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  • Damn, Brother was the only company left I was happy to blind purchase from by name alone.

  • O, damnit. Not the last bastion of hope!

    Edit: 100% serious. Like Rossmann, Brother was the go-to brand.

  • Have to keep things offline and outdated nowadays 🫤 to prevent things like this happening.

    • Honestly, that's not a terrible idea in general. Like, if you have an Internet-connected device, you have a hook onto your network that someone can exploit down the line, including -- as Rossman points out -- making it function differently than it did at the time of your purchase in ways that you may not like. And even if you trust the manufacturer, that doesn't mean that someone cannot acquire them and then exploit that hook.

      Kind of a problem with apps and other software too. Even open-source software, like the xz attack -- the xz package itself was fine, but you had someone, probably a country, intentionally target and try to seize control of an open-source project to exploit the trust that the open-source project had built up. I understand that it's also been a concern with even browser extensions.

      The right to push updates to an Internet-connected device, unfortunately, has value. And there are people who will try to figure out ways to take advantage of that.

  • I've been saying that for a couple of years now. They started fucking with third party ink at least a year ago

  • The last bid I reviewed for a new office recommended Brother printers (woot) but the color laser had toner lock-in. I recommended an alternative and the owner agreed.

    Too bad these companies won't know about the products they don't sell because of this crap.

  • Ugh.

    $100 mono laser printer

    Well, you probably aren't getting a $100 laser printer unless they've got a razor-and-blades model. I definitely paid more than $100 for the mono laser I have. I don't know what printers out there are gonna be fine with third-party ink (or toner), but any that do are going to cost more, because they aren't relying on ink sales to make the printer business viable.

    He says that he doesn't know what to recommend any more, now that Brother has started doing this too.

    I understand that Epson has some inkjet printers that don't use ink cartridges. You just pour more from a (cheap) bottle into the tank. Like, they can't implement a lockout, and there are other manufacturers that sell ink for them.

    kagis

    "Ecotank".

    https://www.amazon.com/s?k=ecotank

    But if you want those, they're gonna cost more than printers that are using the razor-and-blades model and expecting to make their money on the ink.

    https://epson.com/For-Home/Printers/Inkjet/c/h110

    There's a list of their home inkjet printers. Notice how the "EcoTank" ones cost more than the non-EcoTank ones.

    Like, one way or another, the printer manufacturer is gonna make their money. Either it's not razor-and-blades model, in which case the printer is gonna cost more but the ink is cheaper, or it's razor-and-blades and you get a cheap printer but pay more in ink and the printer manufacturer will do everything they can to lock out anyone else from selling ink for the thing.

    EDIT: I'd add that I am not personally a huge fan of inkjet printers unless one really needs what they can do, like printing photo-quality images, because they have so many more issues with ink handling than do lasers. I can have laser printer sit without powering on for five years, then turn it on, and it'll come right up and work fine. Inkjet printers are prone to clogging problems.

51 comments