[dspillett]

> if you sell a device with a certain functionality and you later modify that device later to remove that functionality that is called theft.

It could be argued that it is not theft by various devious uses of legalise¹.

Personally I'd go with calling it, at best, deceptive sales practices (on the assumption that they knew they'd be moving this way long before they did), or possibly outright fraud if I'm in a less generous mood.

[FYI: Bambu A1 user for nearly two years, also have a Snapmaker U1, if I buy anything else it won't be Bambu unless their attitudes change. The A1/A1mini are still two of the best budget beginner printers IMO, though some clones come close, and I do recommend them if asked but with caveats around potential lock-in later and not believing promises due to a history of changed online posts, deliberately excluded from the WayBackMachine, and what to my understanding is an AGPL breach]

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[1] “There is a way to use the feature, so it isn't an attempt to permanently deprive”, or “you agreed to the possibility of such changes in the EULA”, and so on.

[basilikum]

The fact that theft is legal does not change the fact that it is theft. Crime is legal. That should not stop us from calling it out as crime.

[brookst]

Yeah I’m so tired of rhetorical games people play. It’s a shitty business practice, it is deceptive and possibly false advertising, it may be violation of a contract and / consumer production laws, but removal of a software feature is not “theft”.

And many of these same people probably (and rightfully) laughed at music and movie people casting piracy as “theft”.

[basilikum]

When you sell something and then after the sell you take away the very thing you sold — that you no longer own — from the person who now owns it, that is called theft. You are taking something away from someone that they own. Piracy is not theft because you do not take anything away from anyone, you copy it and do not pay for it, but the original is still there. No one lost anything.

It is irrelevant whether the thing or feature you took away is implemented in hardware or software. Notably it is often hardware functionality but the thief uses software to restrict it.

You could perhaps argue that another property crime might better describe it such as criminal mischief or in some cases fraud. But in any case it is a crime against someone else's property.

[cherioo]

Does it not depend on what the feature is?

Is it theft if a company stops supporting TLS 1.0 clients that were previously supported?

What about upgrading service to only support a new form of authentication, breaking some clients?

What if the new authentication can only be done by locked down official client?

What if the company never advertised support through third party clients?

[brookst]

Wait so if a third party took away a feature you use, would that be “theft”? Like if your ISP is down when you want to watch a movie?

It’s wrong for sure, but I’m vicariously embarrassed for those who want to define everything they don’t like as “terrorism” or “theft” or whatever, strictly because it sounds so dramatic and casts the wrongdoers as not just wrong, but evil.

It’s old, it’s tired, it doesn’t convince anyone.

Simple “failure to adhere to terms of sale” is sufficient, and doesn’t have the baggage of being false.