Musk did actually blacklist a someone for tweeting something unfavorable towards Musk.

https://cleantechnica.com/2016/02/03/sour-model-x-unveiling-...

But he did not disable a car. Refusing to continue to sell new products to a customer you consider rude is very different from bricking the product the customer is already having bought and using.

Yes, great analogy.

But Amazon can nuke accounts and disable "purchased" books, video, etc, at will. So there's a gray area. I think what Amazon does ought to be illegal, but hey.

So, with a little shame I'll admit I've actually been "banned" from Amazon. The one thing I can still access is all the digital content such as books, videos, and like, games or game keys that are associated with my account. I can't get into half of the account settings, can't even view my stored payment methods, for example.

But, to their credit, I can read my stupid Kindle books. Luckily their eBook DRM is terrible and I have liberated my content, but, still... to their credit, they did not block what I had paid for.

Now, I'm not saying it's impossible for them to block this content, but, it seems they are sensitive to the dubious legality or morality of doing so. I suspect it might have something to do with the huge negative backlash they got a few years ago when they did disable someone's entire content library and it got publicized.

Sorry about being banned, bro.

But I am pleased to hear that Amazon is no longer (always, anyway) blocking access after account termination.

If companies want to keep control of media and devices in this way we need a law to make them behave. Disabling a device without​ due notice should receive a hefty fine and compensation to the user.

Preventing or no longer supporting access to media should be similar and require an alternative format be made available, so Amazon can block access to an ebook or movie but must provide a download instead.

That would balance alittle the current disparity of power the companies hold IMO.

Recently NowTV/Roku unlawfully accessed my set-top box and disabled an app, the main reason for having the device, because they don't like it. They claim it's illegal but it's available from the curated app-store if I buy the more expensive device from the same manufacturer (or indeed a device from many other manufacturers).

I can't afford a lawsuit and we don't have group actions in the UK. Net effect a company cripples a device because they don't like how it is being used, and commit unauthorised access of a computer system in the process (currently illegal, but only individuals are being prosecuted for it).

We need protection from such companies.

I'm sorry to hear about your Roku. Whenever I get a device, I now have to spend time backing up as much as I can, for the inevitable "upgrades" that will hit me. With Android devices, you should always copy all of the .apk files off. I have a script somewhere which disambiguates the filenames and rsyncs them to my backup server. It has saved me many times. It's ridiculous that I have to go through so much trouble to have the same level of stability I had with a desktop pc I would buy from Dell, in the sense that Dell would give you a restore disc that will return your device to factory functionality.

I keep trotting this comment out every few weeks, because it happens so often now that the cloud eats something we own. Probably my most frustrating experience was when Apple forced me to update iOS, but they removed many features that I relied on. BTSync broke, Nightshift functionality that I was using with Flux was rendered unusable. And a ton of other little annoyances[1].

Apple heavily damaged my iPad with an update awhile ago. And Apple won't take no for an answer, and will keep downloading the next iOS update even over a cellular connection, so I had to firewall it.

Computing today might seem seamless, but, just you try and go against the grain. You'll encounter a remarkable amount of resistance. All I want is so have agency over the devices that I buy.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11986500