Forced Obsolescence
The choice to upgrade our devices is no longer ours to make.
I'm betting that most of us have heard of "planned obsolescence"… the idea that manufacturers intentionally release products that are incrementally better over time so as to encourage consumers to purchase the latest and greatest feature over and over and over. Tech is notorious for this. The iPhone for the last several generations has been basically the same phone with only minor incremental improvements… and yet, there seems to be for many people that one feature they just can't live without. It's very, very incremental, and the choice to buy a new device in order to get that single nifty new feature is really up to us. We can or we cannot. There's no forcing function to make us upgrade.
Historically, this has been perfectly visible. Remember that refrigerator that had the horizontal pull-latch style handle? How about that 50-year-old beautifully restored car? Maybe your oven or range that's been running just fine for 20 years… or your dishwasher… or your microwave. These things might run for just this side of forever. You weren't somehow required to upgrade. Grandma's refrigerator, while perhaps wildly inefficient, still managed to run just fine. That car may have taken work to get back to mint condition, but it's all original parts and it still runs. Things "just worked" until they didn't, and then maybe you'd choose to get something new. Or again, maybe some nifty new feature would come out that was so compelling that the upgrade was worth it. Either way, the choice was yours.
We are no longer in that world. The "choice" to upgrade is no longer ours.
New features are certainly being introduced… but increasingly those features depend on internet access in order to work. Those features depend on the vendor (or some company) to maintain specific services that those features talk to in order to function. They depend on specific authentication mechanisms, specific APIs, specific data, specific protocols, specific everything in order to work. When that vendor or service provider decides to no longer provide those services… the services that your product absolutely depends on in order to work at all… your product is dead. You didn't choose to upgrade… You didn't choose to stop using the product… and the device itself might be in pristine, perfect working condition… but no more. It's dead for reasons that have nothing to do with you or it.
I'm calling this (and I sincerely wish I could take credit for coining the term, but it appears I've been beat) "forced obsolescence". It is the world we're rapidly moving into in which we no longer have to replace a device because it no longer works, but instead have to replace a device because some company somewhere decided it was no longer worth maintaining the services that the product depends on.
There are a ton of examples, but a few:
Insteon - Out of nowhere, Insteon, a manufacturer of home automation products, simply vanished from existence, and all of their online services stopped working. While the primary capabilities for their products may not have been dependent on the company's services (the switches continued to work), various capabilities instantly stopped working. Virtual assistant integrations (Alexa/Siri/Google) no longer worked, their mobile app no longer worked, and the capability to configure the devices online via their server-connected hub product suddenly no longer worked. (Note: Their ownership soon after changed and their services came back online, but now were only available for a subscription fee that was previously not required.)
VanMoof - This e-bike manufacturer designed the locking mechanism on their bikes to require a mobile app that depended on their online services to lock and unlock a user's bike. If those services were no longer available, this functionality would no longer work. If the bike was locked when the services went offline, that person's e-bike would be locked and unusable forever.
Automobiles (numerous, and other products) - In some cases it isn't even the manufacturer that is retiring services. Technology evolves constantly and at some point, the older technologies are simply turned off. While the link is focused on automobiles, this is true for any product that depends on a specific service. In this case, telecommunications companies were disabling their 3G cellular networks. While this had/has nothing to do with the manufacturers, it still means the features that depend on those technologies are now useless.
Google Nest - The acquired Nest cameras will cease to work in 2024. While the products themselves are as much as 10 years old, the hardware is still perfectly functional. It is solely Google's decision to stop supporting the server services that are causing these products to no longer function.
Obviously, this isn't a complete list. Toaster ovens, refrigerators, and other major appliances… Televisions, pet food feeders and litter boxes, speakers, clocks, robot vacuum cleaners, lawn mowers… examples of products that depend on a manufacturer's services to function are everywhere. Will Tesla vehicles continue to work when the wireless technology they depend on is removed by telecom providers? Will that toaster oven still offer even its most basic functions when June chooses to discontinue the services they depend on? Will BMW's seat heaters, which are now being offered via a (paid) subscription, continue to work when BMW discontinues hosting those services or offering that subscription that enable the capability?
While the initial obvious impact is the need for consumers to spend money in order to upgrade devices to a newer, supported model, there is a secondary effect: a massive increase in waste. Every time a product's services are discontinued, and those products cease to function, the consumer has no choice but to somehow discard of those items. While in many cases there are recycling services available, such services are not universal, are difficult to get to, are unknown to consumers, are simply ignored by consumers, or in many cases the products simply cannot be recycled. The impact on landfills is likely immeasurable, as well as the potential release of toxic chemicals and the loss of valuable scarce minerals that are otherwise being mined in environmentally destructive ways.
The choice to replace our devices to get that nifty new feature is no longer up to us. The ability of our devices to function is no longer dependent on the device. We are dependent on companies and people we don't know to continue to offer their services in order to allow our perfectly functional devices to continue to work at all.
Admittedly, there are times when this is impossible to avoid. Mobile phones are by design dependent on specific telecom technologies that will at some point no longer be available.
As consumers we have the opportunity to make choices as to whether we're willing to accept forced obsolescence. When purchasing a new device, perhaps consider the following:
Does it make sense for this device to fully depend on some other remote internet thing in order to work at all?
Am I willing to accept that this device will at some point simply stop functioning despite the device itself otherwise being perfectly fine?
Am I willing to pay, again and probably at a higher cost, to replace this device when it stops functioning?
Is it possible to find a device with somewhat similar capabilities that might continue to work when the online services are no longer available?
Does the manufacturer offer an exchange or return program in support of the day that the product will no longer function and must be disposed?
This is unstoppable… the evolution toward server-side services is expanding into new products every day. The best we can do is to manage the situation, and this likely should be placed on the manufacturers of these products to deal with. For example:
Mandate that a guaranteed lifetime for the services the product depends on be clearly indicated on the product, and have this lifetime be legally enforceable with significant (but reasonable) refunds to consumers in the event that those services are discontinued early.
Require that manufacturers provide a simple and free method and process for return and environmentally friendly disposal of products that cease functioning due to the discontinuation of services.
Demand that products that are dependent on subscriptions for enablement but do not technically depend on server services to function simply be fully activated when that subscription is no longer offered or supported.
Forced obsolescence is real and we're all being affected. The best we can do is push for informed and responsible behavior from manufacturers and make informed and responsible decisions for ourselves. Forced obsolescence is great for manufacturers that will make revenue as we purchase the latest functional product… but it's terrible for us, the consumer, and the environment. It's time for us to recognize that this is already happening and do something to manage it.