[Waterluvian]

I don't think customers need to be protected from themselves. If they don't like the hardware but buy it anyways because they really like the game, that's a choice. And I feel that when we're dealing with luxury goods, we should give consumers very broad discretion to vote with their money.

[jackb4040]

"Vote with money" is such a funny talking point in this discussion. It's a metaphor for actual voting, with votes, which the people already did, for politicians who are now protecting their interests. You just don't like corporations being told what to do.

[johnnyanmac]

"Vote with your wallet" in a K shaped economy simply becomes the slogan of modern feudalism.

Funnily enough, these regulations were made by policy makers who were voted in with votes, and put such a regulation to its own vote. It's the most democratic way to approach this.

[philipallstar]

"Voting" with money is an extremely direct way of influencing something - you clearly want it or you don't want it. People definitely wanted Switches already, hence Nintendo is a going concern.

Voting for politicians (if you even bother) who might someday vote for or against something like this is a far, far weaker signal, if any at all. Politicians can easily do things that are vastly unpopular - e.g. in the UK the mass immigration that is clearly deeply unpopular but politicians refuse to change it.

[munk-a]

Rather than using the coloring of "protected from themselves" I prefer to view consumer protection boards as a collectivized bargaining unit for the consumers as a whole. Similar to unions the deals they strike won't be maximally optimal for all workers but a good consumer protection agency can balance the concerns of consumers and bargain as a single entity with the company. Otherwise the imbalance of bargaining power makes it extremely difficult for change to be enacted.

[yincrash]

As a regulatory decision, this isn't about protecting the consumer. It's about preventing an externality being handled by all of society, specifically reducing e-waste.

[enaaem]

Companies like these enjoy artificial monopolies thanks to IP laws. Why don’t we have the freedom to copy their products and make them the way we want?

[Zambyte]

This is victim blaming. The customer is not the one deciding make the batteries non-removable. This is protection from Nintendo.

[Waterluvian]

I just don't need a government to declare that I'm a victim by treating me like I'm not capable of saying, "no, the Switch 2 isn't cutting it for the pricetag. I'll skip this gen's Pokemon." This isn't bread. It's a luxury good.

[ToucanLoucan]

Yes but eliminating unnecessary e-waste is a good thing for everyone.

This isn't about the government being your nanny, it's about the government, long term, building a better more sustainable society for everyone, as it should be doing. And I don't think there's a reasonable objection to that.

[account42]

The government is the one already saying that bob can't sell me a switch 2 with whatever differences I want because that would infringe Nintendo's IP laws. Thus the government is also the correct place to fix the consequences of that.