News from The Verge + Sonos explains why it bricks old devices with 'Recycle Mode' Chris Welch got Sonos to comment on this ridiculous policy. The more I think about it, the more annoyed I am. Basically: Sonos wants to give people with speakers that are over 10 years old a 30 percent discount if they promise to recycle their old speaker. So far, so good, but apparently the guarantee that it'll be recycled is a kill switch that renders the speaker inoperable. Hey Sonos: the phrase is Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. In that order. Reuse is many orders of magnitude better than recycling if at all possible. The worst part of it is Sonos' reasoning, as follows: For those that choose to trade-up to new products, we felt that the most responsible action was not to reintroduce [the older products] to new customers that may not have the context of them as 10+ year old products, and that also may not be able to deliver the Sonos experience they expected. Think about how patronizing this is for a moment: it assumes that people who buy older Sonos speakers will be incapable of making those used-product purchases with eyes wide open regarding their capabilities. All of this is just badly handled by Sonos, which is a shame because otherwise Sonos is the gold standard for product support and longevity. It supports speakers for 10 years or more in some cases — well beyond what trillion-dollar companies are willing to do! I am a Sonos customer and will continue to be for many reasons. Their speakers are great, their offering is elegant, and it makes me happy to have high quality products that don't come from the giant tech companies. Giving Sonos the benefit of the doubt, what I think it's trying to do is ethically and elegantly End-of-Life these products. That's laudable, and a damn sight better than what happens with most consumer tech. I suppose the issue is that while it can built the lifetime support cost into its speakers for new customers, the second and thirdhand customers ultimately end up costing the company money in software support. Sonos speakers, like everything else these days, are basically a subscription product. Instead of paying monthly, you pay a premium for the retail cost of the speakers. For whatever reason, Sonos doesn't feel like it can just come out and say so. If it's a cost problem, I'd prefer Sonos offer new customers with very old speakers some kind of one-time fee to re-activate service. If Sonos simply needs to EOL those speakers, it should just do so. This whole situation feels like Sonos was trying to get away with something, which is antithetical to its entire ethos. Sonos can't support its speakers forever. Sonos also can't seem to just admit it, either. + Sonos Port review: flexibility for a price Good review from Nilay Patel. I think it's frankly obnoxious that Sonos doesn't have a solution for people that just want a line-in to their systems that costs less than $399 (the price of a Play5) or $449 (the price of this thing). I have a riff about how both Apple and Sonos are forgetting that there's such a thing as a "Prosumer." With Apple, the it's starting the Mac Pro at $5,999. With Sonos, it's the Port. We all hate that corny term, but there really are a lot of people who want to do more than guard-rail gadgets will let them and are will to spend a little more for it. That's it. That's the riff. + Pixel 4A could feature a hole-punch display, unofficial render claims I hope it has better battery life than the Pixel 4. + When your next door neighbor is a glittering spaceport Watch this great video from Verge Science featuring Loren Grush. + Apps don't provide reliable help for suicide prevention Nicole Wetsman: Their analysis showed that there's little oversight of the specific information contained within these apps. "Our findings show information may not be corroborated and clearly demonstrate the lack of self-regulation and self-monitoring of the industry," they wrote in the paper. Developer guidelines on Apple's App Store say that apps that could provide inaccurate health information may be reviewed more closely by Apple, and Google Play says that apps with misleading medical content are in violation of their policies. The Verge has twice emailed Google and Apple for comment, and will update this with their response. + Anker unveils first MFi certified iPhone 11 flash, shipping next month for $49.99 I'm hesitant to call the Made for iPhone program a failure, but think about how few accessories there really are for it after so many years. Apple clearly doesn't think that's a problem. + AT&T's 5G coverage expands to six new cities, including New York, Philadelphia, and Las Vegas I am loathe to give AT&T credit for anything when it comes to naming things given its deceitful, callous decision to rebrand LTE "5Ge." However, giving mmWave the "5G+" brand and low and mid-band a regular "5G" moniker makes a lot of sense. mmWave is so fundamentally different from the more traditional radio reception we're used to on 4G that it makes more sense to call it something different than just "5G." I will do my best not to let accidental, backhanded praise of AT&T branding slip through again. + The Mandalorian shows what Star Wars' future looks like over the next few years My hot take: The Mandalorian is good but it's not *that* good. It's just a relatively unambitious idea, executed very well. Compared to the last few overstuffed, frenetic Star Wars movies, though, it at least feels well-paced. I think that's one of the reasons it was so well-received. | 
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