Do they wait with showing ads, say a month or so, until after the common return policy for most stores have expired? That would be a really evil thing to do, just struck my mind.
Also, sounds like a case of optimization creep - "I know a way to get even more revenue, we just sign up with this $more_shady_ad_network!". Displaying more and more creepy ads, no-one decreasing ads since they don't want to be the one decreasing ad revenue.
Do they have the right to do that? Do customers in any country have a right to demand a product's firmware be restored to factory-state (on the grounds that what they received isn't what they were sold)?
I’ve used Australian consumer affairs laws to return products well outside the return date when they’ve been updated to remove/modify features I specifically wanted.
I returned a Bose speaker when it stopped letting you cast to it without their app, and have returned my Ring external camera when they removed customisable motion zones (I need to block a specific tree that moves in the wind). Plus more.
I’ve never had a problem doing so, I’m always polite and just explain that it’s no longer as advertised and print out the product update notes showing that they removed/changed x or y feature.
Sure, but we're on HN. The discussion here definitely doesn't reflect the general audience where 99% of the people aren't tech savvy and don't even know what a firmware is.
Sorry, don't where you're at. Over here, it's commonly a month return policy of most stores (no law setting this, it's a voluntary thing).
Then there's quite generous warranty for 2 years, up to 3 years, but that's when things break.
In addition, I think this also includes if a sold item is unfit for advertised use, or perhaps even if substantially changed during ownership (eg Samsung mandatorily introducing ads), but I've never had to use that so don't know).
> Then there's quite generous warranty for 2 years, up to 3 years, but that's when things break.
I disagree with describing this as 'generous'. A TV manufacturer should guarantee that the TV will not develop a manufacturing defect for a minimum of 3 years, if not longer. I have CRTs that lasted decades (plural) without issue, while I've had multiple LCDs fail in under a decade.
There's nothing generous going on here, they're systematically making inferior products in order to drive an increase in sales.
Also, sounds like a case of optimization creep - "I know a way to get even more revenue, we just sign up with this $more_shady_ad_network!". Displaying more and more creepy ads, no-one decreasing ads since they don't want to be the one decreasing ad revenue.