HP sued (again) for blocking third-party ink from printers, accused of monopoly::Suit seeks injunction blocking HP from bricking printers using third-party ink.
Perhaps they’ll be fined 1/4 day’s profits and carry on like nothing happened ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Yep. Needs to be tied to profit for the action at a minimum, and should be gross not net. Because net can be manipulated too easily.
But instead it’s just a cost of doing (shitty) business.
Bingo. The fines for these behemoths are pathetic. “I know what will work, let’s shake them down for their lunch money!”
What could work is to impose a daily progressing fine until the firmware change Is reversed and 3rd party ink Is allowed again.
printing all that paper in order to sue them probably ended up costing more than their fine
Imagine if you bought Ford and could only fill it up at Ford endorsed gas stations.
Delete this before a Ford Exec reads this.
Don’t worry, they’d have to geoblock the tank lid, and they don’t know where your car is. Oh, wait…
Tesla did that essentially with their proprietary charging. Then they essentially strongarmed other companies into adopting their standard.
Only in the us afaik. In the eu this didnt fly. We use menekes type 2 and ccs2, including all teslas.
I was under the impression that their standard was objectively better than alternatives, so that was a net positive?
There are upsides and downsides to it vs other standards, but the main point was that it’s a closed standard that no one else was allowed to use (until recently), and so Tesla drivers had to go to Tesla charging stations, not the ones run by other companies or individuals
that’s not true, there’s been adapters for Tesla drivers to visit other charging stations for a long time now
The standard for Tesla chargers wasn’t even released until November 2022, so up to that point it wasn’t possible for other people or organizations to build Tesla chargers. Tesla (so far as I can tell from my research) released the first official adapters in mid-late 2022, so until that point it wasn’t possible to use other chargers as a Tesla owner without using aftermarket reverse-engineered adapters.
For sure, not defending the road to get here, just acknowledging that in this case it worked out.
I hate to side with ElMo, but didn’t that happen because they kick started the EV car wave? And apparently their solution was also the better option, or something to that effect.
I think Nikolai Tesla did that a really long time ago.
He made electric cars?!
Yeah, and cell phones and long-range wireless charging.
I’m vomiting at the idea because while it sounds silly, I have to remember kuerig convinced everyone that coffee pods were a better alternative then tried to lock it down so only official kuerig pods worked.
HP is a dead company. Like a zombie that doesn’t know it’s state. Die already!
HP’s consumer division certainly is. Their computers are buttgarbage and their printers are outright scams at this point. My understanding though is they make shit like MRI machines…yeah the company is a zombie.
That’s probably HPE. The companies split a while back
So they’re completely unrelated? I thought it was just a division of hp. I don’t know much, but I’ve heard hpe makes good stuff.
Completely different companies. In 2015 HP became HP Inc keeping consumer products like printers and laptops and HPE split taking servers and business stuff. I assume lap equipment went to HPE as well but couldn’t find anything on a quick search.
I’m not even finding HP listed among MRI manufacturers.
According this NYT article from 1999, the medical arm of HP was announced to split off from the printer company 23 years ago.
According to a 90s article I linked deeper in this thread, the medical arm split off from the company in 1999.
I wonder what the people who work there are like
I get what you’re saying, but the majority of them are probably fine humans just trying to make a living
Is there a place to check and compare printers in respect to this?
I’m currently looking for a printer replacement and don’t want to lock myself to printers like these. I know to stay away from HP as it looks like they are the biggest offender. I know that brother generally was good, but I’m not sure if that still holds true.
What a great article 😄
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I bought one years ago that still functions on $15 high yield toner that lasts us a year.
Recently bought one for work for $199 (has an ADF) since the HPs stopped printing at all. It was the type that have the long ink cartridges for like $70. Had an employee that needed to print something quick from his phone for work and he couldn’t believe how easy and quick it printed compared to the HP. I think his quote was, “damn, that was awesome.”
Brother is the only printer that just works anymore.
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Yeah, The Verge apparently is fed up with printers
Except for the Brother printer everyone has.
Which is fine
This is the way.
Thank you this looks great, but I also want to be able to scan and copy documents on flatbed as sometimes they are connected or can’t go into the feeder for other reasons.
Brother also offers many MFPs; the MFC-L5700 for instance, has a feeder and flatbed scanner
This one looks very good. I actually was thinking of MFC-L8895CDW which I saw on costco.com, but then I saw MFC-L8900CDW which supposedly is identical to the former and MFC-L8905CDW which costs as much as the one in Costco and was wondering why Costco version costs as much as 8905 and got into a rabbit hole researching what’s the difference between them. And ended up not buying anything so far.
Perhaps those are overkill though.
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I have a Epson Eco tank printer that you just fill the tanks. There is no way for them to prevent you from using any ink you want.
Yeah those CISS style ones are awesome, really glad Epson embraced it after years of customers using 3rd party CISS.
If I were to get an inkjet again (I have a bw brother laser MFC), it’d definitely be a ciss.
Can HP go fucking bancrupt already?
A lot of things get hacked or tweaked. People make CNC machines out of random motors. I wish someone makes an open source paper printer.
No one would buy it. That’s the reality.
Their are two customers for printers businesses that need high reliability and high volume. They will pay more for this, if it’s cost effective in the long term. An open source solution wouldn’t be much cheaper, a business supplying servicing and repairs are still needed. The other are consumers that want something that appears cheap and are too ignorant to asses long term cost. They are served by budget printers sold for a loss. That loss is made up for in by selling them ink that is exorbitantly marked up.
An open source solution cant be sold for a loss, if the carriages are also open source. Only people ideologically in favour of open source solutions and those that do the maths to estimate long term value of printers.
Brother laser printers are good value per print. But they cost much more for less features.
Get a Brother laser printer and never look back
Just to add to this… I rarely print anything, but my wife (an elementary school teacher) prints all kinds of stuff! We picked up an eco tank printer from Epson. We’ve had it now for a coupe years and it’s been fantastic! We would replace ink cartridges a few times a year previously… Where as with the eco tank we do about once a year. The print quality has held up, and it’s just been a good little work horse for her!
If they cannot be trusted to compete fairly in the market, they should not compete in the market. Dissolve them, nationalize them, I don’t care. We can’t afford this bad behavior any more.
Monopoly 🙄
What a stupid fucking way to go after HP.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
HP has used its “Dynamic Security” firmware updates to “create a monopoly” of replacement printer ink cartridges, a lawsuit filed against the company on January 5 claims.
Additionally, the lawsuit highlights the fact that the use of non-HP ink cartridges doesn’t break HP’s printer warranty.
Last month, HP CFO Marie Myers praised the company’s movement from transactional models to forcing customers into continuous buys through offerings like Instant Ink, HP’s monthly ink subscription program.
The new lawsuit claims that HP’s firmware updates forced customers to buy HP-brand ink that costs more than competitors.
When reached for comment, Peggy Wedgworth, a senior partner at the Milberg law firm and one of the lawyers representing the plaintiffs in this case, told Ars Technica:
The lawsuit accuses HP of raising prices on its ink “in the same time period” that it issued its late 2022 and early 2023 firmware updates, which "create[d] a monopoly in the aftermarket for replacement cartridges, permitting [HP] to raise prices without fear of being undercut by competitors.
The original article contains 642 words, the summary contains 169 words. Saved 74%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
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HP is a failed capitalistic experiment.
I was able to install old firmware on an HP printer and circumvent the ink lockout. It’s highly dependant on when your particular printer was made, but it is an option. Just make sure you also turn off all the auto update options.
