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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

#321

Post by tivert »

orev wrote: post #104

For any app that does this, go to the App Store and give them a one-star rating and a comment on why you’re doing this. In this case, they have a canned copy/paste answer saying that it’s for “security”, so feel free to try to debunk that in your initial comment.

> For any app that does this, go to the App Store and give them a one-star rating and a comment on why you’re doing this.

Also leave a 1-star review on Amazon. It's totally fair: if they can "update" their product, I can update my opinion of it.

Unfortunately for me (now), I bought all my Hue stuff at local stores because it was more convenient than Amazon.

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

#323

Post by pawelduda »

I guess you can still "opt out" by getting rid of hue bridge, by replacing it with home assistant + zigbee2mqtt

1) set up homeassistant on rpi

2) get zigbee2mqtt adapter (hue bridge can be used to push sneaky updates to fuck up their bulbs further)

3) backup your rpi

4) bulbs --> zigbee2mqtt --> homeassistant

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

#324

Post by fullstop »

orev wrote: post #104

For any app that does this, go to the App Store and give them a one-star rating and a comment on why you’re doing this. In this case, they have a canned copy/paste answer saying that it’s for “security”, so feel free to try to debunk that in your initial comment.

I did this when they excluded other Zigbee lights from the hub, even though they had previously worked. They backed down on that, and maybe they will with this as well.

With that being said, I'm done with Hue.

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

#325

Post by fullstop »

pixl97 wrote: post #270
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…

Yea, that's mostly where I am on this too. Primary lighting is dumb and controlled by switches. Secondary lighting/mood lighting is smart and has the ability to be color changed and timing controlled. That said, 'smart' systems love to lose connection or their settings and do the wrong thing too frequently.

My primary lighting in the main areas of the house is zwave. The switches work like regular switches and require local access only. It's smart if I want it to be.

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

#326

Post by NonNefarious »

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…

[dead]

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

#327

Post by SparkyMcUnicorn »

t0mas88 wrote: post #317
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.

This is not true. Look into Zigbee binding, it works when the coordinator is offline. I'm using that as a backup solution in my house. All lights are zigbee, permanently powered, normally most are controlled automatically by presence sensors. But I have a couple of Zigbee remotes in a box that are bound directly to the lights to use in case my home automation system is down.

I'd modify my comment if I could. Bound some remotes to some hue bulbs, proving myself wrong.

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

#328

Post by bigstrat2003 »

iteratethis wrote: post #197
bigstrat2003 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't used anything but Hue, but I've been looking to get off them because they're so unreliable. Like clockwork, one or two bulbs go bad every year and will still be dimly lit even when "off", or worse still they will start flickering constantly when "off". It's kind of depressing if something with such poor quality is the most reliable option out there. :(

The type of behavior you describe might be related to your electricity setup in combination with generic LED behavior. I've had this behavior on a physical dimmer switch and an ordinary cheap LED. It couldn't be turned off. Somehow the dimmer always feeds it some power, which the LED responds to. If that low power is at the edge of its "activation power", you're effectively rapidly turning it on and off. This kills a…

Yeah unfortunately I haven't been able to find a fix. I know that dimmer switches are a common culprit, but we don't have them. And regular dumb LED bulbs have worked just fine in the same fixtures where we've had trouble with Hue. In principle I like the product a lot, so I'm hoping I can figure out what is going on at some point

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

#329

Post by friend_and_foe »

ilyt wrote: post #200
friend_and_foe wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think its a coincidence this came right after the ban on incandescent bulbs? Regulation got us here. It won't help when government is captured.

Yes. This is idiotic theory, Regulation is only about power efficiency

You must be European.

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

#330

Post by mirekrusin »

jorvi wrote: post #291
mirekrusin wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

On the planet I live on, Sonos does obnoxious tracking. There is no direct communication between client and speaker at all - everything calls/is routed via home. Moreover client on mobile requires and will refuse to run setup until you grant it precise location permissions. It's a spaghetti of strings attached.

Bose and other bluetooth speakers don't have any strings attached because:

* you don't have to be connected to the internet to use it

* you don't have to have account with them to use it

* you don't have to grant tracking permissions to use it

* manufacturer can decide to discontinue product or go bankrupt - it doesn't matter, you can still use product as you did before, you're unaffected

* you don't have to worry about software deprecation - new versions of sonos client for iOS require recent versions of Apple devices - you can't install client on older phones/tablets to use your speaker

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