me.

> How is this even legal is beyond me. It's the same argument as people who say Google should be allowed to censor whoever they want. "They're a private company, they can do whatever they want. Nobody is forcing you to use their services." Clearly, in many areas of life, politics and the legal system needs to be realigned with the modern technological landscape. But so far, it seems most such efforts are pushing thin…

It's not comparable because you paid for bulbs, swithches, bridges etc. You don't pay for Google, at least not in the example you gave.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#298

Post by jqpabc123 »

And I thought licensing functionality in cars was a bad idea. BMW learned the hard way that their customers thought so too.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alistaircharlton/2023/09/07/bmw...

Hopefully Philips will learn the same. In the meantime, I'm making a mental note to avoid their brand all together.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#299

Post by SparkyMcUnicorn »

Tijdreiziger wrote: post #206
SparkyMcUnicorn wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All zigbee devices require a coordinator. It can be a raspberry pi or any other hardware/software with the radio, but it does have to be powered up.

Not all, IKEA Trådfri works fully hub-less by default.

TIL I can bind my remotes to my Hue bulbs, and they work without the coordinator.

Re: Philips Hue will soon force users to create an account

#300

Post by everforward »

amelius wrote: post #33

We need a no-tether law. If you buy a product you should be able to use it even if you completely break all ties with the original vendor. Otherwise it's a service and not a product.

> Otherwise it's a service and not a product.

I think this is a distinction without a difference unless there's something legally relevant to that distinction. I don't disagree semantically, but I also doubt Phillips cares whether they call their lightbulbs a product or a service.

My solution would be to require refunds for hardware if the underlying software materially changes in terms of features, excepting safety features (I'm fine with disabling features because of an unknown risk of fire or something).

To me, the underlying issue is information asymmetry. The vendor knows when they're going to make changes, and users don't. The vendor knows which features get used and which don't, impacting the features they change, but users would have to guess whether they're a major usecase or not. The vendor likely has a list of lines in the sand they won't cross, but users don't know where those are.

Those used to be irrelevant because it wasn't possible to live-update the features of hardware, but it has become relevant. The free market is lacking information to make informed purchasing decisions.

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