Live data from Hacker News

HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

telegraph.co.uk

421–430 of 461 posts

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#421
post #12

The CEO and the board must serve prison time for things like this. No measure less than prison for the CEO and all board members is enough to curtail this because it just becomes the cost of doing business. No, you can’t say it wasn’t your decision. If you want to not be held accountable for the work your employees, contractors, and agents do on your behalf, you should have to prove they acted against your express wr…

They should also order that HP replaces all of the printers. Make it costly and hard work

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#422
Do you actually own a printer? Since 10+ years I print stuff either at work or in hotel. If it's pictures, I print them in some printing company with some nice ICC profile I got from them.

Owning a printer in XXI century is waste of time.

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#423
post #74
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this as well but then I learned of something called a principal-agent problem. I am talking in general, so while fines might work in this exact case, they won’t work in general. The CEO and board supervising the crimes might be long gone and no longer a part of the corporation by the time the law catches up with them and the owners / shareholders are left holding the bag. I understand what I am advoca…

While GDPR is far from perfect those fines made a huge difference. Hefty fines do scare companies.

The most visible difference inside the EU is a significant degradation of the user web browsing experience.

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#424

As the article states, HP has even been sued for this, yet continues to do it as it's a core part of their profits to keep people buying THEIR ink. Profit alone for the printer itself isn't worth it, they'd otherwise they'd not even bother making printers anymore, but that reoccurring revenue from ink is some sweet sweet cash. It's like google/fakebook/twits whining about people blocking ads or using encryption they…

Worlds smallest violin?

> Worlds smallest violin?

It's a turn of phrase, where you are mocking someone by accompanying their expressed sadness (or whining) by "playing the world's smallest violin", e.g. by rubbing your fingers together

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#426
If people stop buying these printers, then you're voting with your wallet. But people won't. They continue to buy these printers and HP will continue to do this as their sales are telling them it's good.

I accept there is more to this than that, but it's the first step.

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#427
post #116

Where are the Open Source Hardware printers? Literally everybody (except printer makers) hates the printer landscape. All we'd need is to pool money to design a cost-effective open source hardware modular monochrome laser printer with open firmware.

Apropos. I just invented 3D-way to implement color laser printer. Firstly you have enclosed chamber with transparent top. Then you blow some color powder in the chamber. Maybe you apply some electrostatic forces to speed up the process. When the dust has finally settled on the paper, you just zap it with laser. The melted powder adheres to the paper at appropriate points. You suck the loose powder back to its container and repeat the process with next color.

This is clearly more economical construction compared to Xerox-style laser printer. It collects the powder firstly on separate surface, heats that and then presses adhered shit to the paper.

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#428
post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because that's not how it works, it isn't both. Yes HP is laying off employees just like pretty much every other large tech company right now. Which shows you it has nothing to do with fines, and rather everything to do with industry-wide overexpansion during COVID and high interest rates now.

> Because that's not how it works Exactly! I don’t know how to deal with people who talk about the economy in terms of a perfect competition free market where all participants have full knowledge and are all equal in terms of power. If a physicist talked in terms of zero friction or spherical cows, we would laugh them off and never listen to them again. And yet people continue to talk about the economy with these ass…

You will be in shock when you'll see in what terms mathematicians talk about.

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#429
post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would blame it a bit on standardisation… not too much, but when you drop the development of your own cpu, your own operating systems, your own hardware… you’re an oem like the others.

I often wonder whether companies like HP gave up too easily, why did they let Microsoft and Intel walk all over them.

Intel beat them by far with price/performance ratio.

Not to mention, Intel and Microsoft kinda explicitly targeted all the market share that hp and other similar companies were leaving behind… like desktop computing at home.

HP and similar companies just were blind to that, and never adjusted/resized their research efforts to those markets (huge markets obviously).

Re: HP disables customers’ printers if they use ink cartridges from cheaper rivals

#430
post #11

This issue is discussed for over 20 years now, it baffles me that there is apparently still no established solution. By the way, Apple forcing users to install apps only via its 30% fee AppStore has provoked far less outrage. Probably because people are not directly aware of the Apple premium, in contrast to the HP premium.

Because a printer can’t function without ink, that’s its sole purpose unless it is a multi function printer.

iPhones and iPads, you still can do other things, it’s not a paper weight cause you rooted your device or sideloaded an emulator…

Post reply on HN