Logitech CEO Hanneke Faber talked about someting called the “forever mouse”, which would be, as the name implies, a mouse that customers could use for a very long time. While you may think this would mean an incredibly well-built mouse, or one that can be easily repaired, which Logitech already makes somewhat possible through a partnership with iFixIt, another option the company is thinking about is a subscription model. Yes.
Faber said subscription software updates would mean that people wouldn’t need to worry about their mouse. The business model is similar to what Logitech already does with video conferencing services (Logitech’s B2B business includes Logitech Select, a subscription service offering things like apps, 24/7 support, and advanced RMA).
Having to pay a regular fee for full use of a peripheral could deter customers, though. HP is trying a similar idea with rentable printers that require a monthly fee. The printers differ from the idea of the forever mouse in that the HP hardware belongs to HP, not the user. However, concerns around tracking and the addition of ongoing expenses are similar.
↫ Scharon Harding at Ars Technica
Now, buying a mouse whose terrible software requires subscription models would still be a choice you can avoid, but my main immediately conjured up a far darker scenario. PC makers have a long history of adding crapware to their machines in return for payments from the producers of said crapware. I can totally see what’s going to happen next. You buy a brand new laptop, unbox it at home, and turn it on. Before you know it, a dialog pops up right after he crappy Windows out-of-box experience asking you to subscribe to your laptop’s touchpad software in order to unlock its more advanced features like gestures.
But why stop there? The keyboard of that new laptop has RGB backlighting, but if you want to change its settings, you’re going to have to pay for another subscription. Your laptop’s display has additional features and modes for specific types of content and more settings sliders, but you’ll have to pay up to unlock them. And so on. I’m not saying this will happen, but I’m also not saying it won’t.
I’m sorry for birthing this idea into the world.
I’d pay to not have keyboard or mouse backlighting.
You’ll have to pay to disable the default blinking rainbow vomit.
Turn if off, TURN IT OFF!
I don’t know if i should laugh hysterically or cry, What we really need is for the protocols for multiple button peripherals to be standardized so we can let companies like Logitech do what they are good at, designing hardware, and let others do the software. I think i might even pay a subscription for getting my mouse to work properly without installing any software from Logitech.
It is a disease that we need custom vendor specific applications (not drivers, applications, with ui’s, all looking like they were made in Flash 20 years ago) for things like mice, keyboards, printers, sound output, GPUs, and even motherboards for bios updates.
The protocols exist, HID has very well defined ways of doing all this, the vendors just ignore it because it’d mean there’d be less reason to install their crapware.
Yeah I got a Logitech KB that uses G HUB that sits in the System Tray. I’ve got a Rival mouse that has its own System Tray software. Both annoying as hell just for the sake of having all the settings, including the essentially useless RGB animations. I can block those from loading but they need their grafitti-ware trying to keep their crap up to date. Enshitification to the desktop….
Sounds like the industry wants to unsolve another problem. As a poor person myself, the average mouse I use costs $10 and lasts 10 years; the first part to wear out generally being the clicky buttons. So I can’t really complain that I’m getting a bad deal.
Keyboards on the other hand, literally last forever. Even the cheap ones.
While rent seeking is nothing new, over time it may be getting uglier than it used to be. Companies keep trying to normalize the absence of ownership. A few steps each product generation. There was a time when customers owned their copy of Adobe products and could keep using them. Now it’s all subscriptions, they control you and they can unilaterally change software under your feet, even requiring new subscription fees just to open old files as they were.
https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/1/23434305/adobe-pantone-subscription-announcement-photoshop-illustrator
Obviously this trend has been pronounced in IOT devices, despite having genuinely fun & practical applications, IOT device stacks are being artificially handicapped to kill openness and discourage user control. It’s all becoming vendor locked. This absolutely sucks because many people like me actually like IOT innovation, but it doesn’t mean I want to be roped into jails, subscription services, and spying software. Unfortunately these things have become normalized and we’re at a point where consumers are getting hard pressed to avoid vendor locking on devices that connect to the internet.
As for the mouse software, hopefully logitech’s plans get shut down by the general public, but Thom Holwerda’s narrative is all too plausible. It starts with fairly simple software dependencies that become more problematic for customers over time.
Logitech software is the main reason I avoid Logitech products.
I was expecting a sort of rent for life hardware with garabteed replacement. But this?
I owned and cherished a marbleman fx ps2 trackball. Worked like a charm without special drivers and to this day the best mouse i ever owned. I threw it away after too much scratches on the (impossible to reorder) ball made it very frustrating to use for graphics work.
This innovation is brought to you by *Big tech.
Enshittifying your life for profit since…
And yes, rent seeking is evil.
To be fair, 1. this is a thought experiment 2. the mouse’s hardware would be easily customizable and replaceable. I wouldn’t put it past them doing this for real someday, but not yet.
So basically, DUMBaaS (Digital Unified Mouse Bundle as a Service). No thanks.
Very strange idea. My Microsoft Trackball Optical will celebrate its 24th birthday this year, and is still going strong without service contracts, subscriptions, extra software or whatever. A mouse is a mouse, there are the USB and HID protocol standards, why all the extra crap (excusez le mot).
In software “a very long time” usually means 3-5 years, or maybe 10 for an LTSB. I do hope that their “forever” mouse will still be usable once the software has died. For such simple electronics devices, I also doubt they will still be producing parts 5+ years from now; once the number of subscriptions goes below a minimum level, the thing will be killed.
Love the “hot-swappability for mouse button switches for upgrades/repairs”; it is a mouse, it doesn’t need to run 24/7 with 99.999% uptime; it really is ok to disconnect it for a few minutes.
Design to last and offering repair options is definitely a good thing. But Logitech must really be in trouble when such desperate ideas are the best they can come up with.
I bought a mouse for the first time in 30 years of owning my own PC.
Previously, I used rejected mice from the office, that end users said were not working, usualy because they wanted a new one, for whatever reason.
A few weeks ago, while shopping for other stuff, I got a discounted Mionix gaming mouse, for an extra 2€ on my purchase.
It’s still new, not refurbished, and supposed to be an high end gaming mouse.
Comes with custom software, firmare updates (!!!) and so on.
That’s one of the worst piece of hardware I ever used.
It’s totally unusable in games (“gaming mouse” remember), because it’s heavy and its most importantly its “LOD” (Lift Off Distance) is set much too high.
(You known there’s something wrong when you learn about a new technical term you never had to worry about before.)
After spending a week going back and forth with clueless support, it appears only newer models have a updatable LOD, and this issue can’t be fixed.
So this device is going to the recycle bin.
Now I know that if I ever want to purchase a new mouse again, I’ll have to spend days finding a not crappy one.
For now, I’ll keep a eye on rejected mice from users who want/need/require a more shiny one.
No thanks, they can keep their forever lasting mouse!