This should be a standard requirement for abandoning an internet reliant product (with all IP and internal documentation released and becoming public domain in the event of a bankruptcy, and keys handled by some consumer protection agency capable of facilitating community projects working to unlock them for owners).
But questionable value of the product aside, the fact that they’re making the effort to not be assholes and try to do what it takes to give their costumers’ products the life they can is better than most, so they deserve credit for that.
Electronic products and software should get a “at least supported until” label on the packaging and legally obligated to keep the servers running until that time.
The company behind this robot is going bankrupt, which is why support ends and they stop working. This law would do nothing in this case because the company seizes to exist.
Only if there’s an absolute bare minimum they’re allowed to choose of 5-10 years after the last device/software is sold.
And even then, I still think they should be required to unlock devices (and software DRM bullshit/APIs to re-implement server components) to allow people who want to maintain them themselves.
EU pushed new product liability bill. After it takes effect companies will be responsible for breaking of devices and software.
Seems like a good move but it will also raise the risk of releasing new tech. Startup money will have to include some kind of coverage for that, making it harder to get startup money. Rather than simply impose a liability I would feel better about requiring orphaned IP to be opensourced so interested parties can do exactly what’s happening in this case.
Nah, if a company goes bankrupt, their entire software base should just be posted online.
Or sold like their many assets.
Doing the right thing. How rare.
once they threatened to abandon it sure. eventually even corporations can be dragged into doing the right thing.
Most companies don’t listen, these guys did. Many times when people did the right thing, they had to go through a process first.
It would have been if they did it completely on their own, maybe even designed the system for this possible outcome from the beginning.
But it’s the end result that matters. They can release the source or they can not. They chose to release it, and that’s great!
Using some creepy robot with a proprietary algorithm to provide “emotional support” to children sounds like a good thing to go out of business.
One would expect kids with autism to be more picky about their emotional support, not less
it’s about being able to read emotions:
a large portion of autistic people have trouble reading emotions in others.
that’s why they’re often drawn to things like books, comics, animated content, theater, and, like in this example, robots that clearly express their emotions.
speaking for myself (diagnosed ASD), it’s the ambiguity that bothers me more than anything. i like it when things are nice and clear, neatly organized, and generally don’t require a lot of attention to interpret.
interpreting the environment is taxing enough, adding a lot of emotional interpreting on top can quickly get overwhelming, which leads to poor mood, performance, and ultimately just straight-up headaches…again, this isn’t a hunch, it was part of the ASD diagnostic test.
so i can imagine how much easier it is for kids with similar problems to relate emotionally to something that shows it’s emotions in clear, easily recognizable ways, rather than having to guess constantly. that constant guessing gets real tiring, real quick…
I just don’t get it with these proprietary cloud connected devices. Do people just not realize that keeping server infrastructure running for free after a product is sold is not in a company’s best profit-seeking interests (maybe they don’t even think about how things on the Internet actually work, I dunno)? I thought of this almost fifteen years ago when I started seeing smart thermostats. There should always be an option to go local, even if it requires the consumer to acquire a skillset in IT. Maybe we can start working things like that into right to repair legislation if it isn’t already.
I once had a tech support ticket for a computer not turning on. When I checked it out, they had connected a power bar to itself. This 40yr old man genuinely didn’t understand why that wouldn’t work.
I really don’t know. All I can say was he was one of the lucky 10,000 that day.
Most people don’t think about how things work. I’d guess that most customers thought all the smart features were internal and the Internet connection was just an arbitrary requirement
For home stuff, look for the tech “Matter over Thread”. They’re protocols* designed to allow your stuff to work with any ecosystem, including local.
It’s been slow to roll out, largely, imo, because companies would prefer to lock people into their own ecosystems and apps. Apple, Google, and Samsung do have some motivations to be interoperable though, and Matter/Thread is that effort. Consider looking at Home Assistant if you want to know more about this ecosystem and local, open control.
I could go into more detail, but this is already a tangent.
Is there missing punctuation in that headline or am I an idiot?
No, there is no punctuation missing, the headline writing style is just hurting comprehensibility. I’ll expand it a bit.
“A startup, which is set to brick an $800 kids’ robot, is trying to open-source it first”
Cheers, I can read and comprehend the original headline now. I’m Australian so English isn’t my first language, at least that’s my excuse.
Here you go then
“Oi, this startup’s about to turn an $800 kids’ robot into a bloody paperweight, but they’re havin’ a crack at open-sourcing it before it carks it.”
