The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 7, 2016 10:02 UTC (Thu) by karkhaz (subscriber, #99844)
In reply to: The Internet of bricks by NAR
Parent article: The Internet of bricks

The same market where smartphones last for the same amount of time, if you're very lucky?

Thinking of these things as *devices* is misleading. The important bit of the IoT abbreviation is the I, not the T. If manufacturers notice that they can market their Things as *services*---such that the physical device is incidental, merely a way to deliver the service---they they will surely get away with it. They might be so kind as to give you a new Thing every two years---as long as you keep paying your contract---similar to cellphones.

Many ISPs in the UK supply you with a locked-down router that is hard-configured to use the ISP's DNS servers, etc. and is thus useless if you switch providers. Others give you a general-purpose router but then stipulate that you must either return it to them or buy it from them if you cancel your contract. This is the sort of perspective that I'm talking about---where the physical object is considered by the service provider to be merely a way of delivering service, and should not be useful to you if you no longer wish to use the service.

It took me a while to understand this, because I obviously know that smartphones and IoT devices are general-purpose computers. But manufacturers will stop at nothing to ensure that the general public *do not understand this*. The ideal world for them is where an $X box is a thing which is only capable of delivering the $X service, and so it won't seem at all inappropriate for $XCORP to own the box---what on earth else could it be used for? Why on earth would I want a $X 1.0 box when $XCORP has discontinued the $X 1.0 service and is now offering the new shiny $X 1.1 service?

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The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 7, 2016 13:15 UTC (Thu) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link]

This story is repeated again and again and again. First with phones (yes-yes, for more than a century people haven't owned then phone and had no means to buy phone from anyone else except AT&T - remember acoustic couplers?), then cellular phones, now IoT.

First server side and client side components are tightly tied together, then, slowly, they are decoupled more and more and in the end server and client become totally separate entities.

IoT here is a bit perverted since initially people were convinced that they are buying "things" and service would come for free (haha: who would pay for it? TANSTAAFL, you know), but the idea still stays: as long as server and client are tied together they would come as package deal.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 7, 2016 15:22 UTC (Thu) by NAR (subscriber, #1313) [Link] (9 responses)

The phone is not useful without the network. The router or the IP TV set-top box is not (that) useful without the network. But would anybody want a light bulb, heating or air conditioning that does not work without network connection?

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 7, 2016 16:51 UTC (Thu) by karkhaz (subscriber, #99844) [Link] (8 responses)

> But would anybody want a light bulb, heating or air conditioning that does not work without network connection?

Agreed, but

> The phone is not useful without the network. The router or the IP TV set-top box is not (that) useful without the network.

s/the network/a network/g

If your implication is that it is fair for some devices (but not others) to be tied to a service---I disagree with both of your examples.

You should be able to switch your phone/router/Nest to use a different carrier/ISP/home automation service. For example, in many countries, one can easily use a different cellular carrier by changing the SIM card in one's mobile phone. But in the USA, you cannot do this, because phones use CDMA, which (as I understand) ties the phone to one particular carrier.

It would be wonderful if somebody could create the OpenNest service that owners of Nest devices could switch to, either if their devices are bricked, or even if OpenNest is better than the built-in offering. This would foster competition, and reduce obsolescence: this is a very important point that Dianne made above. Of course, this won't/can't happen.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 8, 2016 3:46 UTC (Fri) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link] (7 responses)

> But in the USA, you cannot do this, because phones use CDMA, which (as I understand) ties the phone to one particular carrier.

Actually, AT&T and T-mobile are GSM and the phones are able to move between them. Verison and Sprint use CDMA, at least mostly. I've heard that at least one of them is now offering GSM/SIM based service.

The biggest issue has historically been the phone service contract that included and hid the cost of the phone. Thanks to T-Mobile, that has changed over the last 5 years or so and now phones are a separate purchase (with financing available) from every carrier.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 8, 2016 18:39 UTC (Fri) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link] (6 responses)

CDMA doesn't require a SIM card and those without one are locked to a network. If you do have one, the SIM is locked to the phone (probably the IMEI or something) and cannot be transferred to another phone (apparently; I've never even tried).

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 9, 2016 1:19 UTC (Sat) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link] (4 responses)

> If you do have one, the SIM is locked to the phone

It is the other way around, almost. The phone is locked to the carrier. The phone will reject any SIM that doesn't have the correct country/carrier prefix.
At least, that is my experience. Here in .au you can purchase an unlock code from the carrier to unlock you phone - it gets cheaper as time goes by and I think has to be free after 5 years or something. I've done that a couple of times.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 9, 2016 2:59 UTC (Sat) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link] (3 responses)

How's that work when you bring your own phone to a CDMA carrier?

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 9, 2016 10:06 UTC (Sat) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (1 responses)

The point of the exercise is to prevent people from getting a cheap subsidised phone from carrier A and then (more or less immediately) moving to carrier B. Since carrier A uses your monthly fees to recoup the cost of the phone (think of it as an installment plan) it is in their interest to keep you on the books at least until you have paid off the subsidy. If you do want to move to carrier B before the minimum duration of your contract is up and want to keep the phone, carrier A graciously lets you buy out your contract with them in a single payment in order to remove the “net lock” on your phone.

If you provide your own phone when you become a customer of carrier A to begin with, then that phone will naturally not be net-locked to carrier A because carrier A has no subsidy to recoup, so the issue doesn't arise.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 14, 2016 10:33 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> The point of the exercise is to prevent people from getting a cheap subsidised phone from carrier A and then (more or less immediately) moving to carrier B. Since carrier A uses your monthly fees to recoup the cost of the phone (think of it as an installment plan) it is in their interest to keep you on the books at least until you have paid off the subsidy. If you do want to move to carrier B before the minimum duration of your contract is up and want to keep the phone, carrier A graciously lets you buy out your contract with them in a single payment in order to remove the “net lock” on your phone.

Which is why, in the UK at least, it's presented to the customer as "a single monthly payment", but internally they account for it as two separate parts, the network service contract and the Hire Purchase contract. You can't cancel the former without paying off the latter.

And it was normal practice - I don't know if that's changed - to continue collecting the "single monthly payment" at the original rate even after the HP part had expired ... :-( Actually, I think they now usually pro-actively offer you a new phone a few months before the old HP expires, and roll the lot over into a new one ...

Cheers,
Wol

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 10, 2016 5:13 UTC (Sun) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

In general, they give you credit for turning in your old phone and give you a new one that's setup for that carrier.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 10, 2016 5:12 UTC (Sun) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

I've moved SIM cards from phone to phone on AT&T and T-mobile (and their derivative networks like metro-PCS). The phone must be unlocked, which you can do if the phone is paid for. If it's not yet paid for, you can pay off the rest of the phone and then they will unlock it. This used to be so tightly confused with the contract that it was really messy. But in the last year or so, the purchase of the phone has become a very separate thing from the rest of the contract. With you buying the phone over time, and deciding how quickly you want to pay it off (sometimes presented to the user as "do you want a free phone every year, every 2 years, etc but if you look at the math, it's a simple purchase with interest)

Verison and Sprint are the last bastions of the old way of doing business, but even they have changed recently. I don't use either of them, but I know that my friends who do are now getting phones with SIM cards in them, so I think they are slowly migrating their networks over.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 14, 2016 10:28 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link] (2 responses)

> Many ISPs in the UK supply you with a locked-down router that is hard-configured to use the ISP's DNS servers, etc. and is thus useless if you switch providers. Others give you a general-purpose router but then stipulate that you must either return it to them or buy it from them if you cancel your contract. This is the sort of perspective that I'm talking about---where the physical object is considered by the service provider to be merely a way of delivering service, and should not be useful to you if you no longer wish to use the service.

I'm not aware of any such routers ... not that things might have changed since I last got a router, but EVERY ISP router that I've dug into has a *default* ISP-supplied config, that can be easily changed using the standard manufacturer software.

And as far as that sort of behaviour goes with phones - I believe it is illegal in the EU. I've never had a locked phone from my supplier, unlocking is easy, and the phone company is, afaik, LEGALLY OBLIGED to provide an unlock code on request at the end of a contract.

However, given the way most people use their phones today - a full charge will last a day, a battery will last 1000 cycles, and - ahem iphones I'm looking at you - the battery is not a user-replaceable item (even where it is, most people won't bother), then it's no surprise the majority of people renew their contract to get a new phone every couple of years.

What we need - and hopefully will soon get - is legislation like in the car industry that says spare parts *must* be available (at a reasonable price) for at least 10 years after the car ceases production...

If the regs simply say that support must be available, hopefully manufacturers will suddenly realise that outsourcing this to the likes of RedHat, SuSE or Canonical makes a lot of sense ... :-)

Cheers,
Wol

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 14, 2016 15:35 UTC (Thu) by karkhaz (subscriber, #99844) [Link] (1 responses)

I've seen two routers like this. One from Tesco (yes, Tesco serves broadband...) and one from the ISP I use, which is Andrews & Arnold. I'd recommend them in a heartbeat to LWN readers in the UK, it's so refreshing to talk/email/IRC a technical support team who I wouldn't have been overqualified to work for by the age of five.

http://aaisp.net/broadband-support.html

But they supplied a very basic router (no wifi, one LAN output) on the assumption that I would already have my own switches etc., and it didn't come with any documentation. That was years ago, and they do now have a broadband package specifically for "home" users, so this may have changed.

The Tesco one was the same, you couldn't configure anything, so it was unable to run a server for multiplayer video games (for example). I've not had more experience than that, but I assume that the complete inability to configure anything is the reason why my entire neighbourhood runs wireless networks called LINKSYS-34FB9C5.

Yes, unlocking phones is trivial in the UK (many corner stores do it for a nominal fee), although phones are locked by default. But this isn't true in other locations around the globe, and indeed in many countries there is only one or two telecoms providers anyway, so they're able to strong-arm their customers however they like.

The Internet of bricks

Posted Apr 15, 2016 20:14 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

As far as I am aware, A&A have never locked down their routers or stopped you getting the password -- indeed, the password on the router is the same as the password for your control.aa.net.uk pages, so it would be hard to keep it a secret from the user. They merely provide the *option* to share the password with them (and, obviously, know it by default), so that they can pop in to look at problems if you ask them to (though even then you have to turn on WAN-side administration, which is turned off by default because anything else is a horrific security nightmare). They don't mind at all if you change it.

What they do say is that if they send you a router, you have to pay for it if you leave within a certain time (a year or two?) after getting it. This seems reasonable enough to me: the router did cost them money, after all.

(Note: VDSL routers before BT went to a wires-only policy were locked down, but this was *BT's* policy, not A&A's.)