[HN Gopher] Meta is shutting down its Portal smart display business
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Meta is shutting down its Portal smart display business
Author : mfiguiere
Score : 19 points
Date : 2022-11-11 20:51 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.reuters.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.reuters.com)
| minimaxir wrote:
| It's interesting that Portal never benefited from the COVID work-
| from-home boom, as it was excellently positioned for that.
| bsimpson wrote:
| People who had them loved them, but I think FB's reputation
| cost them here. Nobody wants the internet's least scrupulous
| site running a camera inside their homes.
| joezydeco wrote:
| They've been on 70% markdown at my local Target for about a month
| now. They knew.
|
| It looks like a pretty decent piece of hardware for that price,
| but apparently they're locked down very well. Would be nice if
| Meta/FB gave away the keys.
| Crosseye_Jack wrote:
| Retailers are often the first to know, happens when game
| consoles are going EOL. Manufacturer will issue a "last call"
| to order any stock. But Target may not have been told that the
| whole smart display side of the business was going away as it
| could have been hints at a product refresh instead.
|
| But retailers are not idiots, they would have looked at the
| numbers they were selling and would have put 2 and 2 together.
| joezydeco wrote:
| I'm sure Target called up Meta this summer and asked if they
| were going to lease the shelf space in the fall and Meta said
| nah.
| Crosseye_Jack wrote:
| But its not just Target that are offering the discount,
| Amazon and the UK retailers have been offering the discount
| too (Was half tempted to pick one or two up just for parts,
| Been looking for a decent touch screen I can put near the
| front door to turn into a Home Assistant control panel,
| prob would have to design a new PCB for it as its pretty
| locked down, but you know a decent LCD panel with touch for
| PS40 is rather tempting, but I got to complete atleast one
| of my ongoing projects before I pick up any more).
|
| I guess it would depend on how much Meta valued controlling
| the information about it. They could have saved cash and
| told everyone they were giving up the shelf space and risk
| it getting leaked or eat the cost of the discounted units
| and any penalties for late notice to retailers and pull the
| trigger on the news on their terms.
| rcarr wrote:
| I bought one of these for my grandmother who was going into a
| care home. Unfortunately I ended up sending it back as I wasn't
| aware of how far she had declined; she wouldn't have been capable
| of learning how to use it even with voice control. I played
| around with it and it would have been great for any elderly
| relatives who weren't that far gone, had no interest in
| technology but wanted to video message people. For everyone else,
| they were probably better off buying a cheap second hand iPad for
| the same price and getting the extra functionality.
| veqq wrote:
| Are these $50 tablets which only let you video call or use Alexa?
| What reason did they have to dump hardware at these prices?
| germandiago wrote:
| So may good news coming from Meta lately.
| bryan_w wrote:
| I hope they unlock the bootloader. The portal+ was quite a little
| machine
| warning26 wrote:
| It should be required by law to unlock the bootloader of any
| device once discontinued, IMO.
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