Buy an ecotank printer, they’re more expensive initially but that’s because they actually make you pay for the printer
Ecotank’s use liquid ink that you fill in tanks instead of cartridges
There’s no way they can check the ink on ecotank printers
Foss printer when?
Unironically, this is why RMS was radicalized.
RMS: gestures at GCC and the whole GNU/Linux ecosystem Look man, all I wanted to do was to print this letter to my ma…
Closest I’ve seen was rooting a printer via a security exploit
i came across this explanation of it, haven’t verified it directly but he seems to make good content:
https://youtube.com/shorts/ZX8OaZZDlM8
he says theres identification each time you print using the yellow ink, and basically is a counterfeit currency countermeasure
id kill to have a foss print setup though
It’s a feature that can be turned on the confidential documents but I don’t think it’s actually on by default.
You can check for it anyway, just print a document then attempt to scan it, if it’s got the track marks it will refuse to scan because one of the things the track marks do is block scanning, although you can still take a photo of it because the camera probably won’t be able to see the track marks so it’s not 100% secure. In fact it’s largely considered an obsolete security method these days, along with pink flimsies.
good to know, thanks!
I know about the yellow dot thingy. Literally metadata on paper for no reason imo. I highly doubt a person could make a realistic fake through the use of a conventional printer.
In the UK, we don’t even have paper money anymore, it’s plastic… Maybe it’s more of a USA skill issue, too?
In the UK, we don’t even have paper money anymore, it’s plastic… Maybe it’s more of a USA skill issue, too?
US “paper” money has been made of cotton-linen blend cloth for over 100 years.
I really hope Brother is telling the truth!
Same. My printer works fine, and I recently replaced my toner (went genuine because I found a decent deal), so I probably won’t need another anytime soon.
That said, I will no longer be recommending them until this is cleared up. I won’t be recommending against them though, because I don’t know of a better company, but I’ll just recommend people go to their local library or print shop or something and not deal with having a printer at home.
I got a 4 acre lot on Mars that I’m selling for cheap. You seem like a gulli…great fellow. $10k. Its pretty cheap right now because people don’t known the real estate trend yet. I’m taking amazon cards.
But this is a weird thing to lie about — the only reason to implement toner DRM is to get people to buy your cartridges. But if your public statement is, “it’s ok to buy off brand cartridges,” then…well… that’s kinda weird.
Not saying you’re wrong, and they could be trying to have their cake and eat it too (court the anti-DRM crowd but also scare people into sticking with their toner). I’m just saying your snarky/sarcastic response seems unwarranted here.
Its definitely HP’s way to go.
It looks like to me as some redditor got bad quality third party ink and blamed it on firmware. Some karma whores picked it up, as dogging on printer companies is sure way to gain some free updoots.
And now Louis Rossmann picked it up and the lie spread further.
We live in a post-truth society.
We seriously need a FOSS+FOSH printer
I have even thought of some names:
- Gutenberg
- Aldus
- Manutius
It’s really surprising this doesn’t already exist. It’s such a hated piece of tech, I would have thought someome would have thought they could do better! I don’t know enough to do it myself but I’d sure as hell support a project to do it!
In my experience, people who are aware of open source and the like are also people who only print something when they absolutely HAVE to.
It will cost too much because they can’t get back R&D money back via sales of proprietary ink and spare parts, plus competitors will immediately take advantage of your improvements
Like a prusa (open source 3d printer) costs like 3 bambulab (walled garden closed source 3d printer that uses a fork of prusa slicer)
It’s not, though. Printers are actually fairly expensive to manufacture, and they’re sold heavily subsidized by the companies in order to sell you a decade of printer cartridges where you make up for that loss. It was the first tech subscription model.
If someone made and sold a shitty inkjet printer at cost, the last time I saw something written up on this years ago, it was several times more than the current cost of printers. And consumers are stupid, so they will go for the immediate cheap thing and get locked in to buying proprietary cartridges rather than invest in saving money long term.
What we need is a Graphine OS for existing printers. A repo of firmware updates that anyone can install to jailbreak a handfull of widely sold printers to allow printing every drop of ink, and DIY refills. Let’s be real, we’re not a huge part of their market, so IMO the gains are to exist like wolves preying on the occasional sheep, rather than be wolves that try to evolve thumbs and force everyone to learn how to cook and go shopping in order to eat.
They deny it was the firmware update. But not that something else has happened
I’ve had issues with colour but not B&W
So… when there is some controversy over an article in Lemmy it gets the strike though? How did this evolve?
You can edit the title, so if you want to strike through it, go ahead.
If you read the article:
We are aware of the recent false claims suggesting that a Brother firmware update may have restricted the use of third-party ink cartridges. Please be assured that Brother firmware updates do not block the use of third-party ink in our machines.
So there’s no reason to leave an inflammatory and likely wrong title unchanged or otherwise without notation. The title is completely readable. I’m all for wrong information being flagged, and a strikethrough is a fine method of doing so.
Totally agree. Just the first time I have seen the notation.
We don’t know if it’s wrong though, we just have a statement from the company claiming it is. Now it’s on the community to prove it.
It’s potentially wrong. I guess we’ll see in the coming weeks as people try to prove it one way or another.
That said, the allegation that old firmware isn’t accessible is easy to verify and very troubling for Brother if true (what are they hiding?).
There is no official report of Brother doing what it’s accused of. Only a couple people having issues with a few cartridges, no analysis of whether the flaw was in the third party cartridge or an actual firmware issue, but we should get out the pitchforks and torches and leave a completely unproven statement up? I completely disagree. There’s too much BS passed off as objective truth as it is.
One or two reports could be chalked up to noise. Rossmann provided much more than that. I’m not saying he’s right, I’m just saying there’s sufficient evidence that I’m not just going to accept “nope, we don’t do that.”
We certainly need more evidence, and hopefully Rossmann’s video reaches enough people to get it, one way or another. He has demonstrated admitting when he is wrong, and he has also demonstrated doing the research.
I doubt this is the last we hear about this, and I sincerely hope Brother is redeemed.
I am in no way suggesting we shouldn’t be wary and not investigate. Crappy 3rd party engineering could be an issue. Placing a declarative title with no qualification as truth (because nobody reads the article) despite the quote from the corporation itself denying it in the article shouldn’t be done. Like I said, too much of that happening these days.
Crappy 3rd party engineering could be an issue.
Sure. However, I’ve seen allegations that swapping chips worked for one person and failed for another. That needs to be investigated.
too much of that happening these days
Agreed. Only claim what you have the receipts for. Clickbait blows.
Yes…the engineering could have been in the chip.
The rest, we’re on the same page.
I see editability as generally an improvement, especially since the older versions are still visible with a couple of clicks. Reddit titles are not editable. Tweets used to be uneditable; toots are.
The original rationale for not having editing, at least on Reddit and Twitter, was concerns that someone could get a viral post, and then edit it to spam.
That’s not an impossible thing with Lemmy, though we’re not big enough for it to be worth spamming to, for the most part.
Oh FFS. Not Brother as well. I used to recommend them to everyone. Who is left with unshittified printers?
Epson inkjets with refillable tanks probably.
Depending on the frequency of your printing, they can suck as well. Chronically clogged nozzles are maddening.
You can run a power clean cycle which should help, then just replace the foam pads they saturate with ink for the cleaning
They’re not perfect but they’re still the most consumer friendly option on the market at this point
After talking to support 15 times, they never suggested replacing anything, and power clean wasn’t enough. I’ve long since destroyed the thing out of malignant rage and turned to libraries and copy shops, but it’s good to know that there might have been a solution.
I’m curious how this will go down in Australia. Seems like a pretty solid slam dunk refund, oh the product doesn’t work as advertised anymore?
Cool, I’ve had this for 5 years and now I’d also like a full refund under Australian Consumer Law.
Motherfuckers.
(I don’t actually own a printer)
I imagine they have some stupid note or sticker somewhere saying “to avoid damaging your printer only use genuine Brother replacement cartridges”.
Then all they have to say is “we patched a bug where unverified 3rd party ink cartriges could erroneously be used and cause malfunction or damage to the product.”I found this help article where they say “Although not all non-genuine supplies may cause quality issues”.
They said they recommend using theirs, but up until this they didn’t say you couldn’t.
Plus, it’s been universally understood that you have been able to use third-party cartridges. I really think if you’re persistent enough, you’d get a refund in Australia. Because else (in Victoria at least) you could take them to VCAT for like $70, which will cost them wayyy more in lawyer expenses than the price of a refund.
This is not legal advice, but I reckon a refund under Australian Consumer Law is extremely doable if they go down this path (for existing printers).
Yeah interesting find, and i agree plus you can always sic the ACCC onto them if they start being painful
As much as I love the brand, this was just obviously going to happen. It always happens, it’s the eventual outcome. All that is needed is one middle manager wanting to get an extra bones to come up with some short sighted idea that will make a little extra money in the short run and possibly bankrupt the company in the long term.
See Boeing, see Intel, see…
The only way to not have this happen is to get open source hardware. The open source eco system is amazing already but we need more focus on that, hardware. CPU’s, Computers, printers, phones, everything
What’s worse is remaining “ethical” in the world of business they exist in is a flat out detractor. A financial hindrance of the utmost.
In case anyone was thinking this applies only to inkjet printers: no, it ONLY seems to apply to laser printers – the thing that Brother used to be known for. Where the article says “ink”, they mean “toner”. There is no ink in a laser printer.
Could this be anything related to government printer tracking requirements?
I believe that only applies to ink jet. You can hardly make secret dots in B&W.
You were the chosen one! 😭
Anyone have recommendations on thermal printers?
Why thermal? Seems odd, but alright.
I recommend laser for just about everyone.
Don’t print much? Get a laser. Otherwise your ink will dry out and you’ll have to get new ink every time you want to print.
Print a lot? Laser. Super reliable, can do tens of thousands of sheets before there’s a problem, maybe more.
In fact, the only time I’d recommend an ink printer is for color accurate work like photo printing, and if you’re not using photo paper for it, then there’s not really much of a point, is there?
I used to think bubble jet/ink jet was the shit, then I started working in IT professionally and discovered the truth.
Just buy a laser printer folks. Don’t bother with all the rest of this shit. If you want/need inkjet, then you already know you need it and why. If you’re not sure, get a laser. You’ll pay wayyyyyy less on materials to keep it running
Don’t print much? Get a laser. Otherwise your ink will dry out and you’ll have to get new ink every time you want to print.
I’ve literally never had this happen and I print so infrequently that if I have to buy a new cartridge, I’ll just… not print at home anymore. Is it really that common?
I’m not going to recommend inkjets to anyone though. My recommendation anno 2025 is don’t buy a printer if you can get by without one.
Quick story, I bought a bubble jet printer for college in the mid 2000s, with all the fixings.
I set it up and got it working and promptly never used it. Almost all of my courses allowed either digital submissions or provided the printouts you actually needed, like course work that you would fill out. So I basically wasted my money, especially considering I could always use the large format printers at the school for like 5 cents per page.
Anyways. I did a few test prints and everything was fine and I got to work in college. Almost every time I needed the printer in order to actually print something, I more or less had to go and buy new ink. At first I was like “I guess I printed more than I thought?” But it kept happening. I would print maybe twice a year. Eventually I stopped using it as a printer (it was a multifunction, so I kept it as a scanner), and just used the printers at school. It was cheaper, considering the fact that printer ink is worth more by volume than basically any other substance; and while I was only buying a small amount, maybe $20 or so (adjusted for inflation, this is probably like $50 today) each time, it was a lot for a broke college student.
After college, I picked up a random laser printer, the printer cost more up front (I got another multifunction, but this time with a network port because I’m a nerd). I basically never bought any toner for it, given how little I had to print year over year, and it always was ready to go. I had it for years until a new windows version (maybe the OG Windows 10? Maybe Windows 8/8.1) made the drivers stop working and the manufacturer wouldn’t make drivers for that model that worked with the new requirements from Windows… I did a little print server for a bit to give it some more longevity, but ultimately it had to go to the IT storage in the sky.
Oh my 10+ year old printer is still on its original set of cartridges, or maybe they’ve had at most one replacement set.
The previous one, which also lasted several years but had to be replaced because there were no Windows 7 drivers. That had I believe one set of replacement cartridges over like 6 or 7 years.
I have no idea what the hell is going on, it’s like I’ve been blessed with top 0.0001% printer luck as a stat. But like I said, I don’t intend to tempt faith and try again if this one needs new cartridges or it stops working altogether. If in a few years we discover that in this (or worse, next) decade kids STILL need to print a bunch of bullshit for school instead of emailing or submitting things via like moodle or something, it’ll probably be a laser and probably Brother, as it seems this article was a bit hasty and apparently they’re sitll good?
I know a lot of people who use and like brother printers. Years ago the go to was HP, then it was Xerox for a while when they had decent small format printers, but they seem to have gone back to their roots of large multi function printers for the most part and priced themselves out of most markets. They’re still good, but you pay for the name.
Toshiba’s printing division was absorbed by Xerox, no help there. Dell… Has printers? I guess?
Brother is kind of the stand out. Everything else you can buy as a consumer is either HP, which went completely nuts on the whole “genuine” printer ink/toner, which is why a lot of people ran away screaming. The quality of the printers declined as they tried to force people into, what is basically printer ink as a service. Stupid.
But yeah. Bother is a decent mix of functional, affordable, and being low on the bullshit of using a printer. … That is, as long as the article isn’t a sign of things to come…
I’m hoping that by the time I need a replacement for what I have right now, there will be something open source… Cries for an open alternative to the current printer market have been ongoing pretty much anytime printers are mentioned. I expect someone is, or will be developing something to the effect of an open source hardware printer.
Yeah the printer I have back home is an older HP, just old enough that they don’t sell you an ink subscription yet, but new enough to have drivers for newer Windows versions. Of course, I’ve even got my mom away from Windows, so it no longer matters, but 10-15 years ago when we bought the thing, it was a bit more important, as I wasn’t using Linux full time yet and my mom was using Windows still too. Now she’s using my old thicc Macbook Pro till I either get her something with Linux on it, or a used M1 Air.
It’s like every company that wasn’t complete shit just suddenly decided to…go to complete shit.
I suggest whoever has old firmware files to upload them to the Internet Archive (if they allow those).
