It is hard to imagine that there was not someone inside of Nike that lost their faith in humanity when the pitch for these things was originally taking off.
A Roku stick requires the Roku streaming service to be functioning to be useful. If there wasn’t a service with streaming media, the stick would have nothing to stream.
Still becomes e-waste if Roku drops support for it. Granted, that’s not the best example as I’ve got an old-ass Roku that still works, but the point stands. Same goes for Fire sticks and other devices like that.
They really should be forced to, at minimum, release unlocking tools to allow 3rd party firmware. (Think flashing OpenWRT to a Roku and using it as a travel router or something). Ideally, they’d also release a development kit to foster “after-life” uses of such devices.
Lots of companies will accept old devices back (supposedly to recycle), but there’s another “R”, re-use, that’s also an important part of the process.
Still becomes e-waste if Roku drops support for it. Granted, that’s not the best example as I’ve got an old-ass Roku that still works, but the point stands. Same goes for Fire sticks and other devices like that.
Just look at Spotify’s Car Thing.
There are other risks, such as the functionality changing without your knowledge or input (see again: Roku): https://www.theverge.com/24188282/roku-tv-update-motion-smoothing-turn-off
Are kids still even taught the three Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle)? I was always taught that they were listed in order of importance, but that seems to conflict with modern capitalism.
