"an email from Google stating that they are no longer it's going to support the Nest 1st gen and 2nd gen thermostats. While they will continue to operate locally, it appears that they will no longer work with the Nest app or Home app controls."
at least they dont seem to be planning a mass bricking.
A rule of thumb when dealing with anything Google: never become too reliant on anything made by Google. They tend to depreciate almost everything eventually.
NEST protect has been a thorn in my side. Aside from just completely eating batteries - it constantly has to reconnect.
I wish the internet of things was soo much better than it is. There was a dream once of a world that worked efficiently, and then profit models came in and destroyed it.
To each their own, but the idea of an internet connected thermostat (at great expense!) never made sense to me. A $20 Honeywell lets you program 4 regions per day (waking, day, evening, night) and will be fine almost every day of the year. Has a battery backup and never failed me.
I guess it would be cute to get some analytics dashboard, but that’s about where my interest ends.
Anything that requires a cloud account and does not offer a self hosted option, even a limited one, should be considered throw away. Would be nice if google released a self hosted server for these as a nod and thanks to the early customers.
So, this will happen to ANYTHING that requires a server that you don't control eventually, including cars, smart-anything, smarthome stuff etc. I find this quite obvious to be true, yet the market seems to ignore this, from the consumer and manufacturers side. Why is that?
Connected thermostats are great in theory! But they should not have to rely on a cloud connection. A local network with the option of internet connectivity would be awesome; but, it seems, no company is going to become uber successful if there isn't the option of forced upgrades and cloud subscriptions. Look at Ring...
The shameful part is that the only thing that even remotely (no pun intended) needs a server to even be online, is the out-of-home control, just for NAT traversal. It should be free to Google for these to have at least in-home smart functionality forever.
Well, that, and the moving target of updating an "app" every year for all the breaking changes Google and (especially) Apple do to the mobile OS. Although honestly I'd rather have a QR code that links you to a PWA hosted on the thermostat itself.
OTOH, lack of ongoing support means a greatly diminished, but not eliminated, risk that they push a firmware update in the middle of an extreme weather event, disabling your hvac and endangering the occupants lives.
Google have the gaul to "offer" their newer devices at a discount - yes I want to pay you again for something I've already paid for...trusting that you don't this again in 10 years. I have 3 of these devices.
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[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 56.8 ms ] threadat least they dont seem to be planning a mass bricking.
Some earlier discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45033555
And when it was announced in April: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43802574
I wish the internet of things was soo much better than it is. There was a dream once of a world that worked efficiently, and then profit models came in and destroyed it.
I guess it would be cute to get some analytics dashboard, but that’s about where my interest ends.
Yeah, I don't have a smart home, but all my old stuff works great and that will continue until after I have left this place.
Maybe I do have a smart home.
Lyrion Music Server (formerly Logitech Media Server) is open-source server software for Squeezebox audio players, https://lyrion.org/
Tasmota is open-source firmware for ESP8266 and ESP32-based devices, https://templates.blakadder.com/preflashed-stand.html & https://github.com/tasmota
Some IP cameras have open firmware replacements.
Some Chromebooks are supported by mainline Linux.
Well, that, and the moving target of updating an "app" every year for all the breaking changes Google and (especially) Apple do to the mobile OS. Although honestly I'd rather have a QR code that links you to a PWA hosted on the thermostat itself.
"Smart" home devices work as expected for about a year and then they fail in new and exciting ways, and then you replace them.
Fuck you Google.