No kidding

Older Cricuts

I'm not surprised they have obsoleted machines before, my wife has the Cricut Expression which is not compatible with Design Space, and even the software that allowed you to do some more with the machine doesn't work any more. If your curious see:  https://inspiration.cricut.com/cricut-craft-room-closing/

I would think the registration issue would be simple to deregister under the old account and register under the new one.

Shame companies what to force you to buy the latest by making the old stuff not work.

Why must our toaster be connected to the internet to make toast?

Tesla does it now,  You buy all the add on and options for your car,  supper dooper speed etc. etc.  

When you sell your car or the new owner of the used Tesla car all the options are disable for the new owner.  You need to rebuy all those apps to make the car work like it should.

Our lights are run by the internet just like the thermostat,  internet goes out...We can not turn our lights on or off.  I should not need a Smart phone with an app to run anything in the house,  it should run off the home PC or Laptop and as an added extra is can work with a cell phone etc.   

Why must our toaster be connected to the internet to make toast...?

Oh Boy...........

not much else to add.....other than I'm not sure that re-registering with a different name would help.......Cricut knows who you are, where you are and goes in and looks at all the little ones and zeros in your machine every time it is used as far as I can tell. 

 I thought I had read a while back that there was going to be a version of Design Space that could be used stand alone but that probably doesn't let you work with your own designs.

 Somebody's got to get going on a workaround or this 'ole boy's gonna have to change his way of working.

Stand Alone Version

Rick, I have heard/seen reports a while back that they were testing a beta version of a stand alone tool. Not sure where they are with that.

Now when it comes to stand alone tools, it doesn't mean it's not tied to an account. So even with a stand alone version they could force you to have an active (paid for) account, which they could paywall. Without internet access, your application would only run for X amount of days before it has to connect to "the mothership" and validate you are still allowed to use the application. I'm not saying this is the case with Cricut, but it's one of the monetization models some companies have for their software (think Autodesk with Fusion 360).

I agree with Joe that when I buy a physical product, I should have full control over it and not be nickel and dimed into paying monthly fees to unlock (basic) features or remove certain arbitrary limits. DRM on ink cartridges by HP and others, under the guise of 'that way we can ensure you have compatible ink and get the best results'... What a baloney.

Like I said in my OP: I'm glad I have a SIlhouette Cameo and their stand alone tool for which I paid a 1 time upgrade to get a few more advanced design features (layers and tracing) than the already well featured basic free version.

I do hope Cricut comes to their senses and reverts this decision, but "the problem" with the scrapbooking community I've seen is that they are pretty loyal and seemingly easy to be pushed to accept this "new way" to be "the only way".

Thank goodness for competition

You may be glad you have competition, Joe,

But I'm even more glad I still have an Xacto blade and a straightedge.  Primitive, yep, but no licensing fees or mothership for that!

Blair

Knife & Straight Edge

I'd like to see you do this with your knife and straight edge, jump to five minute mark.

https://trainmasters.tv/programs/cricut-product-review

Prior History

I don’t remember the details, but Cricut did something like this a few years ago with a prior version of their machines. All their users rebelled and they came out with these new machines that allowed you to do your own designs. Sounds like they are back to their old tricks.

I have had several versions of software that I used for years and years, then they switched to a yearly subscription model. I am not willing to play along and stopped using their software in favour of others that I can buy once and use. I don’t mind paying for the occasional upgrade, but most of the time I have no use for the new “features” of the upgrade. Thanks for the open source software movement, I would rather support them than continuously pay for the same thing over and over again.

Joe, this control issue...........

........is everywhere, unfortunately. Take Windows 10 for example. I have a decoder program that needs a particular Silab driver to operate properly. Windows 10 will not install it as it is “unsigned”, whatever that is!  There are supposed “work arounds” but unfortunately they don’t work. I called a computer expert friend to see if he could help me and he told me he has a perfectly good printer that will not work with Windows 10 as it has decided it was “ end of life” for the printer!  Luckily we both have older laptops with windows 7 installed and can use them. This is progress????

Peter

Latest update

Here's the latest on the Cricut situation, courtesy of Ars Technica (https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/03/cricut-retroactively-adds-subscription-fee-to-millions-of-devices/):

"Update, 5:24 pm EDT: After several days of public blowback, Cricut CEO Ashish Arora announced the company was walking back the retroactive need for existing customers to start subscribing to the platform.

"We will continue to allow an unlimited number of personal image and pattern uploads for members with a Cricut account registered and activated with a cutting machine before December 31, 2021," Arora wrote in  an open letter to consumers. "If a machine is resold or transferred to a new user, the new user must set up their own Cricut account."

Looks like you have until the end of the year if you really want to stay in the Cricut infrastructure. I know that I've been looking more at the Silhouette Cameo and the Brother Scan N Cut.

This kind of thing is popping up in the automotive and heavy machinery fields too. John Deere is taking heat because of their requirement to have a factory authorized PIN key to do any repairs on their newer equipment (including basic oil changes, if I recall correctly), and there's been a flurry of "right to repair" lawsuits against several of the auto manufacturers over rumors that they're trying the same kind of thing. Unbridled corporate avarice...

Mike in CO

Well

I was considering buying a Cricut, but I'm pretty cool on the idea now, even though I will have until the end of the year to avoid the monthly fee... at least until they decide to do it again.  I'll be looking more at the competition now.  There is little I hate more than paying a subscription to use something I already bought.

It's the price of rapid technological progress

Ever the optimist, I think we're lucky to live in such a period in human history where technology is evolving rapidly, redoubling every few years it feels like.  The downside is obsolescence happens during our lifetimes, even several times on the same products.  Imagine life a few centuries ago, the tools simply didn't change, for your entire lifetime.  So when I hear folks complain their printer doesn't work with the latest Windows, it's kinda "meh" to me.  It's the price of getting to use the latest tech when you bought it.  

The reason a printer stops being supported is usually this:  with each iteration of the OS, Microsoft is working to improve its security and add new features.  The printer manufacturer writes a driver for the latest OS with the understanding from MS that it will be compatible for one or two OS releases.  After that, it is up to the printer manufacturer to rewrite their driver to work with the latest OS.  That is the agreement.  Your friend's printer company made their money maybe 5, 10 years ago?  There's no business case for that company to invest in developing new drivers for product that doesn't make them money in this quarter.  So it doesn't happen.  I saw this all the time when I was on the driver kit team in Windows.  It is true for all peripheral accessories.  Bigger companies can absorb this legacy support, but even they end-of-life products with regularity .  Hope that helps explain the situation, I know it probably doesn't make you feel any better, what that you're experiencing it now.    My advice is to replace it and move on.

The Cricut biz-model seems greedy to me, but I thought the same about other services and have been surprised to see they live on (like subscription ink programs! no thanks).  So enough people are ok with it I guess.  Conversely, John Deere lost their case to monopolize repairs on their tractors, the right to repair movement is gaining ground.  Lots of churn in society around digital ownership assumptions.

Best, Richard

No it is corporations

No it is corporations realizeing they are better off to rent you something then to sell you it, this gives them a constant revenue stream.  Buy basically making you buy the item forever vs once

-Doug M

Photoshop,  I used to use

Photoshop,  I used to use Photoshop.  Purchased a copy years ago and my upgrade path was when I purchased a new PC etc.  I might use it a few times a month over the lifetime of the computer.

Now that Photoshop is a pay for a month etc. it is not worth it to pay for something every month.  Not worth it,  

Pay the up front cost to install photoshop on a PC that last 6 to 8 years is money well spent paying every month over 6 to 8 years is just getting mugged at the subway station.  $1680 over the life of that computer for one software program with those monthly fees,   Now if every program did that, now one could afford to own or use a computer.

What next are we going back to the days when Online access was charged by the minute like in CompuServe and AOL days?

With software programs...

...i can see a reasonable reason for companies like MS and Adobe to go to the Subscription method of their software.  It will cut down on piracy as if the software requires to verify it's valid every month, then it can't be pirated.  When it comes to hardware though, that's ridiculous.  


Ken L. 

Everybody Else vs Silhouette

AFAIK Silhouette is the only one that does not require you to use the cloud.  Anyone who is looking to get one of these die cut machines should consider that.  That was my research over the last two years.  May finally get one with this govmnt check