I think this is likely going to be true unfortunately, but I also feel like the title is more than a bit misleading. (The title at Ars is identical to the title of the thread here)
I didn’t see anything in this article indicating that Spotify has made any direct comments on whether they were going to open source it or not. From the article, it also sounds like refunds haven’t been publicly stated as the official solution from spotify, but instead just something some people have managed to get spotify support personnel to approve. In fact, it’s stated that Spotify specifically ‘declined to confirm’ that refunds were the official solution.
For reference, I bought my Car Thing for about $50 in 2022 and was able to get 3 months of credit for my family premium plan ($17/mo x3 = $51), so in essence a complete refund.
As much as it sucks to lose the Car Thing, I’m happy with this outcome at least. Anyone recommend a good replacement for an older car?
I ripped out my old radio and put one that had apple carplay. Was annoying to install but worth the effort.
Refunds cost Spotify money. Open Sourcing is free. This is an epic level of dumb.
People underestimate how much work open sourcing something acrually is. Not trying to defend Spotify, fuck Spotify, but open sourcing something isn’t free.
Honest question, why would it cost money?
Unless the code in car thing exposes vulnerabilities or potential exploits in Spotify. Even the potential exposure may not be worth the risk to them.
my money is on Spotify violating licensed open-source code in Car Thing, which would be revealed if they open-sourced their code.
Maybe they don’t have 100% of the rights to the hardware in order to open source it? I don’t think they made this hardware in house. They would have had to outsource it.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Further, Spotify’s support page for Car Thing doesn’t mention refunds and only tells owners to reset and properly dispose of or recycle the gadget.
As noted by TechCrunch today, in October 2021, Spotify CEO and founder Daniel Ek said that more than 2 million people initially signed up for the Car Thing waitlist.
By July 2022, Spotify revealed that it was no longer making Car Thing, its only hardware, naming product demand and supply chain issues as factors.
Since Spotify announced that it will forcibly brick all Car Things in December, users have been pleading with the company to open source the device.
If they continue with the plan to brick Car Thing in December, the refunds won’t matter when our anger & disappointment resurfaces, and we remember why they lost our trust as users.
As Spotify currently looks unlikely to do more to appease Car Thing owners, this incident may have to serve as a note of caution for people considering buying hardware from a company that might not commit to long-term support.
The original article contains 725 words, the summary contains 174 words. Saved 76%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
They might not need to open-source it: hackers have found ways of jailbreaking the installed Linux and are stepping up efforts for making it reusable. It’s a rather feeble SoC, so there won’t be a huge number of applications for it, but there will be some.
I really want a second hand one to use as a Plex controller, would be awesome for controlling my speakers in the home.
What’s SOC?
Honestly it would be cool to have it just able to clip to my vent and show me my now-playing or let me select episodes of podcasts or w/e
Are they making customers mail them back? They’ll probably go for $20 plus shipping if not.
