End of Software Support - Clarifications

Lame CEO apology with no real action, "we apologize that we did not clearly communicate that the shakedown to buy new products will be death by loss of features vs. instantaneous bricking of your multi-thousand dollar investment". Once enough features are lost I will replace my amps and connects with the much less expensive Amazon equivalent. Will need to come up with something to replace my play 5s but maybe will use the line-in (unless you disable that and render them completely useless). Calculating the the cost of replacing everything I have every 5 years or so and can't justify how expensive your stuff is if it has a relatively short shelf life.

No trust, no brand, no business. Good luck.

trust, no brand, no business.

you have lost a loyal fan forever.  shame on your greed!  the rest is all non sense

Sonos new slogan

Welcome to the new Sonos

THE DISPOSABLE SPEAKER COMPANY 

Your updated clarification, clarifies nothing. Telling people they need to quarantine legacy and new equipment into two separate networks breaks the reason people bought a single whole house system. You claim the old products won’t be able to support new updates and play music from newer components, then sell a bridge that enables them to communicate to each other. Your existing software already enables music from one speaker to be sent to another, you only need one modern unit to get the signal.

You claiming new devices won’t be able to talk to old devices makes no sense, your software already does this...

As has been said by many others, I see nothing new in the open letter from the CEO. 

We are working on a way to split your system so that modern products work together and get the latest features, while legacy products work together and remain in their current state.

The most amazing thing about this to me is that they are still “working on a way” to achieve what still appears to be an unacceptable outcome to most of the commentators in this community. How can you announce such a bad outcome without knowing how you will achieve it? What was the alternative, simply telling us that we are out of luck? 

The fact remains that the message remains that legacy components will not coexist with modern components unless what you mean by coexist is that they can exist on the same wifi network (i.e. the same way they coexist with my wireless printer). The picture that your message has left me with is that you are working to update the app so that you it can flip from one Sonos network to another without changing wifi networks.

If this is what you are working on, please direct your attentions to actually addressing the issues being raised in these forums and not on creating an environment that doesn’t allow us to continue using our systems as we do today. As a single, unified multi-room audio system. 

As I have stated before, I don’t care about having voice assistants in my music speakers. I have stand alone devices that do this specifically because I always understood that this would limit the usable lifespan of the integrated device. For this same reason I never bought a TV based on the apps that come bundled with it. I know that those will become obsolete before the screen and I there purchase relatively inexpensive android boxes that can be easily swapped out at low cost (FireTV 4K stick = $25USD on black Friday). Even the Nvidia Shield costs only $200USD. Given that I only need one per TV this is something I can replace every 4 or 5 years. If you want to be in the disposable electronics market then you need to price yourself accordingly. We believed that Sonos was in the audio market, a market that can fetch a higher price because people buy equipment that will last. 

Suffice to say that I feel duped, I believed I was dealing with an audio company only to find out that Sonos has apparently become no better than a maker of smart TVs that decides to not provide any HDMI inputs. I wouldn’t buy that TV because I know that they won’t be able to maintain the services that I want on an ongoing basis and unless this issue is resolved I won’t be buying any more Sonos because apparently neither will you.

just don’t hit the “Please update” button every time you log into the system...because if you ever do by accident...blam!

You say you have a lot of great new products and features in the pipeline yet you do not mention any of them.

You expect us to upgrade to the latest products which still do not support ALAC or FLAC and in my case (Play 5, connect and amp) which do NOT support Alexa or Google.

How do we know whether these new products are Play 5 or newer which DO support these features? Then we have just wasted many thousands on what would then be OLD products.

If these NEW products support those features and are a replacement for these so called legacy products, will there be a discount to then upgrade?

Perfect statement...If I want to interact with Alexa I’ll just talk to my toaster or desk lamp I don’t need another gadget in the house eavesdropping on my conversations.  Did  anybody really say, dam I wish I could talk to Alexa through my speakers?

I’m blown away that sonos would do this. They need to realize that this is the beginning of the end, and not for just their products but their business.  Current customers, whether or not a ‘legacy product’ owner, can see the writing on the wall…...they know their own clock is ticking.  Unhappy customers advise potential customers.  I was brought into the fold buy a satisfied customer and now I have 16 of their speakers and amps in my own home.  Do you think I’m going to advise a sonos purchase to the people I talk to?

Dead. In. The. Water.

One email, one dead brand.

Despite adoring your product and spending pretty much 18 hours a day listening to them in multiple locations, you’ll never get another cent from me, nor from 10,000 others.