Been off the HP bandwagon for a while. My wife mistakenly bought one of their printers and it just stopped working one day until we paid for a monthly subscription. I had to recycle it. Nobody wanted to buy something that required a subscription for ink.
<i>HP CEO: "Our long-term objective is to make printing a subscription."</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39119807">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39119807</a> - Jan 2024 (93 comments)<p><i>HP's CEO spells it out: You're a 'bad investment' if you don't buy HP supplies</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39087776">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39087776</a> - Jan 2024 (62 comments)<p><i>HP's CEO spells it out: You're a 'bad investment' if you don't buy HP supplies</i> - <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39060793">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39060793</a> - Jan 2024 (157 comments)
basically, all they need is that slew of upper rich people captured willing to have their lives automated.<p>Printers and Big pharma have realized it's actually a benefit to have a giant wealth gap, because they can continue hiking prices till they maximize the consumers vs cost. As the base amount of O&M doesnt really need to scale once it's in motion.