No one knows what evil lurks in the heart of men
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@Bishop - this is the worst ever - almost enough to make we want to give up my capitalist badge - quoting the article:
āThis is something we announced a few years ago that our goal was to reduce the number of what we call unprofitable customers. Because every time a customer buys a printer, itās an investment for us. Weāre investing in that customer, and if this customer doesnāt print enough or doesnāt use our supplies, itās a bad investment,ā Lores (HP CEO) says, turning āselling at a lossā into a neat āinvestmentā euphemism.
HPās CFO Marie Myers has also expanded on the subscription approach, noting that the companyās existing cartridge subscription service, known as Instant Ink, can deliver a ā20% uplift on the value of that customer because youāre locking that personā in."
Sounds like the Cali cartel discussing heroin addicts - weāve got 'em hooked, now reel them inā¦
This needs to be a quote in Shakās next Epson EcoTank commercial!
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Tragic example of the change from engineering culture, to MBA āleadershipā.
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I saw this on the ArsTechnica story about this & the CEOās comments about 3rd paty cartridges that can virus to a personās computer.
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The absolute state
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More like an absolute admission that they can no longer compete on engineering or by offering a good value or a reliable product.
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We have an HP printer with the subscription, mainly because I did the math and even though I hate to pay them a subscription for the ink, itās actually cheaper for us than what we were spending on third party cartridges with our last printer. We also had several issues with third party cartridges just sometimes not working.
That being said, I think the subscription is really dumb and I donāt like our printer already. You canāt control the margins and itās just not all that great. Iāve had a lot of bigger purchases in the past 12 months and about to take the family to Disney, but once weāre on the other side of all those purchases, Iāll probably start researching a non-subscription, non-hp printer pretty soon.
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I mean isnāt that how they get you? Actual good deal, turn up the heat slowly (or hit the afterburners like Unity tried LOL)
Technically, yes, but at least for the model I bought, you donāt have to use the subscription ink service. Once you switch to non-subscription ink, you just lose warranty support. Weāve had the printer past the normal warranty period anyway, so if they raise their prices and it no longer makes sense, Iāll just go back to aftermarket ink.
Iām afraid this is going to be a āvote with your wallet issueā and consumers just need to know the scam HP is running. I read comments about ātheyāre giving away the printersā but if thatās the case so are Epson, Canon, and others, yet they allow third party (or Ecotank) ink which is far cheaper than HP - so thatās not a valid explanation.
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I agree with this sentiment 1000%.
And the pessimist in me knows that because the consumers arenāt going to vote with their wallets, weāre doomed.
Case in point
Mercedes has a ādrive more fasterā subscription service SURELY NOBODY WILL EVER FALL FOR SOMETHING THAT STUPI- and theyāre set to make a billion dollars.
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Iām reminded of this.
How do you spell K-o-d-a-k?
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We use a hub printer in our office. It is, in a way, a subscription device. But that subscription comes with toner, technical consulting and on-site service.
In a business, it makes some sense. For consumers, we ought to have the option.
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We have two Toshiba photocopiers on contract (susbcription) and thatās okay, seeing as x and y is included. Done.
Other than the above, we have a selection of HP printers which, unfortunately, will eventually be replaced with Xerox (or whatever manages to work for more than a few months). Why? The last HP printer required online registration. It then wanted to be connected online at all times. It then failed to work with āalternativeā toners. Never again. The reg process was painful.
Greed.
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The sad thing is, HP really should be able to compete on engineering chops ā their new Pagewide printheads are amazing ā we have one at work and the print quality and lower power draw are quite nice, and folks couldnāt believe it was an inkjet based on the print quality and speed.
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So whatās going on with ARM and printing? I just installed the cumulitive update for ARM and it switched my default printer from our Kyocera office hub to Microaoft IPP driver. When I went to change it back it noted that by selecting the Kyocera Network printer, Microcoft could no longer manage my printers. Is this how they are trying to address their compatability issue?
By the way, the programs that have been running in emulation have been noticably slower after the last couple of updates. Hopefully, this cumulative update resolves that issue.
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