this post was submitted on 02 Aug 2026
68 points (95.9% liked)

Technology

86783 readers
3822 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.

Our Rules

  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots

founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
L3s@lemmy.world
enu@lemmy.world
technopagan@lemmy.world
L4s@lemmy.world
L3s@hackingne.ws
68
Should you still buy your next smartphone — or subscribe to it instead? Apple, Samsung … are betting that leasing, subscriptions, and guaranteed buyback programs can make upgrading more attractive. (techcrunch.com)
submitted 7 hours ago by eicker@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
44 comments fedilink hide all child comments
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] JensSpahnpasta@feddit.org 6 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Let's be honest here: A smartphone costs the same to develop, produce and so on, regardless of if you simply buy it or rent it. The companies need their profit, so they will not start renting you a phone when it is more profitable to sell it to you. It should make you suspicious that they want you to rent, because that kind of tells you that they will make more profit from renting than selling. That means that you will pay more for your phone in the long run without owning it.

[–] EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 1 points 11 minutes ago* (last edited 10 minutes ago)

The reason this is happening is because the cost of DRAM is ballooning the prices of all electronics and they are fully aware that people can’t pay the new higher prices even if they wanted to. Lower monthly payments is the difference between whether a lot of people buy an Apple or Samsung device at all.

I wouldn’t call this move nefarious on its own, but it is a dystopian side affect of the real problem which is DRAM price gauging.