Philips Hue will force users to upload their data to Hue cloud

Ooh I can't wait for the new Philips Hue® lighting monthly subscription service, where with a low fee we can access all of our standard lighting IOT with the basic subscription plan and colored lighting with the premium subscription!

Let the enshittification begin.

Friends don't let friends use the cloud enshittified internet services. Stop signing up for subscription services for things that should never have a subscription. Stop giving companies your data. Even if they aren't screwing you over today, they will tomorrow. It happens so often it's just background noise on the news anymore. Just say no to putting your shit on the cloud other people's computers.

I'm struggling to understand the reasoning behind this. Like these are just lightbulbs right? What's the value in that data that I'm not seeing

Remember, just a few years ago when the latestagecapitalism sub was created and everybody was like ha ha you lefties, and now every single big corporation is self immolating in 2023… good times!

You don't understand, your lights need to track you, how else are they going to improve your user experience? Using lights is so complicated that it requires them to train AI models to better understand the necessities of users. The methods that have worked for hundreds of years cannot work with today's users

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Age_of_Surveillance_Capitalism

Well, look who's looking like an idiot for setting up my entire house with Hue lights recently after running two bulbs with local control for years... sigh it's getting mighty frustrating having to deal with companies hoarding your data.

Lately it is getting more like we are not just the consumers, we are the product. It is very uncomfortable.

This was the final push I needed to switch over to Home Assistant and their hub. I needed a simple plug and play solution and Green delivered.

Migrates the lights, curtains, and will migrate more.

Fuck proprietary hubs and technology, and fuck me for buying into that shit in the first place.

Open source Matter/Zigbee/Zwave when?

Its actually illegal under the Consumer Rights Act 2015 in the UK for a product to force a change on its functionality after you bought it.
Also surprised if EU law will allow this ?
I for one will be seeking a refund for the products either directly or through a court just to show them up.

Update Note Showing Consumer Rights Act 2015 "Goods Not Fit For Purpose" alone is enough to demand your money back. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/15/section/10
and as it relies on digital content to support them and this is where the main problem is, section 40 applies where they changed it for the worse
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/15/section/40

This is a great innovation by Phillips, and it follows rule 8 from my best selling business book, “12 rules for business”.

Rule 8: The business is always right - never give customers a choice when you can dictate the terms to them instead.

It was potential decisions like this that made me stop using various IoT devices in my life.

And year after year, i am proven right.

I mean I'll create an account and then block any of that data sharing on my router.

My whole house I sent up with Hue lights.

I'm Australian and I'll be contacting the ACCC.

Hue can go fuck yourself, Phillip

A few years ago, I declared to my family that if they bring any "smart" appliances into the house, they (the appliances) would get the sledgehammer. They (the family) didn't understand why.

Now they understand.

Yep, I started getting the prompts to create an account to continue using their app...

The app rating in Google is currently 4.5 stars. I did my part in leaving a review, and got a nice "As our features grow..." pasta reply.

Edit: I've also downgraded the app to version 4.38 and disabled auto updates (both for the app and the firmware), and asked my housemate to do the same. That should keep things working for now.

I have an adblocker for my home connection. By far, Hue subdomains are the most common blocked ones.

Philips Hue sends data to servers every few minutes.

Glad I still have the old bridge which is not compatible with the current app, and so they offer the legacy app separately. Though I assume it's only a matter of time before the bulbs I have die and new bulbs require the new bridge.

Glad I was always broke enough to not buy their bulbs

isn't hue a kind of vietnamese soup? bun bo hue?

oh wow. i have the GE cync bulbs, everyone says hue is better [which may well be true, the cync app is complete ass + trying to connect / troubleshoot] but maybe this evens things

Does that mean they're abandoning zigbee and not adopting Matter/Thread?

I’m not going to create an account. What I will be doing is looking for an alternative setup that is simple and completely local or just go back to traditional led bulbs.

This is easy for me with just one room using Hue. I feel for those who have them for all or most lighting around their home.

Just get a bulb pre-flashed work either Tasmota or ESPHome. (ESPHome integrates well into home assistant, Tasmota is otherwise a bit more well rounded, but they're both great)

https://templates.blakadder.com/preflashed.html

https://kaufha.com/blf10/

https://www.athom.tech/blank-1/15w-color-bulb-for-esphome

LIDL is selling a bunch of "smart" crap this week including a "smart" kettle. According to the blurb "Can be linked to the Lidl Smart Home System using your WiFi connection". And I'm thinking yeah and what possible reason ever would I have for needing that? And the same is true for most smart products.

did anyone actually go to the store and put a bunch of these in the cart?