I was actually using irony to highlight how "helpless" companies act when they deliberately engineer a flaw that "forces" them to charge a recurring support fee. The scenario where they didn't consider this outcome is impossible; they knew they could charge a recurring fee by removing all physical controls. They did 90% of the work and charged you monthly for the remaining 10%, not because the last 10% is hard, but because you have no other choice.

This is not a bad decision, but an intentionally insidious design pattern intended to separate owners from the functionality they paid for and own. The people that greenlit this design deserve to be held criminally liable. The business in this instance deserves no empathy.

meh, I dont have a lot of sympathy for users who buy devices with subscription functionality unless there is false advertising involved.

IMO people need to grow a pair and stop buying crappy products. business policy would turn around over night if they did.

The fact that collectively we refuse to grow a pair ensures that bad business policy dominates us until we outlaw it.

Or it can mean that most consumers have so much money they accept paying for the product.

Nobody is holding a gun to consumers head and making them buy a $1700 bassinet with an additional subscription.

My preference is to keep the government out of consensual agreements between adults unless it is a matter of life or death.

Your preference is starting to cause substantial market harm that can only be resolved with regulation and antitrust legislation. Suffice to say you may want to tweak your outlook on the free market apropos of the internet and other such technologies our forefathers failed to consider.

Why do you think there is meaningful harm and why do you think it needs to be resolved with legislation?

In my mind, making sure that yuppies get a slightly cheaper $1700 bassinet is completely outside the scope of the roles and responsibility of government.