I’ve had that problem with Roku, Google, and Vizio updates too, over the years.

At this point I’m comfortable saying that on device “Smart TV” software is a crime against humanity, full stop.

Google bricked all of the old fitbit scales with a firmware that glitches out and drains the battery. There were tons of reports at the time, but the devices were out of warranty so they didn’t fix it.

I lost my google mesh network to a firmware update, ofc I didn't even ask for it to be updated, they just shipped an update that bricked the devices. Just got an "out of warranty" response after they gave me the normal suggestions of trying to reboot, etc.

Google seems to have "directives from high" where they shoehorn the latest fad into all their existing devices, regardless of whether it works or not, on a tight schedule. Gemini is the latest one.

I had Google WiFi points that worked fine, and then there was a directive to merge them into Google Home. They didn't show up correctly in the Home app for a year or so.

This is literally the case, and it's not just with products that get shipped externally.

IANAL but I'm pretty sure the authors of software are liable for damages to property their software might cause. Regardless of whether that is the case, legislation should be enacted to ensure this and make complaints/remuneration standard and easy to extract without the costs of taking a huge company to court.

I don't know. Out of curiosity I went to framework website, found the software license for their BIOS firmware and it says "Software distributed under the License is distributed AS IS basis, without WARRANTY OF ANY KIND..."

Again, IANAL, but you can't disclaim certain liabilities.

EU has a minimum warranty period (2 years?) on electrical goods. UK has Consumer Rights Act that amounts to a limited warranty for as long as a reasonable person would expect the item to last(!). These disclaimers are to specify that any language elsewhere that sounds like a warranty -- 'we take pride in our work and ensure every laptop meets exacting standards' -- has a silent addendum of 'not a warranty' so you can't actually win in court claiming "this didn't meet exacting standards" (ymmv).

> installing official updates should extend the warranty.

That sounds like a big incentive to never ship updates.

That's better than bricking devices

Yeah we should go back to Windows XP or some other OS that no longer receives updates. Now they can't break it!

Just also make compagnies liable about any unpatched security issues for hardware newer than X years.

I don't know. I'm sitting here with a framework laptop consciously NOT updating it because I'm in no mood to have my computer SOL because a company can't seem to get their shit together?

Of note, I really like my framework, and I have installed BIOS updates on the past without issue. However, there have been a lot of firmware problems and fixes that are not fixes (battery related) and then bios updates that apparently cut the sound volume down to far lower levels than before the update, etc.

A user shouldn't have to worry about installing a BIOS update from the manufacturer causing the machine to die without circumstances like power loss, etc.

I feel personally that if such a BIOS update bricks someone's device, it should unquestionably be "we are sorry, let us send you out a new board asap". They can then reflash using pogo pins and send them out to other customers.

Accountability these days doesn't exist anywhere. It's making the world shit.