Remember the good old days of buying a product and it was essentially yours to keep and it would just keep working until it didn’t? These days, it’s starting to feel that the things we buy aren’t really ours, and Philips’ recent announcement is certainly not doing any favors at getting rid of that sentiment.
The company has announced that starting in April 2020, they will be discontinuing support for the first-gen Hue Bridge. For those unfamiliar, the Hue Bridge is the device that links Philips Hue bulbs to the internet, which in turn would allow users to remotely control and access their connected smart bulbs.
The company has announced that not only will the device no longer be receiving further software support, but they will also be terminating its access to the company’s online services. This means that any of the online features that you relied on to control your lights will no longer be available.
After April 2020 no software updates will be made available for the Hue Bridge v1 and compatibility with our online services will be terminated at that time. The Hue Bridge v1 can still be controlled locally via the dedicated Philips Hue Bridge v1 app. >>
— Philips Hue (@tweethue) March 6, 2020
However, it should be noted that your lights will continue to function and that you can still control them locally using the dedicated app, it’s just that access to online services will be gone. That being said, the company does note that the Hue Bridge v2 has been designed to be futureproof, meaning that at least for now, this will only affect first-gen Hue Bridges.
Filed in . Read more about Connected Objects, IoT (Internet of Things) and Philips. Source: vice