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Philips Hue will force users to upload their data to Hue cloud - Home Assistant
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this post was submitted on 22 Sep 2023
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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io
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This always annoys me. How can a device you have purchased outright with certain functionality, have the terms of service changed after the point of purchase which then changes that usage of the device.
This seems like you could return for refund as the device is NOW not what you originally purchased.
Where does this end? We buy a car then 5yrs later they change the terms of service and if you don't agree you don't get the right to have tires on your car.
Why does your lightbulb need to connect to the internet at all? Automation does not require the cloud.
How else would you send spam or stage a DDOS attack? /s
Until something is legislated, this will continue to the end-user's detriment.
I bought some Philips Hue bulbs In something like 2015 which have worked mostly fine ever since, but the control surface has become more and more intrusive over the years. I'm now relegating the bulbs to dumb use until they finally die.
I have completely swapped to just normal LED dimmer switches.
I live far enough out in the country that we get brown outs for less than an eye blink. Every fucking light bulb will shine bright like a diamond and there is no way to turn it off.
I've tried setting the 'Power On' Behavior but it just ignores it for these scenarios. It's so maddening to wake up at 3 AM with every light on having paid hundreds for light bulbs I 'own' but can't command.
It's a good feeling knowing that my basic non-internet connected car can't receive an OTA update to make me start paying a subscription to use something I already have just because the company decided they want more money.
I feel that at the very least, the customer in that case should be entitled to a complete refund of the product, regardless of whether they bought it 5 days or 5 years ago and regardless of the condition their device is in.
This should at least give some incentive to companies to not perform such sweeping changes to their terms of service and if they do, the customer can more easily remove themselves from the lock-in without taking a financial hit.