There are people who are okay with others intruding in their lives, and those who aren't. I am one of the latter.
People in the former group tend not to be able to see the forest for the trees, rather they are only looking at the tree in front of them, thus when people from the latter group try to explain why this particular tree is an example of the forest, and the ramifications of it, the people who only see the tree tend to accuse them of over-reaction or hyperbole. This is likely what will happen when people from the former group read what I have to say next.
I don't have a problem with the update. I do have a problem with Rogers withholding a service I pay for to force me to do the update. That makes them "Big Brother". It is not their place.
The people who only see the trees will say "Get over it, whiner, it's just a friggin update for your phone. Look, it fixes the really important 911 bug, and it gives you Sense UI, which is really really sweet. So, just do it and stop whining, trust me, you'll like it."
The people who see the forest, like me, see this; Rogers is forcing an update on to your phone that you have to take. If you don't they will withhold a service from you that you are still paying for until you do it. THIS TIME it's just Sense UI and a 911 fix... as far as we know.What about the next time? What about if Rogers and HTC cook up some other update in the future, maybe with more Rogers branding crap in it? What if they force an update that changes some functionality of the phone that you like now?
We now have a precedent. Rogers used a stick and a carrot. They said, take this update, or we will punish you until you do. By accepting that, and even thanking them for it, you are telling them that you are willing to take it.
Consider this:
1. We don't know how much testing this went through, so there may be errors and bugs we don't know about yet.
2. We don't know what else is in this update yet. There hasn't been enough time to go though it all.
Now, if they'd said we had a month to do the update, or even a week, before stopping data service, at least then there would be time to find out all the ramifications of the update. For anyone concerned about what might happen, too bad, you lose your data plan until you update.
Consider this: Fido customers are saying that after performing the update their phones are stuck on Roaming, and they don't have access to data. What other bugs will there be?
Ask yourselves this: What if your internet service provider did this? That's now a possible reality, given that Rogers is an ISP and they have already demonstrated a willingness to do this. What if your ISP wanted to install a patch or piece of software? Rogers specifically offers software to their internet customers for "protecting their PCs". What if Rogers made that mandatory, and threatened to cut off your internet access if you didn't do it?
What if Microsoft did it with Windows? What if Windows Update wasn't optional, but was mandatory and failing to update would cause Windows to stop working? Would you be mad then?
Those in the former group I described above will likely now accuse me of whining, of exaggerating, possibly even of being paranoid. Well, consider this, it has already happened. It happened this weekend when Rogers said "take this update, or we cut off your data".
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