So let me get this straight. You buy Phillips Hue devices because they work offline. Then they change how the devices you bought function making them only work online forcing you to create an account and allow them to collect data.

This should not be legal. This is a breach of contract, they modified the contract after you already signed it (by buying the device). If they want to do this, they should offer full refunds to anyone that wants to exit the contract, or only apply the changed to new devices.

I swear, these bad EULA updates that basically force users to “accept the agreement, or we’ll brick your device” needs to fucking stop and be made illegal. The price that’s set for a product, especially a damn physical product, should include the acceptance of an existing EULA, and it should be honoured even when new ones come out and the user chooses to not accept the new agreement. You’ve basically never owned the product if companies can just pull the rug underneath you, and render your hardware useless. And you can’t foresee such changes too; a predatory company can acquire one that you’ve trusted and pull this shit. It’s borderline daylight larceny.

The biggest gripe I have with this is that they are not cheep. Hue is one of the more expensive products smart lamp products.

Why are they chasing pennies? I could buy 3 ikea lamps for price of 1 hue.

Shame I really liked their color accuracy but guess I have to find new fancy lights.

Luckily I use home assistant so my lamps are not ewaste.

I know you the author doesn’t seem to want to hear about Home Assistant, but it does have the HomeKit integration they want and you have the fine tuned control the want too!

I know this post didn't coin the term 'enshitification", but it really is a great way to describe the monetization of everything that was once good on the internet

If they remove the ability to Zigbee to other hubs I swear to god I will be the first one on the class action lawsuit train.

Javascript plus a "curl | sudo sh" attitude to life equals "yeah no, I am never touching this thing".

Assclown take. Buy a HomeAssistant Yellow and boom done.

Tangentially related, but I recently bought a Philips shaver and the thing wanted me to install an app on my phone and connect it to the shaver via bluetooth to send shaving data.

I mean, I guess there's theoretically value there for some people? I can't imagine what, but that app's staying well off my phone.

I bought a Raspberry Pi a few months ago and I feel strangely prepared. I wanted to use Home Assistant to have greater control over my devices since Philips Hue's app seemed limited.

I feel like a sucker for falling for Philip's marketing but at least I can use zigbee. I have now decoupled myself from their Hue Hub and app. Unfortunately I now have a wasteful hub sitting around. I have it posted for free on the classifieds in hopes it will disappear.

Couple of weeks ago I wanted to change the intensity of the light bulb. I open the hue app and it tells me to download the new app, not allowing me to do anything else. I install the new app and it asks me to register.... I still have my bulb at full light :D I'll either find a compatible open source app or a light bulb that respect my privacy, I got a couple of tplink ones which were cheap and seems to work ok

I want a lamp that fades on as an alarm in the morning, and doesn't require an internet connection. What options do I have?

This is annoying, I just had to buy a new hue hub because they stopped supporting my old one, now this shit. Guess I have to migrate out of hue hub and set everything up again.

What if you are using Hue bulbs with Home Assistant. Works totally local and not connected to the internet. How are they going to enforce those to go online?

I went with matter supported Nanoleaf who don’t require a bridge nor an account (skip option in the app during set up).