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Internet-Connected 'Smart' Products for Babies Suddenly Start Charging Subscription Fees
The EFF has complained that in general "smart" products for babies "collect a ton of information about you and your baby on an ongoing basis". (For this year's "worst in privacy" product at CES they chose a $1,200 baby bassinet equipped with a camera, a microphone, and a radar sensor...) But to...
A growing number of internet-connected products have lost software support or functionality after purchase in recent years, such as Spotify's Car Thing — a $90 Bluetooth streaming device that the company announced in May it plans to discontinue — and Levi's $350 smart jacket, which let users control their phones by swiping sensors on its sleeve... Seventeen consumer protection and tech advocacy groups cited Happiest Baby and Car Thing in a letter urging the FTC to create guidelines that ensure products retain core functionality without the imposition of fees that did not exist when the items were originally bought. The Times notes that the bassinets are often resold, so the subscription fees are partly to cover the costs of supporting new owners, according to Happiest Baby's vice president for marketing and communications.
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