When we last talked about Hewlett Packard (HP), the company had announced (because it cares about our security) that the “third-party inks can hack your network".
It was just the latest incident in a long history of printer manufacturers using DRM or software updates to dominate markets, always to the detriment of consumers.
There hasn't been much introspection from the company since then. HP CEO Enrique Lores went on CNBC to defend the company's position. First, he said that HP should be averse to ink cartridges to protect consumer safety, and went on to say that any consumer buying smart cartridges is making a "bad investment."
This week, HP unveiled its new plan: print as a service. The new programAll-In Plan” company requires you to pay anywhere from $7 to $36 per month to rent a printer with a set limit of printable pages. During the rental period, HP will send you the ink cartridges.
As Ars Technica reports, the printer must remain connected to the internet for monitoring, and the company's privacy policy gives HP full control over everything:
“Subject to the terms of this Agreement, you grant HP a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free right to use, copy, store, transmit, modify, create derivative works and display your non-personal data”
Of course membership comes with long-term contracts and early termination fees if you don't complete the full two years.
Paying hundreds of dollars for the same printer for an "eternity" is Hewlett Packard's latest brilliant idea. But besides the company who really needs it? Paying up to £36 a month for a printer you'll never own doesn't sound all that enticing especially when you consider that printers by nature aren't that expensive. Neither is ink, if companies didn't limit it so much.
For HP, none of that seems to matter. Lores doesn't think about building quality products or building solid relationships of trust. He is solely concerned with finding ways to accumulate profits and deliver improved quarterly returns to Wall Street at any cost.
If at some point they introduce renting the printers, they will just steadily increase the rental price.
Ultimately, Hewlett Packard is said to be moving steadily away from creating popular quality products, focusing more and more on creating complex subscriptions with "creative" limitations and ever-increasing monthly prices.
Always for our own good.
I threw them away and replaced them with Brother.