Fuck Subscriptions
Naming and shaming all "recurring spending models" where a one-time fee (or none at all) would be appropriate and logical.
Expect use of strong language.
Follow the basic rules of lemmy.world and common sense, and try to have fun if possible.
No flamewars or attacking other users, unless they're spineless corporate shills.
Note that not all subscriptions are awful. Supporting your favorite ~~camgirl~~ creator or Lemmy server on Patreon is fine. An airbag with subscription is irl Idiocracy-level dystopian bullshit.
New community rule: Shilling for cunty corporations, their subscriptions and other anti-customer practices may result in a 1-day ban. It's so you can think about what it's like when someone can randomly decide what you can and can't use, based on some arbitrary rules. Oh what, you didn't read this fine print? You should read what you're agreeing to.
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Some other groovy communities for those who wish to own their products, their data and their life:
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Louis Rossman's YouTube channel
Look at content hosted at Big Tech without most of the nonsense:
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The article is nonsense though. They signed up for a service where HP would send free cartridges as long as they keep the monthly subcription. Of couse they can't get a full cartridge and then just cancel the subscription...
It's like complaining that you can't finish watching that show on Netflix, that you downloaded to save mobile data, after you cancel your Netflix subscription.
Can’t speak for the article because all it leads me to is a photo disguised as a video without much context and pop-up galore.
That said, it’s a bit more nuanced that you make it out to be. HP uses some very shitty dark patterns.
Used to be that printers came with a set of starter ink cartridges.
HP nowadays uses Schrödinger’s ink called “HP Instant Ink Ready” cartridges.
If you never sign up for the HP Instant Ink subscription (incl. trials), then the cartridges that in the box will just be like the starter cartridges you’re used to.
If you however sign up for the subscription **or its ** trial, then the cartridges are changed into Instant Ink cartridges and will refuse to work once the trial is up and/or cancel the subscription.
I can see how people would expect to be able to use the cartridges that came with the printer like they always have been able to before HP pulled this nonsense.
It’s bad enough that this isn’t clearly and explicitly communicated with the customers.
What’s worse is that during setup of the printer (and in the marketing materials for the printer) customers are offered and asked if they want X months ink for free, without much indication that this is a trial for a subscription service.
Even worse that is not ink based, but per pages printed. Or to put it more bluntly: it’s a subscription that, depending on the tier chosen, gives you X amount of pages to print per month (paper needs to be provided by yourself) and HP will automatically send you ink to ensure you can print that amount of pages.
However, in all the marketing HP emphasizes ink and ink subscriptions (or “free” ink), and only after spending time looking into details can you figure out that you don’t pay for the ink, but for pages.
Here’s an example of how they market it as “6 months free ink”:
That ink is not free, because if after 6 months you cancel the trial, that ink is unusable.
Is that so self-evident?
Classically (and HP also still has this as an option somewhere hidden away I believe) these kind of subscriptions used to be supply subscriptions.
For X amount a month we’ll send you Y amount of supply and it was yours to keep and do as you see fit, nowadays it’s often marketed as “auto-ship” across many web shops and comes with a marginal discount, but there are also plenty of examples that just call it a subscription (e.g. razor blade subscriptions).
If you could use if after 6 months, it would be more than 6 months of ink..?
Either you like the deal or not. You can't be mad at it because you wanted to outsmart it but then you couldn't.
Just go away, we don't need shills here.
Fuck I hate this kind of comment. Not every one who disagrees with you on a company practice is a shill. In this case they even call it bullshit themselves, they are making a point about understanding what you sign up for.
Do you read every word in every EULA you click on "agree"? Do you consult with a lawyer and experts about every little detail what it may mean? Do you actually understand and agree on everything?
All these bullshit practices are scum. A person above has written in detail what kind of bullshit dark pattern trash companies like HP use. People accidentally signing for this ink crap is all over the internet, because it's not fucking normal to need to read 50 pages of gibberish shit contract when you buy a fucking printer.
And in no, no circumstances is it normal to design a service for a printer that a customer buys that lets them print only a certain number of pages and then makes the rest of the ink unusable. If nothing else, it creates waste.
Printer companies have been using shitty practices when it comes to ink for 2 decades, HP always being the worst. This is their latest crap and way over the line. If you think this is okay, then you're a shill and you indeed don't need to be here. Go to some community that licks the boots of all these corporations.
The point is that “6 months free ink” is misleading whichever way you look at it because it’s ambiguous since ink isn’t measured in months.
Even if your reading of it would be the intended reading, then it’s still misleading because it’s just a 6 month trial for a per page subscription. Or put differently: if you surpass the monthly allocation of pages, you would have to pay, making it not free.
Given that neither the trial component nor the per page component is mentioned in the image and given the fact that the offer is ambiguous, there isn’t much to like or dislike about the deal because the deal as presented is false and non-existent.
Moreover, you conveniently sidestep all the other issues I’ve mentioned.
Like the fact that people receive cartridges with their printer that will be rendered useless with no clear warning on the box that this will happen or how to prevent this, instead they’re listed on the box in the same fashion other printer manufacturers list their cartridges that don’t get rendered useless.
"mentioned in the image" was the part where you lost me. There is no offer, there are no contract details, it's just an ad. They have to give you details before you sign anything. You can't blame them if you didn't read the EULA and TOS before agreeing to it.
Stop with this bullshit. This is exactly the kind of bullshit subscriptions this community is against.
The problem I have with it is that HP also bricks third party ink. Basically they bought a printer that's useless without a subscription fee. I don't think that's right.
I'm not saying it's a good thing... but they agreed to that. You can't first agree to bullshit, and then complain that it's bullshit ._.
I fully agree with you and decided to post that to give your downvoters an additional downwards-arrow to demonstrate even more that they don't read the EULA nor TOS before agreeing :-)
This would be why I simply wouldn't purchase one of those printers.
Not trying to be a dick here, but it's not like any of this is a secret. If you're dropping a non-trivial amount of money on a printer, and additionally signing up for a subscription to boot, is it not prudent to actually learn about what you're buying?
The point is how shitty it is to have a subscription for ink on the first place.
And if you do have one (it might make sense for businesses and such), then it should be set up so that yes, you can use all the ink, to cut down the waste.
Besides it's known that HP uses enough dark patterns that people aren't sure what they're signing up for.
And just check what community you're in :p
Also, how tf are those cartridges free? This is exactly the kind of bullshit language companies like that want you to use.
Also also yes, DRM is fucking cancer too. Way to give an example.
If I subscribe to a magazine they don't take the last magazine away when I cancel. This is a physical product, not an online product like Netflix.
I mean I'm pretty sure if you cancel your Netflix subscription it still finishes the current billing period and just doesn't renew so you can finish watching that show.
Right which is what's going on here. HP instant ink will let you cancel at any point and then it's good through the end of the billing period. I hate the waste that's being generated here and HP is anti consumer as hell.
I'd be a lot less salty about it if the original cartridge could revert back. On the other hand I understand the bricking of the cartridge If you've used enough ink that you're into your second cartridge.
I think a lot of this could have been avoided if the business decisions behind how instant ink is marketed were less consumer hostile. I'm still baffled that they don't give you the option to buy out the remaining prints in your cartridge when you terminate instant ink. Seems like easy money that would help this feel less anti consumer.
And that’s why I pirate.